Nikon 1 J1 review

Expert Reviews is proud to bring you this Nikon J1 review from Short Sharp Reviews – click through to YouTube for a 1080p HD version

The compact system camera (CSC) market is gathering momentum now, with exciting new models arriving virtually every week. It’s Nikon’s turn in the limelight with a brand new system called Nikon 1.

The system currently comprises two camera bodies – the J1 and the more upmarket V1 – plus four lenses: a 3x zoom, a wide-angle pancake, a telephoto and a 10x ultra-zoom model. Nikon also sells the FT1 adaptor (£230 including VAT) to attach its SLR lenses, although autofocus will only work with AF-S and AF-I lenses.

There are four 1 lenses available, although the FT1 adaptor lets you use existing Nikon SLR lenses.

So far, so familiar, but there is one surprising detail to the Nikon 1 system: the sensor measures one inch from corner to corner. While this gives it over four times the surface area of conventional compact camera sensors, it’s only half the size of a Micro Four Thirds sensor and less than a third that of the Sony NEX range and most SLRs. In our experience, nothing affects image quality more than sensor size, so Nikon’s decision is surprising. We’d understand if the J1 was smaller and lighter than rival cameras, but it’s only around 30g lighter than the Panasonic GF3 and a little heavier than the Sony NEX-C3.

This sensor is also unusual in that it integrates a phase-detect autofocus system, which is usually much quicker than contrast-detect systems used on compact cameras. While consumer SLRs typically have a dozen or so phase-detect autofocus points, housed in a separate unit to the main sensor, the J1 and V1 integrate 73 points directly onto the sensor. They must be extremely small to nestle in among the light-measuring photosites, which would explain why the camera switches to a slower contrast-detect system in low light.

We tested the Nikon 1 J1 with the 10-30mm kit lens, which gives a 35mm-equivalent focal length range of 27-81mm and an f/3.5-5.6 aperture – typical stats for a kit lens. It’s lighter and smaller than its rivals, though, and can be retracted for storage and transit. This gives a 77mm depth when not in use, which is impressively slim but still too big for most pockets. There’s room on the lens for a zoom ring but not a focus ring, and manual focusing is via the wheel on the back of the camera.

The lens has a zoom ring, but manual focusing is via the wheel on the back of the camera.

The lens and camera body are housed in aluminium and look extremely smart and luxurious, especially in the blood-red finish we were sent for testing. We’d normally have reservations about the shiny finish and lack of any kind of handgrip on the front of the camera, but the base of the lens barrel sat comfortably on our middle finger and a small, sculpted thumb grip on the back helped us keep a firm grip.

The mode dial is a big departure from convention, with no priority or manual exposure modes. Instead, there are just four settings: Still Image, Movie, Smart Photo Selector and Motion Snapshot.

The mode dial has no priority or manual exposure settings, just four pre-defined shooting settings.

Motion Snapshot captures what Nikon describes as a “living image”, with a two-second slow-motion 1080p video topped off with a 10-megapixel photo. These play back on the camera complete with saccharine music, although the two files appear separately on the SD card without music.

Smart Photo Selector captures 20 full-resolution images, including some before the shutter button was pressed. It then saves the best five, picking them based on focus, composition and facial expression. It also highlights its favourite of the five – judging by this evidence, its ability to pick the best images seems pretty sophisticated. The camera can repeat the trick every five seconds, making this a useful tool for capturing fleeting subjects.

The Still Image and Movie modes need no explanation, although their inclusion is odd seeing as there are separate photo and video capture buttons on the top of the camera. The record button only works when Movie mode is selected, and the shutter release button takes 1920×1080 photos in Movie mode. On the upside, it’s possible to capture photos while recording video.

Separate Still Image and Movie modes seem a bit odd, as there are dedicated photo and video capture buttons on top of the camera.

Nikon makes a big fuss about the J1’s performance. There’s no denying that this is a responsive sensor, as demonstrated by the 1/16,000-second minimum shutter speed. The autofocus system was extremely quick in bright light, and at least as good as Panasonic’s G-series cameras. Focusing in low light was much slower but not unacceptably so.

The headline 60fps burst speed looks amazing on paper but it only lasts for 12 frames, giving just a fifth of a second’s activity. The 10fps mode is more useful, also lasting for 12 frames but spreading them out over a more useful length of time. This 10fps mode is with continuous autofocus, although in our tests it failed to refocus in low light – presumably the contrast-detect system isn’t quick enough to adjust between shots at this speed – and wasn’t hugely reliable in bright conditions either. Even the 4.2fps continuous mode struggled to track moving subjects, but to be fair, even 4.2fps is faster than rival cameras, such as the GF3, can manage with fixed focus. Overall, continuous performance wasn’t quite as impressive as we’d been lead to believe, but it was still extremely impressive.

Otherwise, performance was good rather than exceptional, with shots every 1.4 seconds in normal use. The menus are slick and extremely quick to navigate, but they didn’t make up for the lack of labelled buttons to access ISO speed, priority mode and so on. Casual users might not miss them but a £500 camera should be able to please enthusiasts too. There’s an F button, but while its role varies depending on the selected mode, it can’t be customised. We like its use during playback, though, providing a quick means to tag photos with 5-star ratings that were recognised by Windows and Adobe Lightroom.

The Nikon 1 J1’s video mode is the best we’ve ever seen from a stills camera – or video camera, for that matter. Details were sharp, colours were rich and noise was incredibly low, even beating our Panasonic GH11 for low-light image quality. It was faster to focus, too, and although some clicks from the autofocus system appeared on the soundtrack, they were barely audible.

There’s a choice of 1080/30p, 1080/60i or 720/60p capture, with AVC encoding at 24Mbit/s with stereo AAC audio. We’d have liked support for the European standards – 25p and 50i – too, but in this age of online sharing it isn’t much of a problem. The 20-minute clip limit is annoying but it’s only a little worse than Panasonic and Sony’s 30-minute limit.

There’s full control over video exposure, including the ability to make manual adjustments while recording – crucial features for keen videographers. The 1/100s minimum shutter speed is surprising as 1/60s is the textbook speed for 30fps video, and would capture more light, but we can live with this minor compromise.

There’s a hint of noise in the shadows of this ISO 200 shot, but image quality is firmly in SLR rather than compact camera territory.

Photos were, for the most part, just as impressive as videos (click on Gallery at the top of the page for more information). Brightly lit shots were smooth and natural looking, and Nikon’s usual knack for flattering skin tones was clearly evident. Noise levels were remarkably low, allaying our worries about the sensor’s relatively small size. At ISO 3200, shadows were scruffy and noise reduction glossed over details but image quality was significantly better than from the Panasonic GF3. It couldn’t quite match the Sony NEX-C3 but the difference was much less than we expected. The modest 10-megapixel resolution plays a part in keeping noise at bay, and we applaud Nikon’s resolve to strive for quality rather than headline-grabbing megapixel ratings.

The sensor size is smaller than on competing cameras, but the lower megapixel count helps maintain low-light performance.

We did notice a few problems with the Nikon 1 J1’s images, though. We can live with the barrel distortion at wide-angle settings, but the low success rate of the fully automatic mode was more disappointing. When we used the flash, the ISO speed was set too high, over-exposing nearby subjects and introducing unnecessary noise when the camera could simply have increased the flash power to keep the ISO speed down. In low light without the flash, it refused to venture beyond ISO 800, which often led to excessively long shutter speeds. Switching to Program mode let us set the ISO speed manually, and also unlocked an Auto ISO mode with a 100-3200 range.

Blurry shots were worryingly common in our tests – it appears that the Active stabilisation mode is largely to blame.

More worryingly, blurry shots were common when shooting outdoors in overcast weather at shutter speeds of around 1/60s. Some photos were seriously sharp but many were a little soft, and a good 20 per cent were woefully blurred. We contacted Nikon about this, and were advised that the Active stabilisation option is best reserved for very bumpy situations such as shooting while walking or on a boat, and that we should switch to the Normal stabilisation mode. That proved to be good advice – after doing so, blurry shots were much rarer – but it’s worrying that Active is the default setting for this camera.

While most image quality problems could be avoided by delving into the menu, that really shouldn’t be necessary on a camera that’s explicitly designed for point-and-shoot operation. Even so, we can’t bring ourselves to mark the J1 down too heavily. With a couple of simple tweaks, it’s a great little camera that has lots of charm. We’d happily pay £500 for the video mode alone, and on that basis, it’s unfair to award it anything less than four stars.