Nikon Zf vs Z8 Low Light Clips, Ergonomics & User Experience, Friday Evening Camera Talk Ep. 23
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ธ.ค. 2023
- Tonight we'll talk about actual user experience with the Zf and Z8 cameras. I'll drop some clips shot on each camera with the nimble 35 mm 1.8 lens and the trusty go-to 24-120 mm lens. This stuff can't be gotten from the back of a cereal box(or by reading a spec sheet) but we'll spill it ALL here tonight on FECT Episode 23. Thanks for joining us and you have my invitation to subscribe to the channel!
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Got my Last ever camera I will ever buy >> the Z8 and thats the only camera I have and NEED .. You can only take an image with one camera at a time Welcome Z8 .. it will never wear out
I love my Rubber Rocket blower
@Mr09260 the cleaning kit wasn't too shabby either. what I thought was dust must've been droplet/stains. they were on stubborn and lifted off right away. it's made me believer. thanks for the comments!
@@Mr09260 Yes, if that's a Giottos Blower, it is excellent and should last many years!
Not a Nikon shooter but wow did they hit a homerun with that ZF, I tried a few fujis for a fun factor, but couldn't fall in love, I use the A7C2 for casual photography, at some point I am going to pick up a ZF with that little 40f2✌️
@longrider9551 I looked at the a7c a few months back. it was on sale about when the a7cii was rolled out. almost bought one. sony has tempted me a few times. thanks for the comment!
What was the ISO setting used, when you mentioned low light, you didn't mention that. The normal ISO range for the Zf is higher than the Z8, 64000 vs 25600, it doesn't seem like you were up in those ranges for each devices.
@waynerm002 Thanks for the comment! Full auto on all settings, which is primarily how I shoot nowadays. I came up with cameras in the early 70's having to worry about all the settings. So I let the camera do it now, unless circumstances force having to change aperture/shutter speed.
@@folkartandcamera LOL, I understand. I was curious as you mentioned the low light capability of both units, would be good to have some setting info to see at what level they were compared at.
Hi. Man in really torn between selling my z8 for a zf. I am just a hobbyist who doesnt shoot wildlife but i do love taking pics of my dog. I never shoot video but want to have very reliable AF. Weight/size is also a factoe. Given those criterias which would you recommend?
@youssefhamidi8152 Zf is a fun and capable camera. That said, I wouldn't trade my own Z8 to get one. I use these 2 cameras for different purposes, but if you want the highest quality output, Z8 for sure. Thanks for the comment!
Glad to have found your video, many thanks to the almighty TH-cam algorithm who giveth and who taketh away from us lowly humans. I was wondering if you would have an opinion for a longtime Nikon user, but recent Zf user (my first Nikon digital since the D100). I presently have the Zf with the 26mm f2.8, the 40mm f2 and the 105 2.8. A pretty nice kit so far! I’m struggling with the next options, ranging everywhere from a 24-200 or the 24-120 for travel/nature or waiting for the used market of 100-400s or 400 primes to show up due to the high prices. I feel like what you gain in reach on the 24-200 you may lose in image quality and limited use in low light. But the 24-120 seems to overlap my current lenses. Any other thoughts I may be missing?
I've mentioned in other videos, I use the 24-120 Z S lens almost daily. We have 2 of these in our household, both bought with our own money and not 'sponsored' in any way. The 100-400 Z S is my favorite wildlife lens. I could easily 'get by' with only these 2 lenses if I wanted a nice, all-round kit.
Haven't used the 26, 40, or 105 you mentioned. the 105 has an EXCELLENT reputation though. the wife shoots the 400 prime with her kit and has a 1.4 t.c. , also an excellent lens. good luck with your search and thanks for the comment!
@@folkartandcamera Thanks. That kinda reinforces my thoughts. The 26 and 40 are so nice and light and small, you just have to smile when you stick the camera in a jacket pocket or a little sling. The 105 puts out beautiful images. I must admit the main reason I got it was to play around with in camera automatic focus stacking. My prior setup looked like a sort of contraption from the Middle Ages, with knobs and racks and gears. If I pick up the 24-120 I still will need to decide between the 400 f4.5 or the 100-400, but that’s a question for some other day! I can also say that the Smallrig grip and the Techart M to Z autofocus adapter are great add-ons to the Zf. The form factor really shines with AI lenses and adapted M lenses!
@@folkartandcamera You seem to have a lot bought with your own money ! Congrats man -- maybe others have just a little more restricted options 😆
Beautiful images and excellent video, sir! As a Z8 landscape, product and occasional wildlife photographer, I was wondering what you base your assessment of the Zf "holding its own" against the Z8? I'm considering the Zf only as a "travel" camera backup to the Z8, but I think that for very large prints (30" x 40"), the higher resolution sensor of the Z8 would be much superior in terms of detail retention...Would you agree? Thanks!
@stevelink3 Finding I reach for the Zf more and more as time goes along. If I'm heading out in the field for 'serious' wildlife shooting or have some event I want to have top tier results, it'll be the Z8. The Zf does about everything else for me now, including shooting around the studio. Thanks for the comment!
Any suggestions on a Z camera for landscape photograph? I have a Z7, but the resolution isn't as good for enlargements as I was hoping for!
@lexnaturae6638 I only shoot landscape in passing, so my opinion won't be worth much... if I were a committed landscape shooter doing mostly photos, I'd have to look at the Sony A7 R5. (and then probably buy a Z9) thanks for the comment!
The Z7, Z7II, Z8 and Z9 all share the same sensor. There is not a higher resolution sensor from Nikon at the moment, 45MP is the maximum. If that is not good enough, you should look at your focus/exposure technique or lens choice. And if that is excellent already: skip the slightly higher MP count bodies from Sony or Canon - if 45MP is not good, then 60MP won't be much better - and look at medium format bodies offerings from Fuji, Hasselblad or Phase One , hitting 100MP or more. Not sure why you would need that though, unless you print on walls and look at them up close or crop heavily.
Look at Nigel Danson's TH-cam channel, he's a professional landscape photographer, and a Nikon shooter. No offense intended , but it's not the camera. I'm sure it's just a simple setting.
Fuji gfx 50r -- nice camera and not too much larger than the Nikon z7 ( rather comparable to the Z8 I suppose ) .
In direct comparison you see a slight advantage for this Fuji sensor against the Nikon 45 MP sensor .
Greetings! As a Z7 and Z8 landscape, product and occasional wildlife photographer, I am quite pleased with the sharpness and detail I get in large prints (30" x 40"), from both the Z7 and Z8...Was wondering what size prints you make , for which the Z7 has "unsatisfactory" resolution?
The Zf is a superb piece of kit. The image quality is exceptional and the AF speed and performance is also equally exceptional. As stated in your video, for half the price of the Z8 and even a considerable more cheaper than the Z9, it delivers a huge bang for the money. There are some minor drawbacks for me though, the lack of a battery grip for both longer battery life and portrait shooting is not a deal breaker for me but would have been a nice option to have. The overall size and weight of the body can be a little awkward when pairing with a large telephoto prime such as my 500mm F4 and even my 300mm F2.8. Again, not a deal breaker but just something to note.
I am confident that with newer firmware updates, the Zf will continue to amaze many people with new and better firmware tweaks. I def recommend this body for those who are looking at getting into the Nikon mirrorless system or want to upgrade from the previous versions of the Z line.
@minuteman2006 I'm turning into a bigger Zf fan as I use/rely on it more and more for shooting. For me the grip is less a factor since much of the camera work I do with it is on a tripod. The Zf is indeed a great all around body for the money. Thanks for the comment!
As Nikon's service point is 15min from my home, I go there and pay their price - a lot more than DIY tools. Happily. With the Z 7(ii).
Are you aware of the OLPF? Optical Low-Pass Filter. This sits between the Bayer colour filter grid and the sensor. Between the OLPF, AFAIK, there must be an air gap. That gap must be very narrow, though.
Probably in the ballpark of a quarter of the wavelength of red light.
I'll explain the OLPF a bit and then come back to the risk in cleaning.
The OLPF was introduced as in-camera hardware-help for the algorithmic old school AI (as opposed "learning" later AI school) used in raw processing in the beginning of digital colour photography (the Bayer way). That raw processing often was done in camera, and certainly with early cameras that only gave SOOC JPEG. The OLPF disperses light travelling to photosite [x,y] in the sensor to the direct neighbours thereof and this makes the guessing of missing colours easier. And this gives less noise when the processing is simply done (less failed raw processing). And helps a bit with jagged edges/lines (so the OLPF is therefore also called an anti-aliasing (AA) filter). And it may help reduce chances of banding a bit. In the case of stupid AI raw processing software.
The downside of the OLPF is reduced low light sensitivity, reduced dynamic range, reduced contrast envelope (the dynamic range available in one shot), reduced colour space, reduced contour sharpness, and increased vignetting.
Because it deepens the optical tunnel in front of each photosite, it also makes what we think of as lens vignetting worse.
This all led Nikon to Eliminating the OLPF from the D800E version of their 36MP D800, over 10 years ago.
The vignetting, especially with pre-digital lenses, was the actual reason why we had to wait for full frame digital cameras for so long - Leica took the longest in this respect and in the end was able to design an OLPF that had changing angles in its tiny lenses from the center to the corners (think of a Fresnel condenser lens with its rings cut up in rods). Took them years more but, while it worked well with their great but old lens designs, it is a compromise between focal lengths and lens angles (at the back end).
(Nikon and Leica lenses would easily do 100 linePairs per millimetre resolution in the late 1970s - easily more in the centre and a bit less in the corners. If we hold the position that we need 1 photosite for each line in the pair, then we need 34.56MP for that resolution. So 24MP full frame is considerably less. The 24MP image still looking so good is because the raw data [1] get extrapolated to large sizes by software. 35mm film also easily did 100 lp/mm - medium format was around 80 lp/mm, but linePairs per degree of image angle would be better of course.)
With Topaz and DxO far ahead in dealing with images without OLPF, Adobe followed this year with an optional AI Denoise function in Adobe Camera Raw (ACR - the actual raw processor to Photoshop and the Develop tab in Lightroom Classic), but Adobe still needs to improve detail loss (improve "demosaicking") that we try to tweak with "sharpening".
The noise you may see in your images, in the blurred areas, or the darker zone of the image, IMO, purely follows from failed raw processing. Better AI can deal with the absence of the filter very well.
The vignetting problem with sensors led to different lens designs, also, and Nikon's old F-mount had a limitation in that respect.
Generally, with ACR, absence of an OLPF is not really noticed on normal monitor sizes, or prints up to some A3 (297mm * 420mm = 11.7" * 16.5" = 20.3" diagonally).
The unanswered to me question is if the air gap between filter grid and sensor is open at the sides. If this is the case, then liquid can get in there and that would pose a problem as it may take ages, even for a volatile solvent, to evaporate from there.
What cameras have an OLPF?
In the case of Nikon, all full frame cameras of 36MP and higher - at the "photosite density" level you can extrapolate this to APS-C and you'll find that around 20MP the OLPF is gone (a D500 doesn't have one).
All 45MP Nikons are without OLPF. The Z 6(ii), and likely Z f, have an OLPF.
In the case of other brands, I only know that Canon sticks to having an OLPF in a fundamentalist way, so high MP Canons likely have an OLPF.
As to the (rocket) blower in the video, note that these things are made of a synthetic rubber that ages and over time at the microscopic level its "skin" becomes brittle. Its ageing will depend on how you store it, but after X years, the particles from the inside of the blower become a problem in itself.
[1] data is plural (of datum)
@jpdj2715 hadn't thought of the deterioration factor with rubber blowers but it's now in my 'to be considered' column. thanks for the comment(s)!
In all honesty the ZF and Z8 are indistinguishable. With my super critique photographers eye I think there may be a slight sharpness advantage with the Z8. But I may be imagining it just because I know which is which.
Hey a note on sensor cleaning. I would highly recommend never use liquid on a sensor. I know they make cleaning fluids specifically for sensor cleaning, but I have known photographers who made small cleaning needs into much bigger issues from using liquid on their sensors. In nearly 20 years of owning, shooting with, and cleaning, digital cameras I only use a sensor brush on my cameras sensors. If interesting I recommend a properly sized brush by VisableDust. Thanks for the video, take care fella.
@BradMangas Agreed! the difference between the Zf and Z8 is way less than the price points would indicate... Less is definitely more with sensor cleaning. I'll look up that item you mentioned. Thanks for the comment!
To me the Z8 was a little sharper. The 24-120 appeared sharper on both cameras than the prime lens. My 2 cents.
@jeffgermanich8105 Thanks for the comment! Yep, the 24-120 is a high tier lens, performs well beyond its price point.
Yes, I use the Nikkor S 24-120 on my Z8, and it's razor sharp at f/5.6-11. I can barely tell a difference in detail rendition between it and, say, the NIkkor S 50 f/1.8, though at 300% magnification in Photoshop, the 50 f/1.8 prime is better. But in a "normal" size print or certainly on a small display, one likely could not tell a difference, at similar apertures.
I think the Zf did a great job and held its own against one of the best cameras on the market, the Z8. Thanks for the video.
@Johnny-Aloha. thanks for the comment!
We have to look at "low light performance" in the following ways: (1) focusing - a mirrorless camera uses its AF system for that (expressed in LV = EV@ISO100); (2) camera dynamic range (operating range in light levels) at the dark end - at what LV can it still take a photo; (3) ability to measure light levels (in LV again).
(4) generally overlooked - at what LV can the camera still use its "recognition AI AF".
As to (1): Z f goes down to LV -10 and Z 8 down to LV -9. The ability to take an image at a level that dark starts much higher as does the ability to measure light. In my Z 7ii, the ability to reliably do (4) recognition AI AF ends in the LV 6..7 ballpark, depending on contrast in the subject.
To me, (4) has become all important and as my numbers apply to a sitter in a studio with ambient light at a level where human irises go to medium aperture (larger pupils are more sexy but too large looks weird and you loose iris colour). In the case of moving subjects, I may need a higher LV number, even.
Bottom line, with Z 8/9 or Z f, you can use the camera's base AF system to focus the darkest starry night, cannot measure light, but can take a picture at a very long exposure time.
I commented all over the place that I want transparency about (4), with 1..3, in specifications.
About Z f and Z 8/9, my perception at this moment is that they will still do (4) well at LV 3, but I may have interpreters the images of naive influencers the wrong way.
If we linearise the LV 7 to LV 3 difference - 4 stops or "4" at 2-log level - then we get a difference of 2^4=16 times darker at the light energy level for the LV 3. As the human eye sees 10-log based differences, then that 16 is a tiny bit more than two times as dark to the human eye.