J5 mini review and some questions

[zzzxtreme]

hi guys, just received mine. for $180 including 2 batteries and one 10-30mm lens, I couldn't pass it up

What I like about it

1) Nikon 1 design ethos - everything can be set/adjusted in my right hand

2) touch AF

3) fn button

4) pre-shoot capture

5) tilt screen

6) can disable image preview

7) touch AF during video (audio noise though)

8) electronic VR for video - sweet

9) able to set video shutter

speed to 1/60. in V1 I can only set to 1/100 slowest.

9) faster buffer clearing than v1

10) ability to delete a series continuous shots with one click, even before the buffer has finished clearing (writing to disk).

11) tilt-able flash. good for remote triggers

12) with non native adapted lens, there's no more restrictions on shutter speed, unlike the V1

13) metering with manual lens - hooray

14) tiny

(anything else I should be aware of ?)

cons

1) tiny

2) a bit sluggish compared to v1 - when accessing menus etc...

3) smaller buffer compared to v1

4) video shutter speed slowest is 1/60

5) no mic in

6) slower flash sync speed because of lack of mechanical shutter

Questions

1) touch screen continuous shooting. is it possible?

2) has anyone tested the fastest micro sd card it can support ?

Conclusion : I love this camera. It fixes a lot of limitations of the V1 (especially manual lens metering) ! It will be great companion to the V1

 

[Miss tilly]

I think it looks a great camera. The tilting screen and flash are great assets, unfortunately the lack of an evf is the downside for me, however I may buy one in the future. It will be interesting to follow your user experiences.

regards

Gary

 

[Stefan BW]

Questions

[...]

2) has anyone tested the fastest micro sd card it can support ?

Conclusion : I love this camera. It fixes a lot of limitations of the V1 (especially manual lens metering) ! It will be great companion to the V1

The J5 is dear to me, even with a manual lens (Sigma 400mm + 3.0 TC) for wading birds. Results can be blurry - who cares. On days without a tripod I can still profit from the J5 + CX70-300. 10fps pics of waders in 150m are lousy, yet almost always suffice to ID a bird.

Fast cards matter a lot for BIF shooters. The two most informative websites on fast cards are havecamerawilltravel and cameramemoryspeed . On the latter site, you can click on the "Camera Tests" rider to see the recommendations for other cameras. No tests for N1 cameras, so I link to the Canon 80D which is limited by the UHS-I standard (like the J5 and all other N1 models).

Both sites use different testing procedures, which explains the MB/s are circa 10MB/s higher on the first site. I bought Sandisk Extreme Pro, rated 90.5 MB/s write speed by havecamerawilltravel as the fastest UHS-I card. Similar result at cameramemoryspeed with the SanDisk Extreme Pro 95MB/s 64GB rated at 81.5 MB/s (write speed). However, this site has slightly worse results for the 32GB and/or micro versions of the same card.

I've read elsewhere that UHS-I has a physical limit of 95MB/s, so I fear waiting for a much faster J5 card would be in vain. ;-)

Thomas Stirr has written in his blog he prefers 32GB cards over the 64GB version. Makes some sense, as failures are always possible, and the price is about the same (per GB). But I strictly prefer the micro versions, even if I sacrifice 0.3 MB/s speed, as the card can be used in my J5, V3 and V2, and not only in the V2. The J5 obviously only uses "micro".

 

[André BARELIER]

I agree. The J5 is a little gem. In all honesty, I miss the V1 EVF, but image quality is so much better with the J5 that it is now my travel camera. Frankly, if the J5 had an EVF, I would be the happiest traveller on earth, and I would not need anything else for travel. Coupled with the 6.7-13, it's a wonderful tool.

I would never have thought that I could use such a small camera with autoiso up to 6400, with no worries. Impressive!

 

[zzzxtreme]

way better than V1. good DR, clarity, detail. 3 photos stitched in photoshop


the dots are rookie mistake. first time loading film into reel

 

[sybersitizen]

the dots are rookie mistake. first time loading film into reel

What exactly was the mistake? In an earlier thread you had an image with just a handful of those spots, which you confirmed were caused by dust on the sensor because they appeared in the same places on more than one image.

Obviously not the case this time! Did you get dust on the film before it was developed?

 

[zzzxtreme]

on the v1, there is a permanent physical damage on the mirror (besides the dusts). on that particular roll of film (above), I touch/rub/scratch too much when rolling the film into the reel (was my first time). the second roll came out fine.

below is a scan with J5 also. no spots, different roll. now I'm more confident in rolling the film into the reel.

 

[zzzxtreme]

is J5 able to output live view thru hdmi during framing/recording?

I tried one mini hdmi cable, there's no output. maybe the cable is damage, so I'm not sure

 

[Laagwater]

Like you i also got a J5 very cheap this week to use besides my V1. What a fun camera to use and like André , i especially like it with the 6.7-13mm. Great sensor and a big improvement to the V1. Sometimes i miss the viewfinder but i like its compactness.

Mostly i'm photographing with a Sony A7 combined with a lot of old lenses. I've tried the V1 and J5 with some of them, but the Nikon 1 are obviously not made for it. I only like it combined with a Sigma 300/4 apo macrolens because of the 2.7 crop.

Only con for me is that the J5 is so plasticy. It really feels that it's not built to last for a long time.

What software are you guys using for converting the NEFs from the J5? I always used captureNX2 for the V1 NEFs but that is not working for the J5. I have tried Capture NX-D but i find it only useful for changing a picturecontrol setting. My best bet for now is DXO Photolab...

Have fun with your J5,

Edwin

 

[André BARELIER]

Like you i also got a J5 very cheap this week to use besides my V1. What a fun camera to use and like André , i especially like it with the 6.7-13mm. Great sensor and a big improvement to the V1. Sometimes i miss the viewfinder but i like its compactness.

Mostly i'm photographing with a Sony A7 combined with a lot of old lenses. I've tried the V1 and J5 with some of them, but the Nikon 1 are obviously not made for it. I only like it combined with a Sigma 300/4 apo macrolens because of the 2.7 crop.

Only con for me is that the J5 is so plasticy. It really feels that it's not built to last for a long time.

What software are you guys using for converting the NEFs from the J5? I always used captureNX2 for the V1 NEFs but that is not working for the J5. I have tried Capture NX-D but i find it only useful for changing a picturecontrol setting. My best bet for now is DXO Photolab...

Have fun with your J5,

Edwin

Hi Edwin,

To convert my raw files (I shoot only raw), I use DxO for low light pictures: its Prime NR engine does wonders. But I'm not entirely satisfied with the color rendering.

I'm currently running Capture One trial version: the results look excellent (the NR engine is not as good as DxO, but it seems C1 renders more details, and more pleasing colors).

But C1 is quite expensive...

For pictures shot in good light (and for further editing), I use PS CS 6 : results are excellent.

--
André

 

[MarcoGV]

hi guys, just received mine. for $180 including 2 batteries and one 10-30mm lens, I couldn't pass it up

Where did you find it at that price?

 

[zzzxtreme]

oh I bought it used in malaysia

 

[Laagwater]

Like you i also got a J5 very cheap this week to use besides my V1. What a fun camera to use and like André , i especially like it with the 6.7-13mm. Great sensor and a big improvement to the V1. Sometimes i miss the viewfinder but i like its compactness.

Mostly i'm photographing with a Sony A7 combined with a lot of old lenses. I've tried the V1 and J5 with some of them, but the Nikon 1 are obviously not made for it. I only like it combined with a Sigma 300/4 apo macrolens because of the 2.7 crop.

Only con for me is that the J5 is so plasticy. It really feels that it's not built to last for a long time.

What software are you guys using for converting the NEFs from the J5? I always used captureNX2 for the V1 NEFs but that is not working for the J5. I have tried Capture NX-D but i find it only useful for changing a picturecontrol setting. My best bet for now is DXO Photolab...

Have fun with your J5,

Edwin

Hi Edwin,

To convert my raw files (I shoot only raw), I use DxO for low light pictures: its Prime NR engine does wonders. But I'm not entirely satisfied with the color rendering.

I'm currently running Capture One trial version: the results look excellent (the NR engine is not as good as DxO, but it seems C1 renders more details, and more pleasing colors).

But C1 is quite expensive...

For pictures shot in good light (and for further editing), I use PS CS 6 : results are excellent.

Hi André, thank you for your answer. For my Sony Raws i also use DXO and i like it a lot. Great noise reduction indeed and I also like their DXO viewpoint. (perspective correction) I have tried Capture 1 for my Sony RAWs also and the colours looked indeed better but it only works for Sony. For the moment i will use Photolab for conversion and like you, use CS6 for further editing...

 

[RussellP]

I use apple photos which deals with NEF raw files easily. I have a number of plugins including DXO to get the prime NR and luminar to get their amazing Boost function that does shadow and highlights at the same time.

 

[mmartel]

Andre, have you tried any of the other color profiles in DXO? I find several more pleasing than the default rendering. In particular, I like the DXO One profile and the Fujifilm Astia. You might experiment and find one you like as well. They have Canon, Leica, Hasselblad, and more. Good luck!