The successor to the two-year-old D3 has a seven-stop IOS range of 200 to 12,800, plus three further boost settings that allow photographers to capture images up to an unprecedented ISO equivalent of 102,400. Even at this extreme setting, judging from images BJP saw from pre-production samples at an exclusive European press preview at St Andrews last week, noise takes on a relatively natural, filmic look that would be usable for some applications, and results shot at ISO12,800 were particularly impressive.
The focus on ISO performance confirms that Nikon is sticking with its strategy of recent years, concentrating on more functional features such as low light shooting with its all-purpose, action-oriented cameras, and reserving higher pixel counts for its studio cameras, such as its current flagship, the D3x.
