The case for the Nikon J1/V1 CX system

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The case for the Nikon J1/V1 CX system

I am not a fanboy by any stretch of the means. I’ve had all sorts of camera gear ranging from Sony to Canon to Olympus to Panasonic before finally settling on Nikon for my go-to professional equipment. Despite this, I have had a lot of fun with Panasonic’s Micro Four Thirds cameras (particularly the GF1 and GH2), and although I got rid of my MFT system a few months ago, I have kept a close eye on the mirrorless camera market because it seems to be a good indication of where things are headed.

So a couple of days ago Nikon dipped their toes into the mirrorless camera pool and seem to have made a splash, but not in the way you might have expected. The V1 and J1 (part of the new CX family) feature a relatively small sensor with a crop factor of 2.7x, compared to the crop factor of 2x for MFT cameras and 1.5x/APS-C for the Sony NEX and Samsung systems.

There are a number of advantages and disadvantages to the new system as far as I can see:

Advantages

1. I think Nikon’s entry level cameras are crap. I would never buy one because from my experience they are slow, the lenses used are not competitive (see LX5, S95/S100). Moreover, any product named ‘Coolpix’ is dead from the start as far as I’m concerned. So it seems to be that this leaves a huge gap before Nikon’s REAL entry level product, the D3100. The 1 series cameras could fill this gap pretty nicely.

2. The crop factor of 2.7x is going to be really really useful for long range/telephoto/portrait work. Using full frame as my benchmark, with the F-Mount adapter and a 50mm f1.4 lens, you will get an equivalent focal length of 135mm and an equivalent depth of field of f4.0, which is not too shabby at all when you consider how small a package this is going to be. Here are a few more equivalents:

- A 24mm will be like a 65mm;

- A 14-24mm will give you 38-65mm;

- A 35mm will give you around 95mm;

- An 85mm will give you 230mm, and if you use a 1.4 you’re nearing 200/f2 territory;

- A 24-70mm will give you 65-190mm, which is not far off the very useful 70-200mm focal length;

- A 70-200mm will give you 190-540mm, which is a huge range;

- A 70-300mm will give you 190-810, which is even huger; and

- An 18-200mm will give you the equivalent of 50-500mm.

And so on, and so forth. These options, coupled with the new lenses that will inevitably be developed for the 1-Mount/CX itself means more choice, which is surely a good thing. Just note that sticking a big lens on a small camera doesn’t really change the focal length of the lens; all that’s really happening is that you are getting a smaller part of the image enlarged. So using a 24mm lens on a crop camera still gives you the same perspective a 24mm lens has on a full frame camera, but you only get the center part of the image. But this is not limited to the 1 system; even APS-C cameras do the same thing.

3. A smaller sensor, but a low megapixel sensor is a really good idea. Pixel density is the all important factor here, and if you compare the density with the class leading D7000, it’s not far off half. So potentially the noise handling could be very impressive.

4. As a consumer, I assume you would want one of these mirrorless cameras for the convenience and size advantage above all else. With the 2.7x crop factor, the CX cameras will be significantly smaller than both APS-C and MFT bodies, which may be enough to leave MFT out in the cold.

5. It has outstanding video capability from the specs. 1200fps? Imagine how much fun that could be.

Disadvantages

1. If the 1-Mount/CX cameras are really supposed to be a step up for the P&S crowd who don’t want to get into the scary DSLR world, then they should be priced accordingly. Alas, Nikon seems to have gone mental here because the UK pricing for these cameras is astronomical. The preorder price for the J1 (the basic one) ranges from £549 to £699, while the prices for the V1 (the more advanced model) start at £829 and go up to £979. WHAT?! A new D3100 with kit lens is only £399!!!!! Fine, the price seems a bit high, but to a lot of people (read: gearheads) this won’t really matter too much. So moving on…

2. As if the price of the bodies isn’t enough, Nikon has decided to charge £229 for the FT1 mount adapter which enables you to use F-Mount lenses on the 1 system bodies. URGH.

3. The decision to use a 10mp sensor may be borne from the notion that less megapixels equals less noise, but that may not be enough to convince the hordes of shoppers who don’t know a photosite from a Photoshop – and while I’m all for lower megapixels in favour of greater image quality, the target market for this sort of camera is consumers, and most consumers want higher megapixels (I think?).

4. The smaller sensor is clearly going to be fighting an uphill struggle when it comes to noise and low light photography. Generally speaking, the larger the sensor, the better it is at gathering light, and the more effective the camera will be in low light situations. With the 1-Mount/CX cameras this appears to be one of the biggest disadvantages when compared with MFT cameras. On the other hand, Nikon can absolutely excel at low light imagery when they want to (hey D3S!) and if they have managed to transfer any of that 2 year old technology into the new system, this might just be enough to offset the difference in sensor size.

5. DOF control. This is one that you just can’t get around, because it’s related to the laws of physics (which may just all be wrong anyway – see here). With a smaller sensor, you will get a smaller aperture, even if it’s wide open. This means you get a larger depth of field, which means it’s a lot more difficult to get those nice blurry backgrounds that have always been so handy. It’s unlikely that Nikon is going to come up with a lens faster than f1.4 for the 1 Mount system (although Voightlander might), so the maximum equivalent depth of field you are likely to get with these cameras is not really much greater than f4.0 (using an f1.4 lens). That’s still nothing to sneer at though, because you can still get a decent amount of blur at that aperture.

6. While you can get some insane focal lengths out of the combo, the wide end is going to be severely limited – but that has always been one of the advantages of a larger sensor camera as opposed to APS-C or smaller. Having said that, Panasonic came up with the absolutely stellar 7-14mm lens (their version of the 14-24mm) so Nikon should not have too much trouble with this.

So I count 5 advantages and 6 disadvantages, but that doesn’t mean all that much because I would say that the biggest disadvantage is price and the biggest advantage is telephoto reach. I’m also hoping that Nikon have implemented some of their low light expertise from their full frame cameras and D7000 into this machine. In any event, I’m waiting to see how it turns out. Nikon, if you want to send me a bunch of stuff to review, I’d be happy to! (Worth a shot).

If you want to know more, you can see the camera specs on Nikon’s site or check out DP Review’s hands-on from the product launch.

Anyway, here’s some new camera porn: