Sorry maybe I am misunderstanding something then, but you made the comment that the Sony AF was unmatched in the non-stacked realm but you haven't actually seen any testing against the Zf? What am I missing there?
I'm just confirming that you were making a statement about the Zf without actually seeing any kind of comparison, because I genuinely wanted to see it if you had found one. Without anything like that from reputable sources (not Sony's PR team), I don't see how you can come to definitive conclusion about it's AF performance. It's Nikon's first non-stacked camera with Expeed7 and the Z8/Z9 algorithms so I'm very curious to see some comparisons as well, to the extent that we can even compare AF objectively.
Other than a few broken records here, this general idea that Sony AF is the be-all end-all of AF is nowhere to be found. Just as one example, professional reviewers have been disagreeing with that notion ever since the Z9 was released, but I guess it's easier to ignore any evidence that doesn't fit the narrative, or discredit anyone who had a different experience.
Other cameras can detect sunglasses, cars, trains, etc. and are smart enough to stay on the head when the subject turns around, that isn't anything new. I watched the video a second time and I fail to see what it's doing that other cameras can't. The comparisons all seem to be made against the A7R4 rather than any of Sony's newer competition, so the bar is a lot lower. I'm not trying to be argumentative, I'm just saying as someone who actually uses a Z9 almost every day, I have seen it do all the same things I see in that video and be just as sticky. As far as I know the Zf is using the same algorithms, but obviously won't have the sample rate of a stacked sensor for the most demanding scenes.
Who are you referring to when you say "you guys"? I was one of the longer holdouts to mirrorless Until the A1/R3/Z9 I didn't feel like Mirrorless had surpassed the best DSLRs so I stuck with what I had. I specifically did not invest into mirrorless until there was a stacked sensor body available that met my needs.
I have said many times here in this forum that I think there is functional parity in AF between the results the A1 and Z9 can achieve in AF and images produced. I have said that to me it seems the preference will be based on other attributes such as size weight, and form factor.
At the same time, I have seen many reviews on the Zf and it's autofocus. I have also read reports of difficulties with some parts of the AF in the Zf even here in this forum. These are being called bugs at this point and some say they have referred these to Nikon for fixing. The Sony latest generation AF implementation performs better at a minimum in those areas.
From my shooting and brief experience with the Zf over two sessions so far, I do not find it as solid as the new Sony implementations. This is an admittedly insufficient amount of experience. But to me it showed up in acquisition, reacquisition, temporary loss from obstacles, and capabilities at distance when the subject is small in the screen. As I said, I think these things will be born out when side by side testing is done as it surely will be shortly.
So, do I think the Zf AF is an improvement over previous implementations in non stacked sensor Nikon cameras? Yes absolutely, and by a good margin. It is equal or better than Sony's implementation in the the previous generation cameras that were named by the OP. I said so explicitly in my posts. But so far in my opinion it is not up to Sony's latest generation cameras. If when the side by side testing is done, and if I am shown to be mistaken, I will happily say so.
Oct 23, 2023 at 05:22 PM
Previous versions of 1bwana1's message #16373093 « Nikon Zf or Sony camera? »
Until the A1/R3/Z9 I didn't feel like Mirrorless had surpassed the best DSLRs so I stuck with what I had. I specifically did not invest into mirrorless until there was a stacked sensor body available that met my needs.