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The Nikon 1 J1 is a gorgeous little thing that is not only easy to take around, but has some pretty cool features that are new to Nikon technology.

The big plusses include 10 fps continuous shooting in AF Mode, full HD 1080p video recording, Smart Photo Selector and Motion Snapshot photo animation.

The fast, new and advanced Hybrid AF system has 73 focus points, the most of any camera to date. When the Nikon 1 is in Focus Mode, it will automatically chose between “focal plane phase” detection and “contrast-based detection” for optimizing your shooting scene. It will also default to the faster “phase detect” AF. The Smart Photo Selector (similar to Nikon’s Best Shot Selector) captures a burst of up to 20 frames and then saves the five best based on various criteria, including exposure and facial recognition.

First off, the camera and its design. The 1 comes in two formats: the J1 and the V1. The V1 is the more expensive of the two, with both a mechanical shutter and electronic viewfinder, resulting in more accurate exposures. The V1 is also a bit heavier, but then again battery life is better with that increased size and weight.

[Nikon 1 J1 with 10-30mm lens]

For now, both come with a standard 10-30mm zoom, and both will fit the 10mm pancake lens, 30-110mm f/3.8-5.6, and VR 10-100mm f/4.5-5.6 PD-ZOOM, all available separately. The V1 can accommodate an SB-N5 speed light or GPS module. It has a stereo microphone input (with optional ME-1 stereo mic accessory) to deliver professional quality audio.

[Colour and lighting: shot with 10-30mm lens]

All aside, these are Nikon’s first mirrorless 2.7x crop models with interchangeable lenses. And now onto the J1. For the purpose of this review, I’ve shot all images using RAW quality.

Unpacking the box revealed a Nikon world in white for me. The strap, body, lenses and lens caps are all shiny white. The J1 is also available in black, red, pink and silver. Sleek and elegant in form, could this little camera work with low light conditions as well as take successful macro shots with the pancake lens?

[Nikon 1 10mm pancake lens]

I compared the Nikon 10-30mm lens at 10mm to the pancake to see how they would compare.

[Nikon 1 shot with 10mm pancake; 1/15 f/6.3, ISO 1100 10mm]

[Nikon 1 shot with 10-30mm; 1/15 f/5.6, ISO 1600 26.7mm; photo cropped]

Looks like I was able to get a better result with the 10-30mm, as the lens took in more of the overall lighting in the room. The stone elephant’s detail comes through better in the cropped photo.

Here are a few shots taken both indoors and out on the town, under different lighting conditions.

In this photo, taken at a new Gastown, Vancouver watering hole, I was able to capture the bright vintage neon sign while keeping the small lantern on the wall visible in the background, maintaining the nuance of the lighting. I used the camera’s Programmed Auto mode to see how the low lighting available would turn out in the photo.

This Christmas market capture taken outdoors shows two crisp nutcrackers at the forefront of the photo, with a nice natural depth of field created by the greenery behind the remaining nutcrackers.

Chinese characters are recognizable through the lantern photo below, while maintaining the bright pink and red of the hearts. This photo was taken at a winter solstice festival in East Vancouver. I zoomed in about halfway on the 10-30mm lens; the J1 even captured the texture of the paper.

Other photos taken with the Nikon 1 J1 can be viewed in the following Flickr photo sets:
Daytime shots
Vancouver Christmas Market

Night/low light indoor shots
Winter Solstice Lantern Festival
Clough Club opening

The Nikon 1 J1 has four shooting modes:
Motion Snapshot, to record photos with about a second of movie footage. The movie will play back in slow motion over 2 1/2 seconds, followed by the photograph originally snapped.
Smart Photo Selector, where releasing the shutter will let the camera select the best four shots based on both composition and motion.
Still image mode, the camera’s default, where the J1 will adjust camera settings to suit the subject (automatic scene selection)
Movie mode, for shooting HD or slow-motion films. With an aspect ratio of 8:3, slow motion films are recorded silently at 400 fps and play back at 30 fps.

I found that the faster the moving subject was, the better the slow motion film results were. I can think of many cases where this would be a fun feature to have on a camera.

Being a regular Nikon DSLR user, I had to get used to similar menus with different button placement. The biggest adjustment of course was going back to using an electronic viewfinder.
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