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The Nikon 1 J1 is usually a stylish compact system camera using a 10-megapixel “CX” format sensor along with the all-new Nikon 1 lens mount. Boasting continuous shooting speeds as much as 60 fps at full resolution, Full HD video capture, an ultra-fast hybrid auto-focus system, Smart Photo Selector plus a unique Motion Snapshot Mode, the portable Nikon J1 also offers more conventional shooting modes like Programmed Auto, Aperture and Shutter Priority, in addition to Metered Manual. Also fully briefed is often a built-in pop-up flash with a guide number of 5, a 3 inch rear display along with an electronic shutter. Charging $649.95 / 549.99 which has a 10-30mm standard zoom lens, $699.95 / 599.99 which has a 10mm pancake lens, or $799.95 / 699.99 within a double-lens kit with all the 10-30mm and 30-110mm zoom lenses, the Nikon 1 J1 is scheduled to be on sale later this month.

The Nikon 1 J1 is mainly created from aluminium with magnesium alloy reinforced parts and is therefore heavier than what you know already dependant on its size alone, weighing 234g for your body only. Additionally, it feels higher quality compared to the official product shots maybe have you believe. Having an essentially grip-less design, the Nikon J1 is extremely much a two-handed affair that needs that you contain the camera’s weight inside left hand, clutching the lens, and use your right hand for balance and operating the controls. This is certainly a very important thing since it pushes you to take note of holding your camera properly, which in turn goes quite a distance towards avoiding shake-induced blur as part of your photos.

The camera’s clean, minimalist front plate is covered with the all-new Nikon 1 lens mount. Rather then like a scaled-down version in the ancient F mount, it’s actually a new design that delivers 100% electronic communication relating to the attached lens plus the camera body, courtesy of several contacts. Exactly like around the manufacturer’s F-mount SLR cameras, there is a white dot for convenient lens alignment, though it has moved on the 2 o’clock position (when viewed front on) up from the mount. The lenses themselves have a short silver ridge around the lens barrel, which should be in alignment with said dot to ensure you to definitely be capable of attach the lens for the camera. Of course this may need a little bit of becoming accustomed to, it actually makes changing lenses quicker and simpler.

With no lens attached, you can view the sensor sitting directly behind the plane with the bayonet mount. Such as mount itself, the sensor is new. Measuring 13.2×8.8mm this “CX” format imaging chip has double the area of the most popular imagers utilised in compact and bridge cameras much like the Fujifilm X10 and S100FS, only most the region of your standard Four Thirds sensor. In linear terms, a Four Thirds chip includes a 1.36x longer diagonal compared to Nikon CX imager. Provided that Four Thirds carries a 2x focal length multiplier, the CX “crop factor” computes to about 2.72, meaning that a 10mm lens has approximately a similar angle of view to be a 27.2mm lens on an FX or 35mm film camera. The Nikon 1 Nikkor 10-30mm standard zoom is thus the same as a 27.2-81.6mm (or, practically speaking, 28-80mm) FX lens in terms of its angle-of-view range.

The remainder of the Nikon J1’s faceplate is virtually empty, featuring merely the lens release, a receiver with the optional ML-L3 infrared remote control, two narrow slits to the microphone spare on both with the lens, plus an AF assist/self-timer lamp. There’s no grip by any means about the front of the Nikon 1 J1.

The two main strategies to powering around the Nikon 1 J1. You may either use the on/off button sitting near the shutter release or, in case you have a collapsible-barrel contact attached, you can easily press the unlocking button on the lens barrel and turn the zoom ring to unlock the lens, an act which causes the camera to exchange on automatically. It becomes an ingenious solution since you need to unlock the lens for shooting anyway. Start-up takes just over a 2nd - not even attempt to write home about but nonetheless decent and entirely adequate.

You are able to frame your shots utilizing the rear screen - there is absolutely no electronic viewfinder as within the V1 model, a vital distinction between the 2. The LCD screen is often a three-inch, 460,000-dot display that features wide viewing angles, great definition and accurate colours but only so-so visibility in strong daylight. We missed the EVF when using the J1 alongside the V1, in a choice of bright sunlit conditions or while using the 30-110mm telezoom lens as holding the digital camera nearly eye-level helped to stabilise the lens and get away from trembling camera.

The control layout is reasonably peculiar. The Nikon 1 J1 includes a small, rear-mounted mode dial that lacks the majority of the shooting modes which are usually available on similar dials - that include P, A, S and M - though it has enough room to accommodate them. These modes can be found within the J1 but you should dive in to the rather long-winded and not entirely logical menu to locate them. The J1’s mode dial merely has four settings, Photo, Video, Motion Snapshot and Smart Photo Selector. The four-way controller even offers four functions mapped onto its Up, Right, Down and Left buttons; including AE/AF-Lock, exposure compensation, flash mode and self-timer, respectively. Even if this isn’t a bad selection of functions, the reality that there’s no ISO button will doubtlessly create a large amount of photographers thinking about getting the Nikon J1 to get unhappy.

We have a button around the rear labelled “F” but alas, this isn’t a programmable function button. In Photo mode, it enables you to quickly select from the continuous shooting modes, during Video mode it enables you to toggle between regular and slow-motion recording. There’s 2 more significant controls within the back of the camera, together with a scroll wheel round the four-way pad and a rocker switch marked having a loupe icon. The scroll wheel is utilized setting the shutter speed in Manual and Shutter Priority modes (once you have found them in the menu, that’s), whilst the rocker switch controls the aperture. Precisely why it’s got a loupe icon close to it truly is until this control can be used to zoom in upon an image to test for critical focus in Playback mode. As a final point, you’ll find four small buttons across the navigation pad, flush resistant to the rear panel of the camera, including Display Mode, Playback, Menu and Delete.

So what are the ones shooting modes around the mode dial information about? The Photo or Still Image mode, marked with a green camera icon, is the place you should be quite often. Using the mode dial set to this position, it is possible to pick your required exposure mode on the menu. The Nikon J1’s Scene Auto Selector is a great auto mode in which the camera analyses the scene before its lens and picks exactly what it thinks is the right mode for that exact scene. Also you can choose one of the conventional PASM modes, which present you with full menu access and the ability to manually set the aperture, shutter speed, or both (Program AE Shift can be found in P mode). ISO and white balance may also be manually selected, only on the menu, as stated previously.

Needless to say there’s AWB and auto ISO at the same time, with the latter to arrive three flavours (Auto 100-400, 100-800 or 100-3200) allowing you to specify how high you wish your camera to go once the light gets low. You can even pick from three AF Area modes, including Auto Area, in which the camera takes power over what it really focusses on (this is simply not a fantastic mode to get since your default since the camera obviously can’t read your head and might consentrate on another thing than your actual subject); Single Point, where you can decide one among 135 AF points beginning with hitting OK then moving the active AF point round the frame while using the four-way pad; and Subject Tracking, the place you pick your subject, press OK and enable the camera in order to that subject mainly because it moves around, providing it won’t leave the frame naturally.

The Nikon 1 J1 has a intriguing hybrid auto-focus system that combines contrast- and phase-difference detection in a similar way as the Fujifilm F300EXR did. This will give the Nikon 1 J1 to focus extremely quickly in good light, even on the moving subject. The organization claims the Nikon 1 system cameras would be the fastest-focusing machines on the planet, this also matches our experience - given that there’s enough light. When light levels drop, the camera switches to contrast-detect AF which, though faster than you are on most cameras, isn’t nearly you’d like additional method. It really is the camera that decides which AF strategy to use - an individual doesn’t have any impact on this.

Usually, the J1 will most likely only use contrast detection when light levels are low. In good light, we had arrived capable of taking sharp photos of fast-moving subjects. The Nikon J1 certainly does not disappoint here. Manual focusing can also be possible, although the Nikon 1 lenses do not possess focus rings. If you want to focus manually, you first ought to hit the AF button, choose MF, press OK and then use the scroll wheel to regulate focus. To assist you using this type of, the Nikon J1 magnifies the central section of the image and displays a rudimentary focus scale along the right side of the frame - but those are the only focusing aids you get. There’s no peaking function available as on some rival models.

The J1 comes with an electronic shutter (the V1 also has an analog shutter). It is absolutely silent (the main objective confirmation beep might be disabled from your menu) and allows the utilization of shutter speeds you’d like 1/16,000th of a second and, while using Electronic Hi setting selected, enables you to shoot full-resolution stills at 60 fps. Note however that while it is a major achievement, it’s on a a buffer that could only hold 12 raw files. Additionally, the utilization of this mode precludes AF tracking - you have to lower the frame rate to 10fps if you would like that -, as well as the viewfinder goes blank while the pictures will be taken. About the only application we could think about where shooting full-resolution stills at 60fps could really come in useful is AE bracketing for HDR imaging. Only at that rate, several 5 bracketed shots may very well be taken in a lot less than 0.1 second, rendering small movements that may otherwise pose alignment problems - like leaves being blown within the wind - a non-issue. Alas, the Nikon J1 does not offer a real feature - in truth no offer autoexposure bracketing by any means.

Getting to it mode, the Nikon 1 J1 has some pleasant surprises here. Above all, your camera is usually set to shoot Full HD footage, and you also even arrive at select 1080p @ 30fps or 1080i @ 60fps, determined by whether you would like to help progressive or interlaced video. Unless you need Full HD, there’s also 720p @ 60fps, which is really smooth and still counts as high definition. Secondly, you obtain full manual treatments for exposure in video mode. It becomes an option; you won’t have to shoot in M mode however, you can in the event that’s what you require. Thirdly, you obtain fast, continuous AF in video mode, and delay pills work well, specifically in good light. Movies are compressed while using H.264 codec and stored as MOV files. You can find separate shutter release buttons for stills and video, and due to this - along with the massive processing power of the Nikon J1 - you may take multiple full-resolution stills at the same time recording HD video. This works the opposite too - you’ll be able to capture a show clip regardless if the mode dial is with the Still Image position, by simply pressing the red movie shutter release. We’ve discovered that in cases like this you will record film at 720p/60fps.

And also competent at shooting regular movies in HD quality, the Nikon 1 J1 may shoot video at 400fps for slow-motion playback. The resolution is less and also the aspect ratio is undoubtedly an ultra-widescreen 2.67:1, even so the quality is adequate for YouTube, Vimeo etc. These videos are played back at 30fps, that is in excess of 13x slower as opposed to capture speed of 400fps, permitting you to get creative and show the world a range of interesting phenomena that happen too rapidly to look at in real time. The Nikon J1 goes a little more forward through providing a 1200fps video mode, but the resolution and overall quality is way too poor for that to get genuinely useful.

The next icon within the mode dial means Smart Photo Selector. This feature allows the digital camera to capture no less than 20 photos at the single press on the shutter release, including some which are taken before fully depressing the button. Your camera analyses the individual pictures from the series and discards 15 of which, keeping merely the five who’s thinks would be best with regard to sharpness and composition. This feature is usually genuinely useful when photographing fast action and fleeting moments.

Finally, you will find there’s so-called Motion Snapshot mode the location where the camera records a shorter high-definition movie - whose buffering starts with a half-press with the shutter release, so again includes events which in fact had happened prior to button was fully depressed - as well as uses a still photograph. The movie and also the still image are trapped in separate files nevertheless the camera can combine them right into a single slow-motion clip with vocals. It’s fun but we not able to really envision people applying this shooting mode often. (Should you observe the video over a computer, it will play back at normal speed, without sound, which means you mode is very only interesting when you comprehend the clip in-camera or hook the camera approximately an HDTV via an HDMI cable.)

The Nikon J1 stores photos and videos on SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards, and sports ths fastest UHS-I speed class. You runs using an inferior EN-EL20 battery to its V1 larger, and is particularly consequently capable of producing even less shots on one charge, managing around 230, even though it helps to make the camera body smaller sized. The camera’s tripod socket is constructed of metal which is situated in line together with the lens’ optical axis. This too means that changing batteries or cards is not possible whilst the J1 is attached to a tripod, as the hinges with the battery/card compartment door are so near the tripod mount.

So, how did we love to utilizing the Nikon 1 J1? On one hand, we liked it lots. In good light, its auto-focus strategy is indeed faster than essentially anything we’ve used so far, being able to track and lock target numerous truly fast-moving subjects, and yielding a great deal of sharp images in situations where our keeper rates have not been quite high. Additionally, its high-speed continuous shooting modes have allowed us to capture interesting moments that we’d have surely missed if we had used a slower camera. The built-in pop-up flash proved more useful the reason is modest guide number might suggest, with the clever design minimising red-eye.

In contrast, the Nikon J1 has its share of frustrating idiosyncrasies starting with the person interface that forces you to dive in to the menu gain access to functions as common as exposure mode, ISO speeds and white balance. While Nikon obviously cannot add extra buttons to your finished product, they may at the least have the “F” button customisable via a firmware update. Also, you will find a passionate button for exposure compensation - a great thing - I didnrrrt are able to activate an active histogram, community . can have made exposure compensation considerably more useful as well as simple to make use of. Again, this will more likely fixed in firmware.

We also missed the V1’s smooth, high-resolution electronic viewfinder, especially in bright light or with all the telephoto lens which doesn’t lend itself well to being held out at arms length. The J1 has only a glass dust shield as it is defense against unwanted debris, as opposed to the more proactive sensor cleaning unit the V1 offers, as well as the smaller battery ensures that you’ll need to buy an additional someone to get to the day’s heavy shooting. Deficiency of an accessory port means that almost no Nikon 1 accessories are works with the J1, such as the external flash and GPS unit.

One more thing we did not like could be that the camera would always show the image just taken a couple of seconds onscreen, so we wouldn’t are able to turn this instant postview function completely off (although you can at least cancel it using a half-press of the shutter release). Finally, as you move the camera is normally fast and responsive, the digital camera takes way too long to wake from sleep mode gets hotter continues to be idle for some time, causing a number of missed shots.

That being said, the Nikon 1 J1 is often a small and compact, high-performance system camera that they like its big brother would use a few tweaks to the gui to increase suit the needs of serious amateurs. The intended marketplace of casual users will cherish it due to its sheer speed, built-in flash, compact size and the fun features it includes. We will now see how the Nikon 1 J1 fared inside image quality department.