Nikon Coolpix 8800 and preview

[3dGameMan]

Nikon Coolpix 8800 and preview: >>>> (http://www.dpreview.com/articles/nikoncp8800/)

http://www.dpreview.com/articles/NikonCP8800/Images/frontview-001.jpg http://www.dpreview.com/articles/NikonCP8800/Images/construction.jpg

The Coolpix 8800 was announced along with the 8400 and 4800 on the 16th September in the run-up to Photokina 2004. It's the first ten times optical zoom eight megapixel digital camera and it's also Nikon's first consumer digital camera with Vibration Reduction technology. The 8800 takes the 8700's design and engine and builds on it, on top of the new lens and Vibration Reduction there are a whole raft of new features and improvements which are also shared by the Coolpix 8400 (the two cameras are virtually identical apart from their lens and body design).

Major changes since the Coolpix 8700
New 10x optical zoom lens (35 - 350 mm equiv.; F2.6 - F4.9)
Vibration Reduction stabilization system
New 'Extra' JPEG compression (larger JPEG, lower compression)
Movie clips at VGA 30 fps up to 60 sec, QVGA limited only by storage
Maximum sensitivity now ISO 400
Exposure mode dial
Removal of play / record switch
Nine focus areas in manual area select, five areas in auto
Additional scene modes: Museum, Sports, Dusk / Dawn
AF Assist lamp on camera body instead of pop-up flash
Maximum shutter speed down to 1/3000 sec from 1/4000 sec
Continuous shooting down to 2.3 fps from 2.5 fps
Flash range up to 6.0 m at wide angle (compared to 4.1 m) - Auto ISO
Flash hot-shoe supports i-TTL and flash zoom
Playback zoom up to 10x
Included Infrared remote control
No Compact Flash card included
USB 2.0 Hi-Speed
Higher capacity Lithium-Ion battery (8.1 Wh vs. 5.0 Wh)

[abb1]

Nice!! I still have to see a proper preview, but it looks like this is the one to beat when it comes to 8mpxl all in ones :Thumb . I know that a lot of the other ones had problems with image quality and purple fringing but lets see how this one will do!

[CyberGuy]

It's ok, but still prefer my Olympus C8080

http://www.cyberzen.ca/imgs/frontview-001.jpg

Really sweet digicam. :Thumb

The Nikon has improved their lens by quite a bit, but at the expense of performance.

[abb1]

The Nikon has improved their lens by quite a bit, but at the expense of performance.The only sacrifice in performance I see is that the ISO sensitivity has been reduced from 800 to 400. NONE of the 8mp all in ones have usable ISO's after ISO 400 anyways. Image quality at higher ISO's is the reason that I would never buy one of these. Read the reviews of any 8mp camera as with the image quality at high ISO's, including yours- they are all crap. The reason that they limited the ISO to 400 is because that is it's limit. The increase in the optical zoom is nice. I still would like to see a comparable review of this camera compared to others in it's class so that the image quality can be compared.

[JCYC5]

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the Nikon came out best, due to the great lens they use.

But then again, at that sensor size...

[egarrard]

It's ok, but still prefer my Olympus C8080

http://www.cyberzen.ca/imgs/frontview-001.jpg

Really sweet digicam. :Thumb

The Nikon has improved their lens by quite a bit, but at the expense of performance.Booo! Olympus. Boooo! Give us an OM-mount digicam! Even if it has a 4/3 sensor...

[abb1]

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the Nikon came out best, due to the great lens they use.

But then again, at that sensor size...They are all great lenses! The Canon Pro1 uses their 'L' lense whereas the Sony F828 uses the Carl Zeiss 'T' lense. Both of these lenses are amongst the best! The problem with these 8mp all in ones is the size of their sensor. This creates noisy image quality at anything higher than the default ISO setting. This is totally unacceptable for me as I frequently use higher ISO settings indoors and in low light.

[CyberGuy]

Yeah abb, I know what you mean with noisy ISO 400. Though my film SLRs (Nikon & Canon) had the same problem with ISO 400 film. Sadly you cant get away from grain (film) and noise (digital) when dealing with higher ISO settings like 400. For a prosumer camera in this class I expect it to see a certain amount of grain / noise. I'm not sure the DSLRs are much better at it though.

The good thing with the Olympus and Nikon is these are relatively fast lenses with f2.4 & f2.6 arpertures. You can open them nice & wide for low light at a lower ISO setting. You usually pay serious money for zoom lenses of those speeds and ranges on a DSLR.

A roundup of the 8mp cameras would be cool for sure.

[tanman_sg]

Booo! Olympus. Boooo! Give us an OM-mount digicam! Even if it has a 4/3 sensor...


I've been saying that for years!!!

Cause I got all these lenses here and the costs of developing film back over in NZ are too much.

[abb1]

Yeah abb, I know what you mean with noisy ISO 400. Though my film SLRs (Nikon & Canon) had the same problem with ISO 400 film. Sadly you cant get away from grain (film) and noise (digital) when dealing with higher ISO settings like 400. For a prosumer camera in this class I expect it to see a certain amount of grain / noise. I'm not sure the DSLRs are much better at it though.
The sensor is much smaller on the Dslr's which results in much less noise at higher ISO's. On my Digital Rebel, I can shoot at ISO 1600 and have the same noise than an 8mp prosumer at ISO400. I shot a picture at ISO 3200 with an acceptable amount of noise. I even posted it in a thread here (I forget which one though), and people were amazed at the amount of noise on the DSLR's at high ISO settings. If you want to see some samples, just let me know :KICK ASS

[JCYC5]

Yeah abb, I know what you mean with noisy ISO 400. Though my film SLRs (Nikon & Canon) had the same problem with ISO 400 film. Sadly you cant get away from grain (film) and noise (digital) when dealing with higher ISO settings like 400. For a prosumer camera in this class I expect it to see a certain amount of grain / noise. I'm not sure the DSLRs are much better at it though.

The good thing with the Olympus and Nikon is these are relatively fast lenses with f2.4 & f2.6 arpertures. You can open them nice & wide for low light at a lower ISO setting. You usually pay serious money for zoom lenses of those speeds and ranges on a DSLR.

A roundup of the 8mp cameras would be cool for sure.

You wouldnt' believe how nice my D70's ISO1600 photos are.

As for the fast lens, I guess it works for these prosumer cameras... after all, the sensor size prevents dramatic Depth of Field like on a SLR with a, say, 105mm Macro...

[CyberGuy]

Ok, if you are going to compare DSLRs against a fixed-lens prosumer, then you are both absolutely right. The DSLR is going to kick the prosumer's butt up 'n down the street. As I said, I wasn't sure about the dslr ISO handling. In sensor size, ISO handling and shot-to-shot performance the dslr wins hands down. BUT you are going to pay for that privilege.

Sure I could have picked up a digital rebel for about the same price as the Olympus and Nikon prosumers, but I would have had to take a crappy lens with it. A decent lens with the Nikon's capability would cost about the same as the camera body. One with the olympus's capability would set you back about 3/4 the body cost. While I like to take nice shots and have full manual control over them, I am not into it that deep. For the price 4 months ago, the olympus was the best I could get. After the 6 months of research I did on all of the prosumers at that time, I still stand by that.