Sharpness

Sharpness at 10mm

The sharpness tests for this review were carried out with the Nikon 1 Nikkor 10-30mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens attached to a Nikon 1 V1 camera body, which in turn was mounted on a sturdy tripod. The self-timer was activated to avoid any blurring from depressing the shutter release. Tonal and colour variances across the crops are due to changes in natural light during the session. The 100% crops represent about 1/250th of the total frame area.

The full frame at 10mm

At the 10mm zoom setting, the centre is sharpest at f/4, just a notch down from wide open. The f/5.6 setting is not far behind but diffraction starts to visibly degrade the image. The f/8 setting is  usable but f/11 and especially f/16 are best avoided.

The extreme borders are visibly softer than the centre, with sharpness being best at f/8.

Aperture	Centre Crop	Edge Crop
f/3.5
f/4
f/5.6
f/8
f/11
f/16