Nikon AW-1 - First waterproof digital Interchangeable Camera

Caporegime
Joined
25 Jul 2005
Posts
28,851
Location
Canada
http://www.dpreview.com/previews/nikon-1-aw1

I only found out about this yesterday, I think it was announced last month. It looks very interesting!

Based on the J3 so not the best IQ but leaps and bounds above the waterproof compacts available and much less bulky than putting a non waterproof camera in a case.

Having seen that Nikonos cameras were eventually designed to be waterproof down to 100m the next version could be very interesting. Hopefully we also see some of the other manufacturers trying to compete as well.

Has anyone tried one of these yet? I'm going kayaking and snorkelling a few times in the next few months and this could be the option to choose, although if is pretty expensive as a second low use camera...
 
It does seem to have had some good previews, I'm hoping there will be a proper review shortly, especially of it's underwater abilities and whether it can actually survive a good dunking. It would be very good if someone who actually knew what they were talking about did that bit, there's a lot of conjecture on the DP article as to what it'll be like, although half the comment seem to be dismissing it because you can't change the lense underwater..
 
Nikon are releasing a strobe for it early next year.

It's not going to be a great diving camera as it is now (although they are releasing a housing AFAIK) but for those diving to shallow depths, snorkelling, sailing, kayaking etc. on and in the water this should be a great camera. No more needing to use a rubbish compact with no RAW capability.

I think I'm pretty much decided on this camera now, however waiting to see what Nikon say about warranty if it gets water ingress... Someone on another forum took one to the Maldives and it leaked...
 
Copied from another forum but I thought I'd post it here as well for reference. :)

Back from the Philippines (well back for about 3 weeks but anyway...)

Both cameras survived and I'm pretty impressed. I was initially a bit wary about taking mine into the water but it was fine in the end. It was put through its paces with a week of being rested on the top of a sprayskirt, constantly getting splashed and coated in sea water alongside multiple snorkelling trips of up to an hour. It wasn't cleaned properly for the entire week it was in use, with just a small bottle of water poured over mine after every prolonged dunking.

I made sure all the seals were clean before shutting them and greased the O ring before we got on the water. No leaks, although lots of condensation at various times. The condensation on both cameras was almost exclusively on the inside of the screen, although the GF's lens misted up once. It seemed, much like K9simons, that most of the condensation was above the water, I think when it got warm in the sun after having a dunking. There were also occasional weird bits of condensation underwater when there were air bubbles on the outside of the screen (and also when there were water drops on the screen above water). I don't think there is any lasting damage though so I'm not planning on sending them off to Nikon, although I may do a bit of research before I fully make my mind up.

It was a great little camera to use though, although the lack of viewfinder was/is off-putting. It makes it feel much more like a point and shoot camera. I had to spend a lot of time slowing myself down when taking shots because they were ending up more like snaps than the DSLR. IQ is good, little noisy at high ISO compared to the D7000 but that is to be expected considering the size of the sensor. What I did notice was the slowness of the lens. After a long time shooting with f/2.8 zoom lenses going back to 3.5-5.6 was a pain! If they release an AW version of an f/2.8 lens then I would consider swapping to that. On the other hand I did find the lens was a jack of all trades, master of none, not quite wide enough for most landscape shots and not quite long enough to get good portraits. A standard kit lens then. The lack of Bokeh was offputting as well, although for landscape not having to worry about aperture was quite nice. I guess that's the negative of a CSC though. I knew there would be more D0F but didn't realise it would be that extreme! The RAW output images are remarkably low contrast, or at least they are in LR5. I had to use high contrast to get the images up to similar contrasts to the D7000, but that's not an issue in the slightest.

Battery life was slap bang on the quoted life all over the net. Around 200 shots. The third party batteries worked just as well as the official one. I didn't end up using all of my 5 batteries in the end but I did get to charge them to full strength again on the second night. It was definitely nice not having to worry too much about running out of juice though, although with 200 shots it invariably ended up dying just after it had got wet and we still had a way to go before stopping again... I'm not sure it it was just the third party batteries (i'm sure one of the official ones did this as well) but the charge reporting in camera didn't seem to be great. It would show full battery for ages then go to half and then to none within what seemed like a few shots. Each battery seemed to be different though, including the official ones.

I didn't really have many problems reading/viewing the screen underwater although there were some times it was difficult to see. The hydrophobic coating on the front of the lens is pretty impressive. even dunked regularly in sea water there was hardly a mark or drip that needed cleaning off. I did have a CPL on it most of the time but that showed how good it was. I was forever cleaning the smears off the CPS (both sides). The electronic spirit level came in handy. When you're rocking backwards and forwards in a boat with no idea what is horizontal and vertical it made flat horizons very easy. What I didn't like was the grid option.... it's 4x4! Why stick a 4x4 grid on a camera?

The video was the biggest letdown IMO. It reminded me of going back to my dads old miniDV camera from 10 years ago. I made the mistake of using 60i and the tearing is awful. The lack of contrast in the RAWs shows here as well. You definitely need to edit it before using/showing it. On the other hand it could just be my inability to shoot video! I'm a little disappointed though considering the quality straight out of the camera of the D7000. I'm going to play with the video we got and see if I can edit into something good though.

It's a great little camera and I plan on using it when I can't be bothered/don't have space to take my DSLR out. It's certainly not going to replace it any time soon though! That is after I've managed to clean all the salt off of it. It's stubborn stuff, especially around the hinges of the compartments (more white staining than anything else).

Anyway, enough jabbering!

Examples of images can be seen in my philippines thread.
 
Back
Top Bottom