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SINGAPORE - Last year, the sleeping photographic giant Nikon woke up from its long furlough in the DSLR (digital single lens reflex) camera market with the release of a full-frame DSLR, the D3, and the more affordable D300.
This year, it combined attributes of both cameras to bring you its latest full-frame (no focal length crop factor) DSLR, the D700.
In a nutshell, the Nikon D700 is a slimmed-down version of the excellent D3. It uses the same 12.1-megapixel FX-format image sensor and Expeed image processing engine, all packed inside a rugged and weather-sealant magnesium alloy body with a gorgeous three-inch display.
New features include a Live View function, a dust reduction mechanism and built-in flash.
Downsized to give it more agility and mobility, the D700 provides an ergonomic and steady grip with all buttons and dials within easy reach. Changing of exposure modes, settings and other functions is intuitive and swift.
However, the CF card compartment does not have a lever-release open mechanism, but a pull-release mechanism that is more susceptible to damage.
And though the button layout and menu interface are user-friendly, the sheer host of options available can be daunting, especially for beginners.
Talking about options, although the D700 can shoot at a pretty fast rate of 5 frames per second (fps), the addition of the MB-D10 power battery grip will let you shoot at up to 8fps. That makes the D700 a cheaper alternative with performance rivalling that of the D3, which is 9fps!
In fact, the D700 proves it is no performance slouch compared to its illustrious cousin with its immediate startup and shutdown. Shutter lag is virtually non-existent, as long as you shoot via the viewfinder instead of Live View.
I did not experience any processing lockups even when I fired off in high-speed servo in RAW mode over twenty odd frames. With its 51-point auto-focusing area, auto-focusing performance is mind-blowing.
However, the same cannot be said with Live View, which comes across as awkwardly implemented. There is a virtual horizon indicator during Live View to help you get the horizon straight.
Pressing the shutter release once in Live View mode does not register any image, but merely locks focus. You have to then press the shutter release for at least a second, and on hearing two shutter-release clicks, the camera takes a picture.
But let's move on to the D700's strongest element - image quality. Sharing the same sensor as the D3, the D700 produces images of the highest quality, with sharp resolution of pixels delivering excellent details, vibrant colours and smooth skin tones.
The rendition of colour range is especially outstanding, with superb contrast and accurate white balance in most lighting conditions.
I was rather critical of Nikon's Active D-lighting implementation in previous models, which created plenty of shadowy noise.
In the D700, however, there were no such problems even when I switched the Active D-lighting to high intensity mode.
On the contrary, the dynamic range of the images was improved subtly, with shadow details surfacing without highlights being overblown.
Noise performance of the D700 is the best you can find in the market now. With a wide sensitivity range from ISO100 to 25,600, images up to ISO1,600 exhibits little or no noise. At ISO6,400, the noise artifacts in images are comparable to those shot at ISO1,600 on rival DSLRs.
The D700 (S$4,499, body only) continues Nikon's recent renaissance in the DSLR realm and would send panic shivers down the spines of its competitors. It reminds me fondly of the film era, when I preferred the smaller Nikon F90X to the cumbersome flagship Nikon F5.
Like the F90X, the D700 is lighter, more sprightly and yet retains most of the performance and features of its pricier cousin. - TODAY/fa
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