Like the D100, the D70 works with a wide array of Speedlight external flashes and Nikon F-mount lenses, though naturally, you'll benefit most from the latest and greatest versions. Before pairing older Nikon equipment with the D70, research the exact feature trade-offs you'll be making. Also, the D70 doesn't support the D100's add-on battery pack, so you can't get a vertical shutter release, a 10-pin accessory plug, or voice-annotation capability.
The D70's feature set does suffer from two important omissions. First, despite the enormous number of possible setting combinations, there's no way to save custom configurations, though the camera will remember the last parameters you used. Even more annoying, Nikon charges you for its Capture software. You need that application to adjust images without degrading them and batch-process files--the real benefits of shooting NEF (Nikon Electronic File) RAW photos. The supplied Picture Project program just lets you organise your shots and perform simple RAW-file conversion.
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 Even after we'd shot more than a thousand photos, the Nikon D70's 1,400mAh lithium-ion battery remained at full power. In a pinch, the camera can take three CRV2 lithium cells instead. |
Overall, the Nikon D70 performs just as well as its dSLR competitors. When we used the 18mm-to-70mm lens included in the kit, the typical shutter lag was a minimal 0.4 second, just about 0.2 second longer than the Canon EOS 300D. Thanks to that short delay, the camera got from power-on to the first snap in an exceptional 0.6 second. At a hair less than 1 second for high-quality JPEG photos and a hair more for RAW files, shot-to-shot time was closer to average, and the lengthy flash recycle dragged it out to 3 seconds, a relatively mediocre result.
Terrific continuous shooting, however, really distinguishes the D70 from the prosumer pack. Capturing best-quality JPEG photos to a 32x Lexar CompactFlash card, the camera took the first 20 shots at 1.6 frames per second, then dropped to a steady 1.4fps. Other models are quicker, but with the D70, you trade a little speed for a lot of frames, and we think that's a fair deal. More importantly, you get to choose the number of shots; you just lower the resolution to snap faster. For example, set to VGA resolution, the D70 maintained a consistent rate of almost 19fps. But we wish that zippy performance extended to the RAW format. Continuous drive was at its worst when we shot in RAW or RAW and JPEG simultaneously: the camera captured the photos at 3.2fps before slowing to 0.2fps.
The D70's autofocus is quite accurate, and as you can tell from the minimal shutter lag, it acts fast, though in low-contrast scenes, it occasionally hunts for something to lock on. Most cameras have the same trouble.
A comfy rubber eyecup surrounds the nice-size, bright viewfinder. Inside, the display shows focus and exposure information, as well as the number of photos the buffer can still hold. Though the D70 doesn't allow you to swap focusing screens, it can throw up a grid to help you align the horizon and compose your shots. When we discuss digital-camera photo quality, we're not given to superlatives, but the Nikon D70, which we tested in conjunction with the company's 18mm-to-70mm DX lens, tempts us to slip in a breathless comment or two. Overall, the D70's images are some of the best we've seen to date from a consumer-priced model. They're sharp, with excellent exposure and dynamic range, accurate colors, neutral white balance, extremely low noise levels, and practically no fringing or other artifacts.
The D70's light-sensitivity range begins at a high ISO 200, but while that would normally raise our doubts, this camera produces surprisingly good photos even at its maximum setting of ISO 1,600.
 The D70's ISO 1,600 photos compare favorably with the ISO 400 and ISO 800 shots of many other digital cameras. |
Nevertheless, the D70's image quality falls short of perfection. Despite a tendency to underexpose, the camera manages to blow out the detail in some highlight areas. It also displays a bit of subtle lateral chromatic aberration, which shows up as cyan and magenta fringing at high-contrast edges. In photos of our test scene, the focus dropped off radically toward the foreground, but then again, that shot has a large depth of field, and we snap it relatively close-up. The focus problem appeared far less severe in pictures we took in the field, in part because those more typical, real-world situations were photographed from farther away and had less detail in the close foreground.
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| One of the few quibbles we have with the D70 is its propensity to blow out highlights (top), even in fairly easy exposures (bottom). | |
Additional editing by Michael Parsons
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john winstanley 29 August 2005
Good: Image quality, usability, build, battery life
Bad: Viewfinder, no preview
Comment: A great piece of kit for the price, but do shoot in RAW. Use Rawshooter by Pixmantic to edit images. You'll be amazed when you do, you won't use JPEG format again. I also mainly use it in manual mode. I get creative control far better that way and it's easy to use in that mode too. Battery life is very good too, but get a spare as you'll get caught out when the battery does die. The firmware upgrade available online is worth getting as it gives many of the benefits of the D70S without the cost. I know six other people who have this camera and are as happy as I am.
Jah Womble 17 May 2005
Good: Solid feel, long battery, fantastic image quality
Bad: ISO dial not shown on display
Comment: Take time to understand it - it really is a very, very good camera that will last you years.
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