As Nikon recently started shipping their latest camera model, the Z8, they organized touch & try session at various points of sale.
I received an invitation email from Nikon to have a tutorial and try the camera for a few hours , kind of sales workshop with Nikon staff and also have coffee, which was really nice.
It was free, so I decided to join and see how the Z8 handle. The rep asked me which camera I used, and I said Pentax K1 of course, they immediately talked positively mentioning the "high quality", (the first thing Nikon rep said), sturdiness of the Pentax K1, so they appeared to know Pentax well :lol:
After that , I mentioned having some difficulties with Pentax K1 auto-focus especially on moving subjects, so Nikon staff decided to show me the various modes of Nikon Z8 auto-focus, as well as showing me how it works.
Nikon staff kindly and patiently listened to and answered all my questions about auto-focus and other things such as manual focus, focus stacking, until I had exhausted all my questions and couldn't fail either the Z8 or Nikon staff, basically everything I asked the Z8 could you it no problem.
I was lucky to be able to try the Z8 with the Z 240-70 2.8, Z 24-120 and the Z 100-400. Surprisingly, Nikon guys who were there complained a lot (negativity) about things they'd like to be better in the Nikon Z8/Z9, which made me laugh as it reminded me of us complaining about things we'd like to be better on our Pentax cameras, but the things they complained about I would consider to be very minor details compared to Pentax K1 AF shortcomings, so I guess Nikonians are much more demanding/picky compared to us Pentaxians.
Overall, here pros and cons from my first impression using the Nikon Z8, for still images only, I haven't tried any of the video features.
> Pros:
- Nikon Z8 is the first mirror-less camera model that is very close to the ergonomic goodness of my Pentax K1, about the same weight, it handles very nicely and very comfortably.
- External aspect of build quality is comparable to Pentax K1, although Pentax K1 still better, especially the articulated rear display of the K1 is more sturdy and the connector/door seals of the K1 are also better quality
- Z8 auto-focus is from another era (feel more like star wars), covers the whole frame, automatically find subject or people eyes and track, almost instant focus (after a small lag..), very responsive and sticky tracking of moving subjects
- As I could chimp and zoom in shots, I could see that focus accuracy is extremely good, if not perfect, I took over 50 shots to check focus, and I couldn't find a single shot miss-focused or even slightly off focus, mounting lenses off the shelf without any calibration
- When the electronic sound of shutter is disabled (there's no mech shutter in the Z8), the camera is totally silent. Immediately noticeable coming from DSLR. Not sure if it is a Pros or Cons, it depends, DSLR sound is also good to have, Z8 silent mode is also good when desired.
- Z lenses AF motors (the one I tried) are totally silent, super fast (almost instant), very noticeable coming from Pentax screw-drive and even Pentax SDM
- For regular shooting situations (landscape, wedding, sports), I could confirm that the Z8 can do everything the Pentax K1 can do, and more including setting auto ISO speed to +-2 stops to take advantage of IBIS/VR (SR for Pentax)
- Despite the lenses being focus by wire, manual focus is surprisingly smooth and accurate, better than with my mechanical Pentax lenses, I didn't expect that. Z 24-120 is super good, quick focus and not large.
- Focus peaking in the viewfinder, sensitivity can also be tuned, choice of colors, which is great.
- The EVF experience was surprisingly outstanding, I could not see any lag when panning the camera with the 100-400, even in indoors lighting (Z7 was pretty bad for this), EVF is about as good as my Pentax K1 OVF, I could hardly tell it is an electronic viewfinder
- Crazy fast FPS, with buffer and memory completely seamless. I could take 50 burst shots in RAW, and the camera is just waiting for me to take another round of 50 or 100 shots, felt like I can't reach the limit of the camera, it's always ready to shoot
- Z8 IBIS/VR is automatically handled by the camera and performance of IBIS+lens VR is extremely good. Where the Pentax IBIS would require to take two or three shots to get one sharp, the Z8 gives a sharp picture on a single exposure.
> Cons:
- The battery that was full when I switched on the Z8 , was fully drained at the end of my testing, which lasted about 90 minutes. On a K1, the battery would still be at least 2 bars full even after 90 minutes of intense use. Luckily, Nikon had a big power bank to plug on the USB-C port of the Z8.
- Complexity of user interface. You can set a lot of things and customize buttons in the Z8, which is nice, but then you need to dig deep somewhere into menus to change a simple setting, a setting that would be completely straightforward on a Pentax K1
- Small AF lag between shutter button press before AF kicks in, once AF kicks in it's instant on the Z8. On the K1, the shutter lag is noticeably shorter, almost immediate, but then lens AF move towards target is slower or sluggish in comparison to Nikon
- Maybe still have some IBIS bugs, such as with long lens VR (IBIS), the picture taken does not always line-up with the picture you saw in the view finder when you pressed the shutter, glitch that demo rep. couldn't explain. Never had such issue with the K1 IBIS, as IBIS seems to run smoothly on the K1.
- Z8 doesn't do pixel shift, doesn't have built-in GPS, no astro-tracer, no composition adjust either
- More than twice the price of a Pentax K1 II
- Doesn't take K mount lenses with an adapter :(
It's tempting, yet hard to sell, even to a Pentaxian as I can't let go my Pentax K1 because it's so well built, so easy to use, image quality is as good or better, great battery life, but K1 system auto-focus, buffer and memory are stone age compared to the Z8, and I haven't even considered video, not even HD or 4K video...:eek:
