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

The Nikon 1 J1 is certainly caused by created from aluminium with magnesium alloy reinforced parts and is also therefore heavier than you would think depending on its size alone, weighing in at 234g with the body only. What’s more, it feels better made versus the official product shots maybe have you believe. By having an essentially grip-less design, the Nikon J1 is very much a two-handed affair that will require you to secure the camera’s weight within the left hand, clutching the lens, and rehearse your right hand for balance and operating the controls. This is certainly the good thing mainly because it forces you to be aware of holding your camera properly, which often goes a long way towards avoiding shake-induced blur inside your photos.

The camera’s clean, minimalist front plate is covered with the all-new Nikon 1 lens mount. As an alternative to as a scaled-down version with the traditional F mount, it’s really a new design that provides 100% electronic communication involving the attached lens and the camera body, from twelve contacts. Much like for the manufacturer’s F-mount SLR cameras, there exists a white dot for convenient lens alignment, even though it has moved on the 2 o’clock position (when viewed front on) to the top level with the mount. The lenses themselves use a short silver ridge within the lens barrel, which should be in alignment with said dot to enable you to have the capacity to attach the lens to the camera. Of course this might require a little bit of acclamating yourself with, it genuinely makes changing lenses quicker and much easier.

Without having lens attached, you can see the sensor sitting directly behind the plane on the bayonet mount. Just like the mount itself, the sensor is completely new. Measuring 13.2×8.8mm this “CX” format imaging chip has double the amount surface of the biggest imagers utilised in compact and bridge cameras such as Fujifilm X10 and S100FS, only most of the area of your standard Four Thirds sensor. In linear terms, a Four Thirds chip incorporates a 1.36x longer diagonal than the Nikon CX imager. Considering the fact that Four Thirds incorporates a 2x focal length multiplier, the CX “crop factor” works out to around 2.72, and therefore a 10mm lens has approximately a similar angle of view as a 27.2mm lens by using an FX or 35mm film camera. The Nikon 1 Nikkor 10-30mm standard zoom is thus similar to a 27.2-81.6mm (or, practically speaking, 28-80mm) FX lens regarding its angle-of-view range.

The other Nikon J1’s faceplate is nearly empty, featuring just the lens release, a receiver with the optional ML-L3 infrared handy remote control, two narrow slits to the microphone either sides with the lens, as well as an AF assist/self-timer lamp. There is absolutely no grip in any respect on the front on the Nikon 1 J1.

There are two means of powering about the Nikon 1 J1 and Nikon 1 V1. You can makes use of the on/off button sitting next to the shutter release or, when you have a collapsible-barrel standard zoom lens attached, you can simply press the unlocking button for the lens barrel and turn the zoom ring to unlock the lens, an act which causes the digital camera to modify on automatically. It is really an ingenious solution as you need to unlock the lens for shooting anyway. Start-up takes about an extra - absolutely nothing to write home about but nevertheless decent and entirely adequate.

It is possible to frame your shots utilizing the rear screen - there’s no electronic viewfinder as around the V1 model, a key distinction between the 2 main. 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, either in bright sunlit conditions or with all the 30-110mm telezoom lens as holding you up to eye-level helped to stabilise the lens and steer clear of camera shake.

The control layout is very peculiar. The Nikon 1 J1 has a small, rear-mounted mode dial that lacks a lot of the shooting modes which can be usually entirely on similar dials - especially P, A, S and M - even though it has enough room to support them. These modes are available within the J1 however you should dive in to the rather long-winded but not entirely logical menu to get them. The J1’s mode dial has only four settings, Photo, Video, Motion Snapshot and Smart Photo Selector. The four-way controller boasts four functions mapped onto its Up, Right, Down and Left buttons; including AE/AF-Lock, exposure compensation, flash mode and self-timer, respectively. Although this isn’t a bad selection of functions, the belief that there isn’t any ISO button will doubtlessly create a wide range of photographers interested in getting the Nikon J1 to be unhappy.

We have a button for the rear labelled “F” but alas, it is not a programmable function button. In Photo mode, it lets you quickly choose from the continuous shooting modes, whilst in Video mode it permits you to toggle between regular and slow-motion recording. The two main more vital controls for the back of the camera, together with a scroll wheel about the four-way pad and a rocker switch marked with a loupe icon. The scroll wheel is utilized to line the shutter speed in Manual and Shutter Priority modes (when you have found them from the menu, that may be), as you move the rocker switch controls the aperture. Exactly why it provides a loupe icon close to it is that this control is needed to zoom in upon an image to check for critical focus in Playback mode. Finally, you’ll find four small buttons throughout the navigation pad, flush resistant to the rear panel in the camera, including Display Mode, Playback, Menu and Delete.

So what are the type shooting modes within the mode dial all about? The Photo or Still Image mode, marked that has a green camera icon, is the place you would want to be most of the time. Together with the mode dial set to the position, you are able to pick your desired exposure mode on the menu. The Nikon J1’s Scene Auto Selector is a smart automatic mode in which the camera analyses the scene in front of its lens and picks what it thinks could be the right way of that exact scene. You may also choose one with the conventional PASM modes, which supply you with full menu access along with the power to manually set the aperture, shutter speed, or both (Program AE Shift can be found in P mode). ISO and white balance can also be manually selected, but only from your menu, as stated earlier.

Of course there’s AWB and auto ISO as well, while using latter to arrive three flavours (Auto 100-400, 100-800 or 100-3200) allowing you to specify how high you would like the digital camera to look if the light gets low. You may also select three AF Area modes, including Auto Area, the location where the camera takes charge of what it really focusses on (this isn’t a terrific mode to have as your default because the camera obviously can’t read the mind and may even concentrate on another thing than your actual subject); Single Point, in which you can select certainly one of 135 AF points starting with hitting OK then moving the active AF point across the frame with all the four-way pad; and Subject Tracking, in which you pick your subject, press OK and invite your camera in order to that subject the way it moves around, as long as it does not leave the frame certainly.

The Nikon 1 J1 has a intriguing hybrid auto-focus system that combines contrast- and phase-difference detection likewise as being the Fujifilm F300EXR did. This gives the Nikon 1 J1 to concentrate extremely quickly in good light, even with a moving subject. This company claims the Nikon 1 system cameras will be the fastest-focusing machines on the globe, and this also matches our experience - so long as there’s enough light. When light levels drop, your camera switches to contrast-detect AF which, though faster than you are on most cameras, isn’t you’d like one other method. It is usually you that decides which AF solution to use - the user does not have any affect this.

Normally, the J1 will usually only use contrast detection when light levels are low. In good light, there we were capable of taking sharp photos of fast-moving subjects. The Nikon J1 certainly will not disappoint here. Manual focusing can also be possible, however the Nikon 1 lenses will not have focus rings. In order to focus manually, you firstly ought to hit the AF button, choose MF, press OK then makes use of the scroll wheel to adjust focus. To be of assistance using this, the Nikon J1 magnifies the central portion of the image and displays a rudimentary focus scale on the right side with the frame - but those include the only focusing helps you get. There is not any peaking function available as on some rival models.

The J1 has a electronic shutter (the V1 even offers a mechanical shutter). It’s totally silent (the main objective confirmation beep may be disabled on the menu) and allows the use of shutter speeds as fast as 1/16,000th of your second and, while using Electronic Hi setting selected, permits you to shoot full-resolution stills at 60 frames per second. Note however that although this is the major achievement, it’s tied to a buffer that will only hold 12 raw files. Additionally, the application of this mode precludes AF tracking - you should lower the frame rate to 10fps if you wish that -, along with the viewfinder goes blank as you move the pictures are taken. One application we can consider where shooting full-resolution stills at 60fps could really come in handy is AE bracketing for HDR imaging. At this rate, a few 5 bracketed shots might be consumed in less than 0.1 second, rendering small movements that will otherwise pose alignment problems - like leaves being blown in the wind - a non-issue. Alas, the Nikon J1 won’t offer a real feature - the truth is no offer autoexposure bracketing in any way.

Moving on to the video mode, the Nikon 1 J1 has some pleasant surprises here. First of all, the camera could be set to shoot Full HD footage, and also you even arrive at pick from 1080p @ 30fps or 1080i @ 60fps, dependant upon whether you’d rather help progressive or interlaced video. If you don’t need Full HD, additionally, there is 720p @ 60fps, and that is really smooth yet still counts as high definition. Secondly, you will get full manual treating exposure in video mode. It is deemed an option; you won’t need to shoot in M mode however you can if that’s things you need. Thirdly, you have fast, continuous AF in video mode, and it works well, specifically in good light. Movies are compressed utilizing the H.264 codec and stored as MOV files. You will discover separate shutter release buttons for stills and video, and thanks to this - as well as the massive processing power from the Nikon J1 - you are able to take multiple full-resolution stills at the same time recording HD video. This works vice versa too - it is possible to capture a motion picture clip even though the mode dial is with the Still Image position, merely by pressing the red movie shutter release. We’ve found out that in such cases you will usually record the video at 720p/60fps.

In addition to being capable of shooting regular movies in HD quality, the Nikon 1 J1 may also shoot video at 400fps for slow-motion playback. The resolution is gloomier and also the aspect ratio is undoubtedly an ultra-widescreen 2.67:1, however the quality is adequate for YouTube, Vimeo and so forth. These videos are played back at 30fps, and that is over 13x slower compared to the capture speed of 400fps, permitting you to get creative and display to the world a multitude of interesting phenomena which happen prematurely to see or watch in real time. The Nikon J1 goes a little more forward through providing a 1200fps video mode, but the resolution and overall quality is just too poor for your for being genuinely useful.

Your third icon on the mode dial represents Smart Photo Selector. This feature allows the digital camera to capture at the least 20 photos with a single press of the shutter release, including some that had been taken before fully depressing the button. You analyses anyone pictures inside series and discards 15 of these, keeping just the five which it thinks should be with regard to sharpness and composition. This feature could be genuinely useful when photographing fast action and fleeting moments.

Finally, there exists a so-called Motion Snapshot mode when the camera records a short high-definition movie - whose buffering starts for a half-press from the shutter release, so again includes events which have happened before the button was fully depressed - as well as uses a still photograph. The movie and also the still image are saved in separate files however the camera can combine them in to a single slow-motion clip with background music. It’s fun but we can’t really envision people by using this shooting mode regularly. (In case you look at the video on the computer, it will play back at normal speed, without sound, which means you mode is really only interesting in case you observe the clip in-camera or hook you as much as an HDTV with an HDMI cable.)

The Nikon J1 stores pics and vids on SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards, and supports the fastest UHS-I speed class. The digital camera operates on a smaller EN-EL20 battery to the V1 larger, and it is consequently able to produce even less shots on one charge, managing around 230, although it does help to create you body smaller sized. The camera’s tripod socket is manufactured out of metal and is in line with all the lens’ optical axis. This actually also signifies that changing batteries or cards isn’t feasible while the J1 is mounted on a tripod, as being the hinges on the battery/card compartment door are so towards the tripod mount.

So, how did we love to while using the Nikon 1 J1? Similarly, we liked it a good deal. In good light, its auto-focus system is indeed faster than basically anything we’ve used so far, being able to track and lock consentrate on an array of truly fast-moving subjects, and yielding a great deal of sharp images in situations where our keeper rates never been very high. Additionally, its high-speed continuous shooting modes have allowed us to capture interesting moments that we’d have surely missed when we had used a slower camera. The built-in pop-up flash proved more useful that its modest guide number might suggest, using the clever design minimising red-eye.

Conversely, the Nikon J1 has its own share of frustrating idiosyncrasies starting with anyone interface that makes you 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 some finished product, they are able to no less than make the “F” button customisable by way of a firmware update. Also, as there is a separate button for exposure compensation - a advantage - Some be capable of activate an active histogram, though it might have made exposure compensation considerably more useful and simple to use. Again, this can probably be fixed in firmware.

We missed the V1’s smooth, high-resolution electronic viewfinder, specially in bright light or with the telephoto lens which does not lend itself well to being held out at arms length. The J1 just has a glass dust shield because it’s defense against unwanted debris, as opposed to the more proactive sensor cleaning unit which the V1 offers, and the smaller battery implies that you’ll need to buy an additional anyone to go through the day’s heavy shooting. Having less an accessory port signifies that almost not one of the Nikon 1 accessories are compatible with the J1, such as external flash and GPS unit.

One more thing we failed to like could be that the camera would always show the picture just taken for a few seconds onscreen, therefore we wouldn’t are able to turn this instant postview function completely off (while you can at any rate cancel it using a half-press with the shutter release). Finally, whilst the camera is generally fast and responsive, you takes far too long to wake from sleep mode if this has become idle for a short time, leading to several missed shots.

That being said, the Nikon 1 J1 is a small, and compact, high-performance system camera they enjoy its government are able to use some tweaks to its gui to better suit the needs of serious amateurs. The intended market you work in of casual users will require to it because of its sheer speed, built-in flash, lightweight and also the fun features it offers. Let’s now observe the Nikon 1 J1 fared in the image quality department.