Re: Z9 ! : Official thread for Z9 images and discussion
Finally got out to try Z9 AF a bit. Now about 120 km away from where I live, there is a big flocks of black kites who are taking winter vacation here from the Himalayas annually for the next few months so it is quite convenient
Big disclaimer, I dont do bif very often and I am not very good at it but these black kites are relatively easy. All shot with 600/4e FL, FTZ ii, the first two picture was without TC. The first shot is cropped a bit, second shot was without cropping. The last 2 shots were with TC14e iii, no cropping. All wide opened.
1/1000s, iso 720
1/1000s, iso 500
1/1000s, iso 1000
1/1000s, iso 1600
Basically, the bigger the bird, the faster and easier Z9 will AF and track.
Against the sky there was really no problem at all.
When there are trees in the background, if the kite filled about 10-15% of the frame, Z9 will grab on to the tree in the background more often than not if AF point is beyond the bird already. If focus point is in front of the bird, it is still more likely that it will focus on the bird successfully. This was something that was complained a lot with Z9 during fw 0.8 field testing. Nikon increased focus points as a response but promise to improve more on this with future firmware. I was told that they will also add more types of birds to subject recognition with future firmware so Z9 will be able to identify more birds faster.
After awhile after tracking one bird, I just point the camera to the ground to bring focus point closer to me before tracking the next bird. Sometimes, if the bird is small and Z9 grab the tree in the back, if the bird flew toward me and got bigger, Z9 can find the bird eventually but I think it is just faster to assist with manual focus or point toward the ground first.
EVF is very smooth and I don't miss D6 OVF at all. With 600/4e FL and FTZ ii adapter, it is definitely not slower than D6 at acquiring AF using group focus. I however use mostly auto area focus with animal detection and tried some 3D tracking. I shot Brahminy Kite with D6 a couple of months ago but it was in better light and no busy background but also on the boat and I think Brahminy kite flight is a bit more erratic and more difficult to follow so it is a bit hard to say if Z9 is really better but keeper rate for black kite is definitely better for me.
I was shooting 10 fps and ended up shooting a bit over 5000 shots in about 3 hours and only used up 1 bar of the battery.
I definitely will go back there next month as it was a lot of fun and today about 10 greater spotted eagles showed up but stayed very far back. I hope next time they will be closer. There was also one Eastern imperial eagle that showed up but stayed on a tree in further back the whole time
Dec 30, 2021 at 01:03 AM
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