Going mirrorless with the Nikon Z8 - the good and the bad
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 25 ก.พ. 2024
- Moving over to Nikon mirrorless from the DSLR world has not been easy for Alastair. The Z8 offers many improvements over his D500 and D810 combo, however, there are also some significant challenges that he's having. Is it worth it? Yes, of course, but thats hardly the point. Complaining about the numerous shortcomings is way easier. And yes he's read through the insanely long manual. All 948 pages of it. #nikonz8 #nikon
Fantastic video Alastair! I'm now keen to watch lots more of your content!!
To customize the viewfinder it is on page 609 of the manual. You need to do right arrow on the d19 and d20 (on V2.0 firmware manual says d18 which might be V1.0)
I’ll take a look, thanks.
LOL the fact that there’s a page 609 in a camera manual is insane .it’s interesting that these features aren’t a thing nor readily accessible via USB or wireless protocols as this is all accessible with code. It’s too bad camera makers fail to make these features accessible , as it would significantly make them more enticing devices for consumers and open up a culture of hardware hacking and modifications. Bummer.
Thank you Alastair for your take on the Nikon Z8. Hoping to hear more about this camera from your perspective. I'm still hanging out with my Nikon DSLR.
I get the same issue. I've set my z8 to show clipping or highlights.. I purposely over exposed but I didn't see the warning while using my 70-200 vrii. For now to work around this however, as photographers we should know when we are over exposed when looking through the VF or screen. For me anyway, I can clearly see when over exposed. .. Long term, Nikon should address this issue however. Seems it's a basic fix.
The good thing is that Nikon could do a firmware update to fix this.
I would also like to see live highlights warning.
I love the fact I can shut the sound OFF!!!!!!!!!!!!! :P
Nice interesting film
I look at the RGB Histogram. One can clearly see when the red channel is clipping. Nikons have always blown the red channel quite easily. It also doesn't mean it's blown in the raw file, one's looking at the image on the screen in the narrow DR of a JPEG.
Thanks for the comments. I know I can look at the red channel (and I do - I'm not really going to let this slow me down much), but I would love for the highlight warning to be set to the red channel, like you could in earlier DSLRs. The green channel is the last to clip. I'm flummoxed as to why they removed that option, when they packed a zillion other things into the camera.
I recommend Thom Hogans books on the Z9 and Z8. He not only explains all the functions but also what the result of each setting is. The cameras today are computers which can take photos. A lot of people obviously think that they just pick up such a beast and then they magically get good photos (not you though). But it doesn't work this way. A lot of knowledge and training is required to get to good results.
I think his point isn’t that he doesn’t understand the functions, but he is pointing out what’s lacking compared to other Nikon models and especially what’s lacking in a camera that is a “computer” and is at a high price point.
I would like the sound of a silk curtain shutter too but keep in mind that they have to make it short enough that it doesn't overlap on itself at the highest continuous frame rate. I just a simple sound on the lowest setting so I can just barely hear it. Once I get used to the frame outline flashing I'll just turn it off.
This is what I do.. I have my histogram turned on inside the EV. I take a picture then, while looking through the EV, the Blinkies show up on any overexposed areas. I checked my histogram in my EV and expose to the left using my exposure compensation, I have my exposure compensation Setup so I can easily Dial in negative compensation on the Function ring of the Z Lens, I set it to Expose to the left on my histogram. Then, I take my next shot and see if this satisfies me and make any needed adjustments if necessary. A lot of folks. may tell you to expose to the right on the histogram. But I've always found that on Nikon you need exposed more to the left and stay off the right. It's always a lot easier to recover detail from the left than it is from the right in post processing. I do all this in about two or three seconds without taking my eye off the EV. I don't know how experienced you are, but you're gonna find that it's almost impossible to knock out blown highlights completely. The only thing you can do is try to minimize them.. Hopes this helps good luck.
Thanks for your comments. Very helpful, indeed.
“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”
“Always more questions than answers, there are."
Fear I see not here.
If you’re using the highlight warnings for taking photos of skin then you’re already way over!
That said, you can still dial it back most of the time. The “255” is based on the jpeg preview w the regular conversion. Dial the exposure down in post and you have a lot of leeway.
I know it shows you the preview jpeg and I know you can recover highlights... But I'm still frosted that in the d500 and the d810 you can set the highlight warning to show the red channel rather than the green channel. Then it tells you when your skin tones are near 255.
Im pretty sure you can customize the display menu !
Only limited customization. You can't pick and choose what you see.
The sounds are somewhat clinical, agreed... TBH I bought this camera for the images, which are amazing, as are their 24mp images of the Z5 and 6, and the AF, especially after FW2, it's amazing. Both the EVF and the screen are customizable. Yes it's probably your nose, mine too. Turn it off, 2 clicks, turn it back on if needed, 2 clicks. I'm not a "Nikon fan boy", I've been shooting for nearly 60 years, Canon, Rollei and flex, Mamiya and more. However, the Z8 is the most amazing camera I've owned as an all rounder. Landscape, sports, wildlife and esp birds, architecture, video. I actually don't need the 8k video etc but it's there if I want. The camera is so good at every discipline that it negates the need for different specialist cameras for most things, for most people. Those that need medium format or mega high MP counts or who want to shoot 8 K video all day, they know what they need.
You have an internal AND external light meter, a built-in histogram, multiple metering modes AND an exposure meter.
You had to very intentionally circumnavigate all of these to over expose your highlights.
What's the issue other than intentional user error?
If you intentionally hit a guardrail directly going 100MPH, and you go over the cliff, it's not the road's fault.
Maybe I wasn't making myself clear. Not sure what you mean by 'intentionally circumnavigate?'
My point was not that I don't know how to meter a scene.
My point is that the scene was overexposed in the red channel. The Z8, using the system that they have in the camera to let you know if you have overexposed your image, did not warn me that the scene was overexposed in the red channel.
BOTH the D500 and the D810, in EXACTLY the same scene with ONE change - namely the overexposure warning set to the red channel rather than being set, as a default to the green channel in the Z8 (which you can't change)...
...would have warned me about 2/3 of a stop earlier that my image was overexposed.
What's worse is that it doesn't show all 3 channels in the warning. Just the green channel - which has twice the photosites as the red or the blue channel and as a consequence is THE LAST CHANNEL TO CLIP.
I would love for them to let me set the highlight warning to the red channel like they used to, that's all.
Give d17 a look. for the nose thing try to turn off : a5
A couple of valid points! I can agree that the overexposure warning is a must-have, both in review and live view. Weird that Zebras/Highlight display is available in Video mode but not stills?
10:50 This one confused me a bit, but I got it to show the latest image taken with Picture Review On, not monitor only, and Prioritize Viewfinder (2). Choosing Prioritize Viewfinder (1) would show the image in playback in the viewfinder too. Is that what you were referring to?
11:30 Might be the little icon on the left side of the lcd where you can cycle through Touch focus/shutter/point position off, not really sure.
Thanks for the comments! I'll take a look.
Beautiful model
You are so alone on that I can’t even begin to tell you! For video you want less megapixels for still photography you want more and more and more. I guess you don’t do retouching for models… When they ask you to take out their nose hairs, you’re really glad you have lots of megapixels.
Nikon doesnt have Zebras for 90/95/99% Highlights?
For video, maybe? Haven’t checked, actually. But for photography… no.
@@UnderexposedwithAlastairBird Yeah it`s for Video but on all my Sony i can also use it for Photo, and set to 99% Highlights its perfect for RAW 14 Bit clipping.
If it focuses better than my Z6 focused a my last shoot couple of days ago then, I'm all for it (whatever the shutter sounds like.)
You will be all in then. I went from the z6 to the z9.
"the most shrill!"
Muahahahahaha hahahahahahaha! Bwahahahahahahahaha
Easy Fix buy a Sony a7r5 9million dot evf 😊.
you are indeed alone.
I see why clipping is useful for flash, but for regular photography, wouldn’t the histogram help tell the story
The highlight warning is really the key. Let’s say you’re shooting outside and the sun comes out from behind a dark cloud and it is brighter but not hugely so. A quick look at the highlight warning could prevent overexposure, especially in skin tones. But if it’s not so bright that the greens are clipping, the highlight warning won’t tell you that things are overexposed.
Nose! Hehehehe!
Too much data shoot 25 megapixels, medium file.
When you're shooting RAW there is no option for small, medium or large. If you shoot DX mode (which I do a lot) it's a smaller RAW file.
@@UnderexposedwithAlastairBirdthat’s not true. You can chance RAW size.
@@jamesjackson4264 Can you? Show me where - seriously - I would love to knock it down a few steps. I looked in the manual and didn't see it.
try to remove your fingers against the sun!) photo
This seems to be a video of a very poor photographer not a camera problem
Really? If I was a better photographer then Nikon would have let me set the highlight warning to the red channel? If I was more like Avedon then the focus peaking when I put on a prime lens wouldn’t have randomly turned itself on?