NIKON...MIRROR LESS NOW WITH FIRMWARE UPDATE

BabaGanoush

Pistnbroke said:

Changing the tack slightly the second hand market has dropped through the floor ..advertised my D7100 and 200 lookers but no buyers ..not found this before . wonder if it the uncertainty in whats to come that is holding them back... ??

Amazon is a place where I would occasionally trade-in old camera gear for gift cards I could use to upgrade my kit, but lately they are buying absolutely nothing. I don't know why. I suppose it could be explained by the uncertainty over Canon's and Nikon's impending full-throated entry into the mirrorless game.

vtc2002

@hiker I did not perceive your post as being frustrated at all. Compared to some of the comments regarding the potential new lens mount, adapter for f mount lens and lack of direction for the DSLR product line, your comments were pretty tame. I think we all would like to have more information coming from Nikon about the strategy and direction for the mirrorless and DSLR product lines but it is apparent that that's not going to happen. We have some passionate people on the forum and that is a good thing.

moreorless

I actually think Nikon should take note of the EOS M series success with regards to lens range.

Sony's clear weakness for me is that they seem to deliberately offer underperforming cheap options and then very expensive high end upgrades. the EOS M offering a range of cheaper lenses with quality performance could make headway against a much larger Sony lens lineup.

Most specifically I would say a good quality normal zoom(doesn't have to be fixed aperture) and a good 35mm F/2 should be their on release.

Pistnbroke

The new Fuji X100 shows how easy it is for an experienced maker to cock it up compared to the canon offering..lets just pray for Nikon

manhattanboy

Per the main blog page, Nikon seems to be targeting night or "noct" shooting for their mirrorless cameras. I rarely shoot mirrorless at night...its where flash is most important and as a result the sensor scan rate is critical...this let's me know that the new Nikon mirrorless is likely going to use a mechanical shutter with probably no emphasis on silent shooting. And then Nikon is giving the middle finger to the F mount (and in the process a "F you" to their longtime supporters with legacy lenses sadly).

And then we have Canon. Canon’s M series is disappointing with their lack of putting any effort into a silent shutter. Their M50 is the first camera after many years of the M system to have a silent shutter option and sadly its only in a scene mode with terrible rolling shutter to boot. Sigh. They too seem to be abandoning the EF mount for a new mirrorless mount for their full frame mirrorless.

Thus as of today, my options for a silent shooting camera are basically M43's or Sony. The Panny G9 with the new 200 2.8 looks great, but the question as always is IQ as the ISO rises. Also, how much more effort will Sony put in to innovate for m43rd's sensors in the future? Sony is the only company producing m43 sensors, and I wonder how hard they will push on innovation given the shift to prosumers that m43rd's has been making recently, which will not only compete with Sony's own E and FE cameras, but also decrease sensor volume orders by Olympus and Panasonic making the return on m43 sensor development poorer for Sony.

Ultimately, I broke down and bought a Sony A9, a FE-mount 35 and Sony 100-400. Its a boat ton of cash that I would have preferred to spend on a Nikon mirrorless (or even a Canon mirrorless camera), but waiting till 2019 at the earliest just seems ridiculous at this point. Neither Canon nor Nikon has shown they give two cents about what I need a mirrorless camera for...silent shooting situations. For most everything else, a competent person with a D800/810/850 can best any other camera and it seems like a wasted effort to half-heartedly produce a mirrorless camera against those outstanding Nikons if they can't give us something that we can't already do better with what exists today.

mhedges

Isn't there a silent mode on the D850?

WestEndFoto

Only in live view, though quiet mode is pretty quiet.

HankB

manhattanboy said:

And then Nikon is giving the middle finger to the F mount (and in the process a "F you" to their longtime supporters with legacy lenses sadly).

I gotta take exception to this statement because no company, photo equipment or otherwise, has bent over backwards and been so creative for so many many years to maintain backward compatibility, as has Nikon. All this while implementing the introduction and evolution of so many electronic functions.

60 years with the same mount! This is not only admirable, but totally astounding!

manhattanboy

Many, myself included shoot Nikon because of the legacy support in addition to leading image quality. But we are delusional to think that Nikon hasn't already started to break backwards capabilities. Look at the new AF-P lenses. Many of them don't work right on older bodies. This is a "new" Nikon. One that has no problem canceling products like the DLs or directly deceiving customers when it comes to the continuation of the Nikon 1.

I am not abandoning my 810 nor 500. But for me the direction Nikon is going is one that has given me pause. Yes, the 850 can shoot silently in live view, but does so with marked rolling shutter and without the benefit of the awesome AF module. It's similar to Canon in that regard as being part of a feature list and not a well thought-out and useful shooting mode. One step backwards for the 850 is that it's shutter is louder than the 810. Compare the two side by side...Nikon was on the right track with the 810's soft shutter but they went with a louder shutter to hit higher fps with the 850.

As I previously stated, I just dropped nearly 7 grand and I would have preferred it to go towards an awesome Nikon mirrorless product. But at the current moment Nikon does not sell a single mirrorless camera as even the ancient Nikon 1 has been officially discontinued! IMHO Nikon should have at least continued to iterate the Nikon 1 if for no other reason to at least give their customers hope that they are actively working on mirrorless products. Right now all we have is rumors and unfortunately I can't shoot with those

Capt_Spaulding

I have to agree with Hank. Nikon has generally set a high bar when it comes to supporting legacy equipment. I have a stable of Minolta SRT and X bodies and a shelf of lenses that I probably could not give away. Not true of Nikon. I bet on the wrong horse. To be sure, that may change, but I'm cautiously optimistic that they will accommodate those who want to convert to mirrorless without showing the rest of us the door.

I wonder if all the folks abandoning ship may be doing so prematurely. Nikon may lay an egg with their mirrorless offering(s), but we should know relatively soon. If they turn out a winner a fair number of people who, in some cases in fits of pique, may find they have acted in haste only to repent at leisure.

The whole topic has become divisive to the verge of toxicity. By the standard of my friends on this board I am probably a photographic dilettante. With that stipulated I continue to suggest patience. Sony is not going to quit making cameras and my observations of them suggest they will be just as happy to take everyone's money in January as they are now.

Capt_Spaulding

Did you need those capabilities right now? If so, Its hard to quibble with the decision.
(Which is, after all, entirely yours to make) If you did not, and Nikon comes out with a winner in October, you may regret it. At this point, my entirely unsolicited advice for those not in dire, immediate need, is patience.

I don't have a dog in this fight. I'm pretty committed to my dslrs and have no current need of or use for a high end mirrorless. But I am not, at this point willing to count Nikon out of that game. It seems to me they are on a roll.

WestEndFoto

manhattanboy said:

Many, myself included shoot Nikon because of the legacy support in addition to leading image quality. But we are delusional to think that Nikon hasn't already started to break backwards capabilities. Look at the new AF-P lenses. Many of them don't work right on older bodies. This is a "new" Nikon. One that has no problem canceling products like the DLs or directly deceiving customers when it comes to the continuation of the Nikon 1.



I am not abandoning my 810 nor 500. But for me the direction Nikon is going is one that has given me pause. Yes, the 850 can shoot silently in live view, but does so with marked rolling shutter and without the benefit of the awesome AF module. It's similar to Canon in that regard as being part of a feature list and not a well thought-out and useful shooting mode. One step backwards for the 850 is that it's shutter is louder than the 810. Compare the two side by side...Nikon was on the right track with the 810's soft shutter but they went with a louder shutter to hit higher fps with the 850.



As I previously stated, I just dropped nearly 7 grand and I would have preferred it to go towards an awesome Nikon mirrorless product. But at the current moment Nikon does not sell a single mirrorless camera as even the ancient Nikon 1 has been officially discontinued! IMHO Nikon should have at least continued to iterate the Nikon 1 if for no other reason to at least give their customers hope that they are actively working on mirrorless products. Right now all we have is rumors and unfortunately I can't shoot with those

I should point out that the backwards compatibility extends to the ability of current bodies to work with older lenses, not the ability of current lenses to work with older bodies. Nikon has been very good at the former, even going to the extent of releasing the DF for those that want to go back further in time. However, I am not aware of a particular effort by Nikon to provide the later.

sport

manhattanboy said:

Many, myself included shoot Nikon because of the legacy support in addition to leading image quality. But we are delusional to think that Nikon hasn't already started to break backwards capabilities. Look at the new AF-P lenses. Many of them don't work right on older bodies. This is a "new" Nikon. One that has no problem canceling products like the DLs or directly deceiving customers when it comes to the continuation of the Nikon 1.

At some point this was going to happen. The biggest problem that I consistently see with users moving away from Nikon is there is no feedback from Nikon. The silence is causing an erosion of customers and Sony has been brilliant at taking advantage of the silence. Customers have to know two things: where are you going in the future and will you stand by your product. Nikon has been failing on both of those.

It looks like both Canon and Nikon are constantly playing catch up with the digital age. They were slow to understand how cellphones would eat the point and shoot market. They are slow in understanding how to work with the internet (workflow). They are slow in embracing video.

Two years ago I was at a crossroads with my next camera purchase. I tried out Canon, Nikon and Sony and ended up with the D750. The D750 won because I was familiar with Nikon and it was awesome in low light. If I had to make the decision today it would be interesting to see what the winner would be. In the end the camera is just a tool and you have to pick the one that works best for you.

HankB

Lack of meaningful communication from large organizations, both corporate and government, is exasperating, infuriating, and just plain bad service. But I guess no one wants to be the guy in the organization who releases info that causes that career-busting jolt. Institutional rule #1: cover your ass.

And compounding the problem of keeping customers in the dark about product direction is the example of Apple's breathtaking success with their notorious secretiveness.

WestEndFoto

HankB said:

Lack of meaningful communication from large organizations, both corporate and government, is exasperating, infuriating, and just plain bad service. But I guess no one wants to be the guy in the organization who releases info that causes that career-busting jolt. Institutional rule #1: cover your ass.

And compounding the problem of keeping customers in the dark about product direction is the example of Apple's breathtaking success with their notorious secretiveness.

Which suggests that secretiveness is or can be important to organizational success. It is hard to criticize Nikon if this is the case.

And let's flip this around. I am in the real estate development business and we sell hundreds of condos every year. I suppose that I could find it infuriating that purchasers don't disclose the highest price that they are willing to pay when they walk into a sales centre. It would also be good to know their real estate ownership history and future plans plus their income history.

But they don't tell us that, so we have to sell our condos for less than we might get with that information and adapt our business model accordingly.

mhedges

I don't know that you can necessarily say what works for Apple would work for the ILC business. They aren't that similar. All their success notwithstanding Apple is kind of a one trick pony with the majority of their $$ coming from a single product, and that product is basically a long term consumable. ILC companies need to have a broader product line and their products last much longer.

BVS

It'll be interesting to come back to this discussion a year from now after all has (most likely) been revealed and we have a better sense of Nikon's direction.

sport

Quietness over a new product is acceptable, but Nikon has gone off the deep end with it. They started a 100 year marketing campaign and it just fizzled. They released the D850 and you hardly see any advertising on it. It's not even being promoted on the front page of nikonusa.com. Leaving a void in information with customers causes two major problems. First, that void will be filled with information (correct or not) by someone else. Second, you will have to do damage control on that information that someone else creates.

Nikon, where is your marketing department? Where is the excitement of 100 years in business? Where is the shouting of your technology advantage? Stop relying just on users to evangelize your products and start doing some real marketing.

BVS

I agree that Nikon marketing/advertising (if you can call it that) leaves a lot to be desired. However, with respect to the D850 specifically, it was promoted front and center when it was released, was covered extensively by the major photography websites, and anyone that's likely to buy one surely knows about it by now. If Nikon wasn't running a sale right now it'd probably still be on the homepage. Plus, even if they pushed it more and generated more sales, there's no extra stock to sell anyway, at least in the USA.

The bigger problem is that there's been virtually no other releases of any kind in the last nine months since the D850 was released, save for the 180-400 f/4 which most people will never own anyway. It sucks when everyone else is getting new toys and you're not. Also, like you said, the 100 year campaign kind of fizzled out after the big trade shows ended and we're in this kind of dead zone period waiting for Photokina.

manhattanboy

@Capt_Spaulding I rented mirrorless cameras from Sony, Fuji, and Olympus for two years now. I kept out hope that Nikon would release a mirrorletof their own. Now that we are "close" to that release, it looks like it will not be exactly what I had wanted. If Nikon at least did a development announcement to freeze leaking to Sony, etc. I would have waited. But the way it stands I can't rely on rumors alone. The Sony a9 is now down to $3500, which is cheap enough for me to bite given that's about what the 850 costs.

As I've stated above, my need for a mirrorless camera is specific...silent shooting situations. I probably will also make it my primary vacation camera as well as at least there are pancakes available to keep size/weight down. These two specific things Nikon is lacking in... A competent silent shooter and FX pancakes. Sadly they haven't shown any dedication to either of those items with the past several years.

rmp

I have been reading this subject and following rumors about the mirrorless-to-be camera for so long it is getting to be boring. I think I will just keep my D850 and switch to new toys in the computer or fishing arena.

spraynpray

What RMP said, but with guns and motorbikes.

dissent

Yeah, unless the mirrorless is truly extraordinary, I expect to continue to keep using my DSLR's for the next decade or so. At least as part of my weight training regimen.

manhattanboy

Didn't see this posted on the main blog, but there is a new Nikon FF mirrorless lens patent out today. I don't quite know what Nikon is doing as they have some really expensive lenses such as the new Nocts for their upcoming mirrorless camera, and then they have something like this, a 55-200 slow zoom, that seems like it would be cheap and aimed at consumers. Maybe they are planning on releasing multiple mirrorless cameras simultaneously?? Otherwise, it just seems crazy that the person dropping several grand on an exotic Noct for their new mirrorless camera is going to turn around and want to pick up a 55-200 zoom.


http://www.nikoneye.com/new-nikon-patent-discloses-the-55-200mm-f-4-5-6-lens-for-a-full-frame-mirrorless/

Some other interesting things from that site:
We got some early info about the future new Full Frame Nikon mirrorless camera:
There will be two cameras at launch
The first cameras will ship during the first half of 2019
The new mount is NOT name Z-mount as rumored on other sites
The sensor is not the same of the D850 but a new sensor optimized for autofocus speed. Megapixels will be less than the 46MP from the D850
The design is somewhere in between the modern Sony A7 and the more classic Fuji X cameras.
The viewfinder is in the middle just like the Sony A7 series.

mhedges

Mmm. The URL says full frame but wouldn't 55-200 imply crop sensor? I don't think I've seen that range on a full frame lens.