Nikon's $599 Coolpix P900, announced back in March, is perhaps the king of the superzoom crop. The focal length of its lens spans the range from 4.3mm to 357mm. In full-frame 35mm angle-of-view equivalent, that's a reasonably wide 24mm at one end and a monstrous 2000mm at the long end. That's a big zoom. A really big zoom.

Given a suitable vantage point—such as 1 World Trade Center, Condé Nast's new home—we can watch what people are up to from miles away. And take video of them.

Of course, a zoom like this does have some trade-offs. While the P900 does have image stabilization, there's only so much it can do. At the full extent of the zoom, using the camera hand-held is tricky; even tiny movements can cause a lot of blur, and you'll need a very fast shutter speed to get respectable pictures.

For a point-and-shoot, the Coolpix P900 is also pretty big, about the size and weight of a medium SLR, and that lens sticks out a long way at the long end of its zoom range.

Of course, this is all relative. In the 35mm SLR world, the Canon EF 1200mm f/5.6L USM is in some ways the benchmark. Sold for about $90,000 new (and now selling for $180,000 or more second hand) it weighs 36 pounds (compared to the Coolpix's 2lbs) and is 33 inches long. The Nikon may give up some picture quality, but it certainly makes up for it in versatility, portability, and price.

Listing image by Nikon