Camera review
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LEFT Continuous shooting of 5.5 frames-per- second helped capture the best moment at this zebra crossing. ABOVE AND BELOW Low- light performance is excellent, and there was no problem in pushing ISO sensitivity to 6400 (below) or 12,800 (above).
Flagship quality When it comes to the insides of the camera, there’s nothing retro about the Df, although it could still be considered a bit of a fusion – not of new and old, but a combination of elements from all of Nikon’s other full-frame DSLRs. The sensor is the same as in the D4, and while Nikon points out that this makes it flagship quality, you can’t get away from the fact that next to the resolutions of the D610 and D800, the Df’s 16 megapixels look relatively meagre. This may make for relatively limited resolving power, but it’s worth bearing in mind the advantages. Obviously files are smaller and easier to work with, but there’s another plus – the camera’s compatible with and positively encourages use of old film lenses, and a pixel count like the D800’s 36 million could reveal the shortcomings of such optics. Flagship focusing doesn’t accompany the sensor in the Df, and instead you get the same 39-point system as in the D610. This provides dense coverage in the centre of the frame, and it’s as speedy and reliable as you’d expect. For me, it only ever struggled in extremely low light, and this perhaps reveals a shortcoming of the technological mix – the Df’s ISO capabilities, which match the D4’s, mean it can take excellent-quality images in light levels that are so low it struggles to focus. The D4’s focusing system has an extra EV of sensitivity, and I can’t help feeling that the Df would benefit from this too. There’s a variety of continuous AF modes that offer an array of different solutions for keeping moving subjects in focus. This includes 3D tracking AF, but as with most tracking AF systems, I found this was easily confused and hit-and-miss as to whether it would follow your chosen subject. Much more effective in my opinion is dynamic area AF, which uses a number of surrounding AF points to keep your subject in focus should it wander temporarily from your selected point. The coverage of this can be varied to either 9, 21 or 39 AF points.
Auto white-balance only really had problems with mixed light sources, but the system includes a couple of neat features that really helped when it didn’t get it quite right. You have the option of fine-tuning the AWB setting to add either more blue or more yellow with the WB button and sub- command dial, ideal if you just want to add or take away a little warmth. The highlight though is the Spot White Balance function for setting a custom balance. You just specify a point in the image in Live View that you want to be neutral to set a custom value, and this is stored as the preset value when you switch back to viewfinder mode. It makes it quick and easy to get the white-balance absolutely spot on. The Df feature set does have a couple of notable absences. It joins the D4 as the only other Nikon without a pop-up flash, so there’s no wireless control of off-camera units, but it is compatible with Nikon’s creative lighting system with a wireless adaptor and has a PC socket for a sync cable. There’s also no video recording – this makes sense in a camera designed to enhance the experience of stills photographers, but at this price, its absence doesn’t make you feel you’ve saved money from not having a feature you never use. One other disappointing feature of the Df is the single SD card slot – the three other Nikon full- frame DSLRs all have dual card slots. The single slot is positioned alongside the battery compartment in the bottom of the camera, which may help keep the body size down, but it’s an arrangement you’d more often associate with a compact, and hinders quick memory card changes, especially on a tripod. Speaking of the battery, the pack in the Df is different from those in the other current Nikon full- frame models, and is the same smaller cell as that used in the D5300. This might be annoying if you use the Df in tandem with another Nikon full-frame body because you can’t interchange batteries, but it has a longer claimed life of about 1400 shots. For us, it delivered just short of 1000 shots – most of which were in temperatures below 10˚C.
There’s nothing retro about the insides of the Df, although it could still be considered a bit of a fusion
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Issue 4 | Photography News
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