360Photography

Introduction

At long last, it’s here – the Nikon D780, successor to the D750 that was released more than five years ago. At the time, we considered the D750 as one of the most well-rounded digital cameras ever made, and it remains highly capable even today. So, to put it lightly, the new model has some big shoes to fill.

We’ve just received a full-production D780 and have gotten a start on our full review. As we work through our testing, we figured we’d take a look at the D780’s design, handling, and some of its high-level updates.

New BSI sensor

The heart of any digital camera is its sensor, and the unit in the D780 looks to be a good one. With 24MP, it’s not a megapixel monster, but should offer enough resolution for most users and most use cases. It’s now backside-illuminated, which is nice to have but doesn’t offer the same image quality benefits on large, full-frame sensors as it does on smaller ones. No, the real news is that it’s a dual-gain design. This means that, at the lowest ISO values, you can get maximum dynamic range out of the sensor, while higher ISO values give you better noise performance.

The sensor is also capable of 4K video, and the D780 can shoot silent bursts at up to 12 fps. We’ll be taking a look at rolling shutter as we push through our full review.

New shutter and mirror mechanism

Being a DSLR, a mirror sits in front of the sensor most of the time and redirects light up to an optical viewfinder. The D780’s sensor and mirror mechanism have been redesigned, boosting burst speeds modestly up to 7 fps from 6.5. The redesigns also enable a minimum mechanical shutter speed of 1/8000 sec (the D750 could only reach 1/4000 sec). Unfortunately, the flash sync speed remains at 1/200 sec; many competing high-end models can reach 1/250 sec or even 1/320 sec.

And, speaking of flash…

Removal of pop-up flash and top-plate design

That’s right, Nikon’s removed the built-in pop-up flash that was on the previous model. While Nikon says this makes it easier to weather-seal the D780 to a higher degree, it also means that you no longer have that built-in flash for some quick fill-light when you need it. For strobists, the removal of the flash also means that you need a separate dedicated transmitter (or another speedlight) to wirelessly control Nikon’s speedlights using its Creative Lighting System.

On the top plate, we see an LCD info panel that is about the same as you’d see on the D750. There’s been some button shuffling, though; gone on the right side by the power switch is the dedicated metering button, though an ISO button has been added. Lastly, the mode dial has been simplified with fewer options.

Rear design and controls

While the rear of the camera might look familiar, there are a few substantive changes. There’s the addition of a dedicated AF-ON button, and the relocation of the live view and stills / video switch to the top of the plate near the viewfinder for easier access. The ‘i’ and INFO buttons have swapped sides of the camera as well, so if you pick up a D780 and are a long time D750 user, prepare to reprogram your muscle memory just a bit.

Oh, and if you’ve ever lost your Nikon DK-21 eyecup for your D750, we have some good news – it seems like the DK-31 eyecup for the D780 is attached a bit more securely, and we haven’t lost ours (yet).

Optical viewfinder and autofocus system

And so, despite the bit of button shuffling, it looks like much of Nikon’s mantra with the D780 was ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’ In that vein, the optical viewfinder is identical to the previous model’s: same pentaprism design, 0.7x magnification, and autofocus layout with 51 points clustered around the center of the frame.

Indeed, after our experience with ever-more-capable mirrorless cameras over the past five years, we’re starting to find the spread of DSLR autofocus points a bit constricting. But hey – if you’ve been using a D750 for the past five years, well, at least it’ll be familiar, if not a huge upgrade.

All that said, you can expect at least an increase in accuracy and tracking performance, courtesy of an upgraded 180k-pixel metering sensor and AF algorithms derived from the D5 sports camera. We’ll be digging into these in our full review to find out just how significant these updates are.

Rear touchscreen and live view

The D780 retains a similar tilting screen mechanism that its predecessor had – and I have to be honest, when I first used a D750 professionally, I was pretty stoked at tilting the screen out and not having to lay down on my stomach in the dirt for low angle shots. But I digress.

In consideration of all the D780 offers, this is where the most significant updates lie. Sure, the screen has been updated to 2.36M dots (up from 1.23M), and offers touch functionality for shooting, playback and menus. But the real story is that once you switch the D780 into live view, you effectively have a bulkier, F-mount Nikon Z6 in your hands.

You get the Z6’s 273 on-sensor phase-detection AF points (compared to the slow, ‘hunty’ contrast detection of the D750) and the same AF tap-to-track functionality for both stills and video. And speaking of video, the D780 is capable of 4K video, which we’d wager will look an awful lot like what the Z6 is capable of (in other words, pretty darn good).

The one gripe we have with the touchscreen is that you can’t drag your finger across it with your eye to the viewfinder to move your AF point around (and this was included on Nikon’s D5600 DSLR as well as countless mirrorless models from other manufacturers).

Dual UHS-II SD card slots

Moving on, we can see that the Nikon has resisted moving the D780 to the XQD format seen on Nikon’s Z-mount cameras, instead offering dual UHS-II SD card slots (an upgrade from the UHS-I slots on the D750). Whether you prefer the more ubiquitous SD card format or not, at least we can breathe a collective sigh of relief that there will be somewhat fewer “NO DUAL CARD SLOTS NO BUY NOT PROFESSIONAL GRR” comments floating around the internet.*

And while we haven’t yet tested the buffer depth of the D780, it was a bit limited on the D750, and was regarded as one of that camera’s weak points. We’re hopeful that the faster slots on the D780 will enable longer burst-shooting for sports and action photographers.

*(In all seriousness, the D750 made for a great wedding camera, which is a use-case where dual card slots have an obvious benefit – we’re happy the D780 continues to offer them.)

Battery, no grip

One area that has generated a barrage of bilious bloviating is the D780’s apparent lack of compatibility with an add-on vertical grip. The bottom-plate of the camera is where we would usually see a small rubberized door hiding some electrical contacts that enable the camera to use additional controls present on most vertical battery grips. Without those, the most we can hope for is a grip like this one for the Z series, which boosts battery life but doesn’t do much else.

At the very least, the D780 is CIPA rated to 2260 shots through the optical finder on a single EN-EL15b battery, which is over than a thousand shots more than the D750 could manage. That’s pretty impressive.

Ports and connectivity

Further related to battery life, the D780 gains a USB Type C port, which can also charge the camera if you have the EN-EL15b battery installed. The previous EN-EL15a and EN-EL15 batteries will power the camera, but they cannot be charged over USB. It should also allow for faster data transfers, as well as better tethering support.

In terms of wireless data transfers, the D780 now supports Bluetooth as well as Wi-Fi using Nikon’s SnapBridge wireless system. It’s become quite a capable system and is a far cry from the original WMU mobile app that users had to contend with on the D750.

There’s also a mini HDMI port, which supports 10-bit 4:2:2 4K video output (just like the Nikon Z6), as well as a remote port and microphone and headphone ports. If you have a stabilized lens, a gimbal or plan to use a tripod a lot, the D780 should make for a pretty capable DSLR video rig.

The wrap

By now it should be apparent that, in creating the D780, Nikon has chosen not to mess with the basics of what made the D750 a great camera. We still have a reasonably compact DSLR body with a comfortable grip and well-sorted ergonomics, burst shooting that is likely fast enough for most people, and what is looking to be a really capable viewfinder autofocus system. With the addition of 4K video, a smoother live view experience, a touchscreen and better wireless connectivity, they’ve only really updated the things that really needed updating.

Does that make the D780 a particularly exciting camera? I suspect it will be pretty exciting for a fairly small subset of users (particularly those with large collections of F-mount lenses). But it does help guarantee that, just like the D750, the D780 will likely remain relevant as a reliable workhorse for pros and enthusiasts for many years to come.

And if you’re a D750 user that still can’t decide whether or not to upgrade, watch this space – we’ll be publishing an article dedicated to just that very soon.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)