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Nikon D1 |
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Nikon has presented to the PMA Las Vegas in February 99 a sample of its new Professional Digital SLR: the Nikon D1. Nikon said that the launch of Nikon D1 is as important as that, in its time, the launch of Nikon F, thirty years ago. |
Preliminary.
The design of the same than the F100 to which it is had integrated the handle of the F5. The body of the machine is in magnesium as the F100 and Coolpix 950. The reference to these two cameras is elsewhere usual when one sees the D1 which merge the better of the two technologies.
It is interesting to note that Nikon has changed the form of its body and changed name. There will not be a Nikon E4.
The Nikon Series E2 (and E3) were the fruit of collaboration with Fuji. The DCS cameras were designed and manufactured by Kodak, based on Nikon or Canon bodies. Kodak announced elsewhere at the same PMA a new model, called DCS 620 based on Nikon F5 body.
Technical view.
The Nikon D1 has a 2.74-megapixel CCD (2,012 x 1,324), what constitutes the current reference (July 99) for a unique CCD .
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It has also four levels of sensitivity equal to 200, 400, 800 and 1 600 iso, the possibility to store images in several compressed modes (modes JPEG) or uncompressed (several modes TIFF), |
It can be piloted by a PC microcomputer and has an IEEE1394 interface and a control screen to the back of the camera (2" inch and 120 000 pixels). It receives CompactFlash™ Card (Type I/II).
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The rest of functions is that the same as F100 : |
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Nikon has also showed two new lens. One is a Nikkor AF-S 17-35mm/2,8 D IF-ED, which is a standard (but expensive) lens for Nikon D1 and is equal to a zoom 25-52mm/2,8 for 135 film.
Price and availability.
The Nikon D1 will be on the market next October with an aggressive price of $5,580 or £3,600. Its main pretenders are Kodak DCS, DCS 520 (Canon-body based, also sold as Canon EOS D2000) with a 6 Million pixels CCD and DCS 620 (Nikon F5- body based), these two cameras are sold $15,000.
The Challengers and the Future:
Today, a lot of professionals are using digital cameras (often Kodak DCS). Nikon can't be dependent of either companies Kodak or Fuji (film makers with their own strategy) to be present on this fabulous market. It seems that now, Nikon is also strong enough to be its own master of its future in digital cameras for mass market and professionals.
The Nikon D1 is completely designed by Nikon (except its CDD). The Nikon D1 is perhaps the first Digital Nikon (what would explain its name). The Nikon D1 represents the first item of a new series of machine, We can think that Nikon starts with the professional model.
The questions that we may have are :
- The CCD is not interchangeable, It is a risk to have a quick obsolescence of this CCD (one year), like it was the situation of its predecessors : Nikon E2, E2s and E3.
- Or can we consider that current CCD are sufficiently effective to be not outdated quickly and to satisfy needs of professionals during several years. (note that more the number of pixels of the CCD is important, more the definition of the image is good but more the storage of image (8mbsize) is big. What is the interest to have a super CCD if we store the images in mode degraded ?)
It is true that Nikons and Kodaks cameras are also accepting type II cards and IBM hard drives of 330 mb, so you should be able to store 40+ images before having to put in a new card or drive.
- What will be the reaction of Canon and Kodak in the next months,
- When some other Digital SLR cameras mass-market (Nikon Dnn) will be launched ?
We have now just to wait impatiently these new bodies... or to be enough lucky to buy a Nikon D1.
pierre j.