Z8 Sensor shield

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Doomrider74

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Hi folks.

I got my first Z8 on Tuesday and I'm busy working through set up. How do you have the sensor shield set up? Obviously, you want it closed when changing lenses, but having it set to close whenever the camera is turned off could cause premature wear and tear if I turn it off regularly to save battery, couldn't it?

Is it a function that can be assigned to a control? Is it worth concerning myself over?

Thanks.
 
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Doomrider74 said:
Hi folks.

I got my first Z8 on Tuesday and I'm busy working through set up. How do you have the sensor shield set up? Obviously, you want it closed when changing lenses, but having it set to close whenever the camera is turned off could cause premature wear and tear if I turn it off regularly to save battery, couldn't it?

Is it a function that can be assigned to a control? Is it worth concerning myself over?

Thanks.
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I set it to close when the camera is turned off and don't worry about it at all. After all, it's opening and closing far less than an actual shutter from DSLR days.

Doomrider74 said:
Do you have your Z9 set to auto shut-off when not used?
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I have the Standby Timer set to put the camera in standby mode if I don't use it for a while but that does not close the protective shutter though it does turn off the viewfinder and VR and dock the IBIS on the sensor. Even if it did close the shutter I still wouldn't worry about shutter life but that's only opening and closing when the camera is powered on or off.
 
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Doomrider74 said:
Hi folks.

I got my first Z8 on Tuesday and I'm busy working through set up. How do you have the sensor shield set up? Obviously, you want it closed when changing lenses, but having it set to close whenever the camera is turned off could cause premature wear and tear if I turn it off regularly to save battery, couldn't it?

Is it a function that can be assigned to a control? Is it worth concerning myself over?

Thanks.
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For two reasons I have it set to close when the camera is powered off.

1) When I change lenses I don’t have to worry that it’s not closed.

2) I don’t think the mechanism will wear out during the life of the camera. And if it did, Nikon will replace it. Also it has minimal impact on battery life.
 
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The sensor shield is a moving part that undoubtedly has a finite life span. I added the menu item to My Menu for easy access. My shield is off until i need to change a lens and turn it off ones the lens is changed. There is no use letting the shield constantly close and open every time you put the camera on and off needlessly putting wear on it.

The other issue of the Z8 and Z9 is when the shield is on and the camera off, it takes the camera a full second to go from off to ready to shoot. With the shield off, the camera is ready in 0.5 seconds. Meaning the camera is ready before you can bring the camera to your eye, never missing a shot due to waiting to l for the camera.
 
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JAJohnson said:
2) I don’t think the mechanism will wear out during the life of the camera.
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A sensor shield is relatively simple to design as it does not need a first and second curtain to create a valuable width slit to expose the film/sensor at different shutter speeds

If you take an average of 20 images while a camera is switched on then the sensor shield would have 5% of the wear of a conventional shutter – accept the Z8 and 9 do not have a shutter.
If you take an average of 50 shots then the wear factor is 2%.

Potential wear is an issue that does not concern me at all as even relatively basic camera bodies had a shutter operation tested life of 100,000 cycles.

JAJohnson said:
Also it has minimal impact on battery life.
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A detail sometimes overlooked, particularly for sports photography, is the first shot after switching can be taken a fraction of a second sooner if the sensor shield is not closed.

Sensor shield up or down seems only a choice in the camera body setup menu.

EDIT the sensor shield down combined with the special anti-static surface on the sensor of a Z8 and Z9 for most people results in a dramatic reduction in sensor dust.
 
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Thank for your input, everyone. I've turned off the function to close it every time the camera shuts down and added it as an item in "My Menu", so I can find it easily, as suggested above.

I'm not concerned about battery life, just premature wear. I'm also not someone who changes lenses in the field ( I only have two, and use my 500pf 99% of the time. The other is a 24-70S), so it doesn't need to close when I'm out and about.
 
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One other reason to have the shield down is to protect your sensor in the event you accidentally point the lens at the sun while carrying the camera. Even if the camera is off, focussing the sun on the sensor can damage it. Unlike DSLRs, on most mirrorless cameras the sensor is always exposed - having the sensor shield down is good protection.
 
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EricKlees said:
The sensor shield is a moving part that undoubtedly has a finite life span. I added the menu item to My Menu for easy access. My shield is off until i need to change a lens and turn it off ones the lens is changed. There is no use letting the shield constantly close and open every time you put the camera on and off needlessly putting wear on it.

The other issue of the Z8 and Z9 is when the shield is on and the camera off, it takes the camera a full second to go from off to ready to shoot. With the shield off, the camera is ready in 0.5 seconds. Meaning the camera is ready before you can bring the camera to your eye, never missing a shot due to waiting to l for the camera.
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Yes…it is a mechanical part and thus subject to wear. However…it moves more slowly than a mechanical shutter does and those are rated for many thousands of actuations…and we all know that 100,000 shutter actuations without failure is pretty common. Even if one turns the camera on and off 25 times in a days shooting…that’s still far less than a mechanical shutter would actuate on the same outing. Wear on the shield mechanics is so clearly not something you’ll ever need to worry about. Sure, leaving it disabled except when changing lenses lessens even the trivial wear we are talking about…but the work to enable and then disable it again after swapping lenses turns a lens change from a 15 second max operation to something more than a minute I’m guessing…so unless lens changes never happen in the field that seems a non starter.
 
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Anjin San said:
Yes…it is a mechanical part and thus subject to wear. However…it moves more slowly than a mechanical shutter does and those are rated for many thousands of actuations…and we all know that 100,000 shutter actuations without failure is pretty common. Even if one turns the camera on and off 25 times in a days shooting…that’s still far less than a mechanical shutter would actuate on the same outing. Wear on the shield mechanics is so clearly not something you’ll ever need to worry about. Sure, leaving it disabled except when changing lenses lessens even the trivial wear we are talking about…but the work to enable and then disable it again after swapping lenses turns a lens change from a 15 second max operation to something more than a minute I’m guessing…so unless lens changes never happen in the field that seems a non starter.
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LoL people have already shown some shields to have failed in the first 6 months of so of the Z9s release. It's already known to have failed for some

But ok keep letting your open and close for no reason. It's your camera
 
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Doomrider74 said:
It's generally a good idea to provide evidence when you make such claims.

Anyhoo: If you set the shield to close when power is turned off, does it close when the camera goes into auto- shutdown or only when you turn it off at the power knob?
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Nikon’s documentation states that the behavior is when the camera’s power is off.
 

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EricKlees said:
So it didn't happen?
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I haven’t either…and while that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen..it doesn’t mean it did either. A quick google didn’t turn up any reports but I spent very little time looking. As noted…it’s a far simpler mechanism than an actual shutter and it does move slower…so it seems the likelihood of failures, particularly systemic failures as you seem to be alluding to seems pretty small. Obviously anything mechanical can fail…but if this was a serious problem most of us would have heard or read about it.
 
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EricKlees said:
I didn't remember which forum but it was almost 2 years ago there were a couple
Could have been on FM or DPReview (which i left able a year ago.

But the shield collapsed is was off it's track.
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The Z8 hasn’t been put 2 years…May 23 was the intro…that sounds like an anecdotal report and if it was a significant issue it would have been all over the net…the two Z8 recalls were and even though we’re just a handful of reports that I saw so neither of those was a widespread issue AFAIK.
 
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