NIKON D4 announced

Or leaf shutters but the idea of an SLR with leaf shutter was abandoned decades ago.
 
hsuffyan said:
Although I'm not a Nikon user, I am disappointed to hear that the max flash sync speed for D4 is only 1/250. For such a high end body, I think a lot of event and wedding photographers could do with 1/500 sync. The 5DII only syncs at 1/200 which is a pain in the backside if you are trying to balance a bright background against a dark foreground. You have to lower your ISO/aperture and dump more juice out of your flash or carry an ND filter.
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FP High Speed Sync :)
 
gpa said:
FP High Speed Sync :)
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Yes, but thats flash dependent not camera specific. To get to the equivalent of 1/500 sync and dumping a 580ex at full power, will require a massively more powerful flash to do the same in high speed sync
 
hsuffyan said:
Yes, but thats flash dependent not camera specific. To get to the equivalent of 1/500 sync and dumping a 580ex at full power, will require a massively more powerful flash to do the same in high speed sync
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Use pocket wizards' Hypersync mode?
 
Just noticed good old Thom now has his review piece on the D4 up:

http://bythom.com/d4intro.htm

Worth a read - as are pretty much all of his articles I find.
 
I've only speed read it, but one thing that stood out was that the control functions have a different layout to the D3/3s, which he says
make shooting both simultaneously a bit of a problem
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That might rule it out for me for a while, (might buy a half decent car, for a change, instead) :)
 
treeman said:
I've only speed read it, but one thing that stood out was that the control functions have a different layout to the D3/3s, which he says
That might rule it out for me for a while, (might buy a half decent car, for a change, instead) :)
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Na - just grab 2 x D4s :clap:
 
Things that stood out for me:-

  • New battery type, more expensive, less capacity.
  • No dual card slot (different card types).
  • On the sensor - "we have an outstanding question at the moment of better, same, or worse than the D3s"
 
gramps said:
Things that stood out for me:-


[*]New battery type, more expensive, less capacity.
[*]No dual card slot (different card types).
[*]On the sensor - "we have an outstanding question at the moment of better, same, or worse than the D3s"
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The battery type is due to new laws in Japan apparently. The Nikon D4 does accept the new type of ultra fast card though! The sensor appears to be better specced, slightly faster, better low light, better video, etc
 
I trust Mr Hogan despite being a self confessed Nikonite he pulls no punches... but not quite sure what it is he expects for Nikon to provide to illustrate his point about the sensor?

Unless he means side by side comparison shots to illustrate visible noise?

Maybe I will email him and ask what it is he's looking for?
 
jacob12_1993 said:
The Nikon D4 does accept the new type of ultra fast card though!
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Yes but one of each doesn't really seem helpful to me, I can only imagine that the 'next' D4 version will have dual compatible slots.

desantnik said:
Maybe I will email him and ask what it is he's looking for?
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Good idea.
I think there will be two classes of Nikonites who can afford this camera, the first will rush to get it just because it's new, the second will think "do I need a compromise edition?" and wait to see what happens next.
 
Well, Mr Hogan is very chatty via email - have enjoyed batting a few emails back and forth this afternoon/evening :)

In answer to the question " what you think Nikon didn't say about the D4's
sensor,what do you think they should have shown? Side by side shots of D3S vs D4 at different ISO's? Is it noise you are concerned about with the increase in pixels?"

Thom said:

they're now saying "one stop better than the D3s," but in a way
that is very couched. From what I've seen of images so far, I'd say one stop
worse visually, or back to D3 levels.

High ISO is a tricky subject. There are far more variables involved than
usually get talked about. One thing I see in the D4 samples is color
reduction, for example.

As to why the didn't say anything very specific, it's probably because it
isn't the clear win the D3 was at the time, or that the D3s was over the D3.
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I asked him what he meant by "color reduction" (because I didn't know!):

As you amplify low level data you get tonal ramps in all the color channels
that have gaps in them. And you might get noisy data, too. What you'll see
in pushing a camera up through ISO values is that contrast changes and color
fidelity changes. The D3/D3s are the best of the bunch at high ISO values,
and by a considerable margin.
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So I followed that up by asking if what he described there went against the claim of higher dynamic range in the D4:

No, higher dynamic range is a big can of worms. What most people mean by DR
these days seems to be the engineering definition: max saturation minus 1:1
SN ratio. Unfortunately, SN 1:1 is unusable. And DR is highest only on the
lowest ISO (or the real base ;~).

The D3/D3s have very clean high ISOs. The breakdown of data is very gradual,
and a lot of that has to do with the way the D3/D3s do the electron gain
prior to the ADC and apparently in a unique way. The D4 goes back to the
on-sensor ADC and traditional gain. The problem is that in very low light
(which is why you're boosting ISO in the first place usually) there aren't a
lot of photons being converted to electrons. When you push that count up via
a gain and then amplify it (for high ISO) bad things start to happen.
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Thom clearly has a much better grasp of camera tech than I do (!!!!) and I'm not afraid to admit it... I *think* I understand what he is saying to mean that there are a lot of large technical question marks about D3 vs D4 performance that even now will only be answered with hands on evaluation and that there is a fair chance the D3S might be the pick of the crop...
 
Interesting indeed, and a bit of a bitter sweet feeling. I dont profess for 1 second to understand what hes talking about, but it doesnt sound too good. I wonder if the noise issues is to do with the increase in MP? It would be a shame if that was it, as there's nothing wrong with 12.8MP of the D3s.
 
I can understand a bit about of what he saying,will have to wait and see when more reviews come out :)
 
The D4 vs D3s comparison will be very interesting. Personally I hope the D4 is a corker, might help me find a nice D3s is a year or so. Deciding to add 4mp at the possible expense of low light performance (even if the performance is the same) would be an interesting design decision.
 
The only high res images ive seen so far are no better than a D3S and the majority of those images have been taken in daylight so whats the point.
 
Joe McNally posted a new blog yesterday remarking on high ISO performance of modern cameras, in particularly the D4 which we all know he's been testing for a few weeks. He spoke of the great performance at 12,800 which certainly sounds promising.

Personally I only desire that high iso performance is on par with the D3s which considering the increased sensor density is a considerable enhancement alone. Coupled with much improved video and reworked AF makes it a lot more desirable than the D3s IMHO.
 
Send one for Gary to test I say.

Can we petition Nikon for this?

He can be out 'Birstall One'.

Actually that sounds a bit too much like 'Borstal' which I hear Gary went to as well. :D
 
Well, at the moment, I'm in no hurry to change. I keep reading and will continue to. But so far I'm keeping what i've got.
 
Yes I saw the Galbraith interview.

What is great is that we shouldn't't have too much longer to see it in action and also to see who has (if any) the bragging rights against the 1Dx.

Personally I reckon they will both be superb.
 
kalibre said:
I give up, the dude just don't get it.

As for the comment about not having to change lenses in egypt, well I guess you've found the worlds first 10-500 1.2 lens with pro quality optics that can do everything. Congrats.

(why don't Nikon just make one lens anyway????)
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I found a 24-120mm lens is perfectly fine for the Nile River trip and all other places we saw as well.

Realspeed
 
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FedEx has just been!

d4box.jpg


Playtime! :)
 
Very pleasantly surprised to see that they've included a 16GB XQD card and a card reader in the box... wasn't expecting that!
 
Pete is rigging up his camcorder for his un-boxing video as I type. :lol:

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on it.
 
C'mon Keith post some samples, even the box looks good!!

I saw the thing about the XQD card elsewhere and I bet loads of peeps will be chuffed by that alone.
 
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Best to leave them overnight!

:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:

Have fun with the new camera and be sure to post back some real life pictures so people can talk about something else about dire high ISO 100% crops shot in studios. ;)
 
Why do you need to charge it fully?.....I have never understood that.
 
With all the new canon's and nikon's about to hit the shelves we need a new thread "Show us your shutter count #1 image"
 
Enjoy it Keith. Been told that I wont get mine until 25th March or early April. :'(


Kev.
 
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