Nikon ZR uses the same PARTIALLY-STACKED CMOS 24MP sensor as the Nikon Z6III but does the ZR perform as well. I did a quick test using my default AF area mode - 3D with subject detection OFF & here’s my initial impressions.
The Nikon ZR only uses an electronic shutter, which means that the stills results in this post were captured with the ZR’s electronic shutter.
Photography at Chinatown (Singapore) Mid-Autumn Festival Lightup decorations
SUPERB 3D TRACKING PERFORMANCE
Note: when you watch the clip , you will see a white 3D AF square (half-press not triggered) , when 3D AF square turns green I was half-pressing the shutter button to focus/track.
with the Z24-70mm f2.8 S II lens, 3D performance seems quicker & stickier. Check out the segments where I lock on, move to compose & the one where I recompose from horizontal to vertical WITHOUT refocusing. 3D was locking on smoothly over long periods without being distracted by other bright areas 👍
Niko
EXCELLENT DYNAMIC RANGE FROM ZR JPEG (SHADOW RECOVERY)
I did this test in JPEG FINE* because I probably could not read the ZR’s Raw file & testing in JPEG was a “worst case” test. If the JPEG file performed well in shadow recovery, the RAW equivalent would be even more advantageous allowing more bandwidth during post editing.
The clip below will show how I did a simple post edit to recover the shadow areas. Keep in mind that my ZR camera exposure was biased a little to protect the scene’s highlights. Bottomline ZR’s JPEG did very well with a very high dynamic range scene.
UNEDITED & UNCROPPED JPEG version ☝️☝️
EDITED version 👇👇
LOVE THE LOOK of the new | CineBias_RED | CREATIVE CONTROL
JPEG FINE* with CineBias_RED picture control applied ☝️☝️UNEDITED / UNCROPPED
JPEG FINE* with STANDARD picture control applied 👇👇UNEDITED / UNCROPPED
That’s it for this 1st Initial impressions post, did not want to make it too long so that it would be easier to digest. I will definitely be publishing a couple more posts covering people detection, wildlife, video & most importantly ZR handling impressions from a STILLS photographer point of view.
So far the ZR is showing me that it has
equivalent if not better AF if compared to the Z6III (more testing to come)
JPEG FINE* file looks great
a very good looking CineBias_RED picture control that I can use straight out of camera (SOOC)
the 4-inch LCD monitor performs spectacularly
ZR is very responsive & I really like how fast the camera switches ON & OFF
Anything I don’t like 😅😅
For my style of STILLS photography , the physical camera handling & ergonomics is very important to me, so I will dedicate a post just on this. DON”T jump the gun , it’s NOT a show stopper by any means but it’s still good to know how I would use the ZR for stills photography ?
Till the next post.
Happy shooting , Andrew