ok, so my first real squabble about the z6, not a deal breaker, since its a thing with all PDAF Mirrorless camera, but definitely needs to be addressed. Can we please make a dedicated flash unit for Mirrorless cameras that have a dedicated AF assist light!? Please? Someone? Godox? Flashpoint? yunguo?
I was shooting an event in relatively lower light, iso 1250-3200, f5.6, 1/40 shooting with flash shooting with the 24-1204 f4 (i believe this is the real reason for struggle, f4 isnt the best light collector) and i tend to under expose 1/3-2/3 the ambient light on purpose when using flash, just to get a nice flick of fill from the bounce card of the flash, and ill say that the 24-120 f4 struggled a little bit without the AF beam with d8 live view preview on, i believe the camera was closing down the aperture to give me a preview and thus closing it down to 5.6 in a dark situation which made the camera struggle a bit on locking focus from time to time. So i turned d8 off, and it did better, but still could have used a good AF assist beam to help it in certain situations. And oh yeah, failed to mention the AF assist bean on the camera doesnt do much because with the ftz adapter, it extends the lens to the point where it blocks that beam from hitting the subject
the tamron 15-30 g1 is starting to piss me off on the FTZ adapter, it does weird things.
snapsy wrote:
Do you mean his copy of the 24-70S? I don't see any Z6 shake issues with IBIS+mechanical shutter on the 24-70S I tried. Or on the 70-200 FL I posted here.
to my eyes, which arent great, the IBIS on didnt seem to help much with the 24-70S test at 1/60.
turbodude wrote:
to my eyes, which arent great, the IBIS on didnt seem to help much with the 24-70S test at 1/60.
The issue @cvrle59 reported was that sharpness was worse with IBIS on vs IBIS off on the mechanical shutter when using the 24-70S, which implied vibration from the shutter was interfering with the operation of IBIS/VR.
turbodude wrote:
ok, so my first real squabble about the z6, not a deal breaker, since its a thing with all PDAF Mirrorless camera, but definitely needs to be addressed. Can we please make a dedicated flash unit for Mirrorless cameras that have a dedicated AF assist light!? Please? Someone? Godox? Flashpoint? yunguo?
I was shooting an event in relatively lower light, iso 1250-3200, f5.6, 1/40 shooting with flash shooting with the 24-1204 f4 (i believe this is the real reason for struggle, f4 isnt the best light collector) and i tend to under expose 1/3-2/3 the ambient light on purpose when using flash, just to get a nice flick of fill from the bounce card of the flash, and ill say that the 24-120 f4 struggled a little bit without the AF beam with d8 live view preview on, i believe the camera was closing down the aperture to give me a preview and thus closing it down to 5.6 in a dark situation which made the camera struggle a bit on locking focus from time to time. So i turned d8 off, and it did better, but still could have used a good AF assist beam to help it in certain situations. And oh yeah, failed to mention the AF assist bean on the camera doesnt do much because with the ftz adapter, it extends the lens to the point where it blocks that beam from hitting the subject ...Show more →
Give Custom Setting Menu -> a11 "Low-light AF" a try. It's slow but will give you locks.
turbodude wrote:
totally forgot about that feature. But what is it actually doing.
Based on my initial testing it appears to increase the sensor gain during AF operations (brighter image for AF), along with including a contrast-defect AF cycle that will lock focus in low-light where PDAF might not.
snapsy wrote:
Based on my initial testing it appears to increase the sensor gain during AF operations (brighter image for AF), along with including a contrast-defect AF cycle that will lock focus in low-light where PDAF might not.
ill give it a shot next time, im also researching which flashes have LED lamps instead of IR beams for AF assist now.
I thought it would be useful for everyone to share their bracketing/HDR strategy for the Z cameras. Since the Z operates similarly to the D8xx series the bracketing strategies are likely similar if not identical. However bracketing is even more important on the Z due to the potential for banding in shadows.
Exposure
First, I use Highlight-Weighted metering (HWM), which is essentially spot metering but across the entire frame and with some additional intelligence done by the camera to account for individual color channel clipping. HWM puts the brightest highlights at the center of the histogram but I want them at the right of the histogram (ETTR) so I keep a +2EV exposure compensation dialed into the camera. You could probably go a little more aggressive such as +2.3EV or even 2.66EV but initially I'm using +2EV.
Bracketing Type
I use the +3F bracketing settings with 2EV spacing, which shoots 3 shots, the first at the original (base) exposure, the second at +2EV and the third at +4EV. Note I use +3F rather than 3F because my exposure technique gives me the darkest exposure I want that still retains highlights (ETTR), thus I have no need for an "Underexposure" shot the 3F mode (MTR/under/over) would produce. I also set my bracketing order (e7) to under/MTR/over, so that the three shot sequence is base, base+2EV, and base+4EV.
Shutter triggering
I typically trigger with the shutter in self-timer mode, configured for 2-second or 5-second. This allows all exposures to be taken with a single shutter press. For the Z I use the electronic shutter exclusively for minimum vibration, since I'm usually bracketing landscape or natural-light shots that don't yield side effects from the electronic shutter.
So i shot a low light concert tonight at the Mirage Hotel for their Annual NFR Concert series. I must say the z6's performed way better than i thought they would, this time i left "Low light AF = on" Lots of backlit situations, lots of shadows due to cowboy hats covering most of the face, etc. i used AFC - AF Wide Small, to try and see if it would work better than AFC - Dynamic AF. Im not sure, if the "Low Light AF " or the Wide Small helped more, but it didnt struggle at all. my d850 used to have a little trouble in this lighting situation. i was using 24-70 G non VR, and 70-200 vr2, and tamron 15-30 g1 (again this lens is the one thats buggy me, may have to bite the bullet and upgrade)
again was able to lock on to the face even though it was in shadow. i pushed the shadows on this a bit, it was basically black when i put it thru conversion.
Saw this on Nikon Rumors, for those with the Z6 and FTZ, based on other dovetail plates, does this one look like it will clear and work with the FTZ? What I like about this bottom plate is the 9.8mm extension, maybe enough for a full grip with pinky?
wjmeyer wrote:
Saw this on Nikon Rumors, for those with the Z6 and FTZ, based on other dovetail plates, does this one look like it will clear and work with the FTZ? What I like about this bottom plate is the 9.8mm extension, maybe enough for a full grip with pinky?
Depending on the size of your clamp, it should be ok. Though I would suggest if adapting bigger lenses, I would be tripod mounting via the ftz not the body.
turbodude wrote:
Depending on the size of your clamp, it should be ok. Though I would suggest if adapting bigger lenses, I would be tripod mounting via the ftz not the body.
What do you mean by "bigger lenses", if it's one that already has a foot, wouldn't you want to mount to the lens foot and not the FTZ? Or are you talking about the middle ground of heavier lenses that do not have a foot like the 105 1.4 and the like? I'm curious how the FTZ will work with the vertical grip, because the grip should have a bump out for your fingers when held vertically which means mounting anything to the FTZ in that situation might prove difficult.
bigger as in 105 1.4, 85 1.4, 135 f2, 14-24, even the 24-70G, lenses that dont have a foot, but are pretty front heavy. the grip shouldnt be that large, so i doubt that will be an issue.
turbodude wrote:
bigger as in 105 1.4, 85 1.4, 135 f2, 14-24, even the 24-70G, lenses that dont have a foot, but are pretty front heavy. the grip shouldnt be that large, so i doubt that will be an issue.
Right, that's what I thought, just wanted to make sure. With regard to the grip, it's not the size of the grip I'm worried about, it's the position of the FTZ tripod mount, with it being so close to the body, if you add a vertical grip I'm not sure if a big ball head is going to fit up there and connect to the FTZ without interfering with the grip. We'll have to wait and see when Nikon actually delivers a grip but based on what I've seen of the FTZ so far I don't know if it will work with ball heads and a vertical grip.
Sagar wrote:
Don’t think so. I didn’t receive with Z6+24-70 kit
Thanks, I thought I read reports that they were, but hadn't heard anything, maybe just the UK was doing this. It appears the Nikon cards aren't even available yet unfortunately.
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