D500 VF Blackout

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Doomrider74

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For some reason this has been bothering me of late. I'm more than willing it's a technique thing, and something I'm going to have to learn, but thought I'd poll you folk, who have far more experience than me.

I use CH with AF-S for the most part, and have been shooting Ospreys a fair bit of late. During fast action I find it difficult to keep the focus point/s on the bird because of the blackout (I use GRP for action and S for static or slow critters).

Has anyone got any thoughts and/or tips on this?
 
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Doomrider74 said:
Has anyone got any thoughts and/or tips on this?
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Not sure if it was a typo or you were referring to Single Point AF Area Mode, but for action scenarios you should be shooting in AF-C mode (Continuous Servo AF) or the camera will lock on an AF solution and miss AF as soon as the bird moves.

For action work with a D500 I'lll use:

- AF-C Continuous Servo AF so the AF tracks distance changes as the bird moves
- Either Group AF or sometimes one of the Dynamic AF areas. As you've observed it can be very difficult to keep the Single Point AF Area right where you want it for fast moving subjects. I save Single Point for slow moving and static subjects.

- I prefer Group AF Area mode if the subject is moving very fast and hard to track assuming there's not a lot of foreground clutter as Group AF tends to grab whatever is closest to the camera even if it's an inconvenient tree branch or twig.

- If there is substantial foreground clutter I'll use the smallest Dynamic AF Area mode where I can still keep the AF area on the moving bird fairly reliably.

- It takes practice to pan smoothly and keep a flying bird well placed in the viewfinder but it can be learned.

- Also if you use VR, make sure your VR mode is set to Sport and not Normal or the subject can jump like crazy when shooting a high speed burst
 
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DRwyoming said:
Not sure if it was a typo or you were referring to Single Point AF Area Mode, but for action scenarios you should be shooting in AF-C mode (Continuous Servo AF) or the camera will lock on an AF solution and miss AF as soon as the bird moves.

For action work with a D500 I'lll use:

- AF-C Continuous Servo AF so the AF tracks distance changes as the bird moves
- Either Group AF or sometimes one of the Dynamic AF areas. As you've observed it can be very difficult to keep the Single Point AF Area right where you want it for fast moving subjects. I save Single Point for slow moving and static subjects.

- I prefer Group AF Area mode if the subject is moving very fast and hard to track assuming there's not a lot of foreground clutter as Group AF tends to grab whatever is closest to the camera even if it's an inconvenient tree branch or twig.

- If there is substantial foreground clutter I'll use the smallest Dynamic AF Area mode where I can still keep the AF area on the moving bird fairly reliably.

- It takes practice to pan smoothly and keep a flying bird well placed in the viewfinder but it can be learned.

- Also if you use VR, make sure your VR mode is set to Sport and not Normal or the subject can jump like crazy when shooting a high speed burst
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Sorry, I meant AF-C, not AF-S.

Thanks for the tips. I've never really used VR Sport but I'll give it a go.
 
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Doomrider74 said:
For some reason this has been bothering me of late. I'm more than willing it's a technique thing, and something I'm going to have to learn, but thought I'd poll you folk, who have far more experience than me.

I use CH with AF-S for the most part, and have been shooting Ospreys a fair bit of late. During fast action I find it difficult to keep the focus point/s on the bird because of the blackout (I use GRP for action and S for static or slow critters).

Has anyone got any thoughts and/or tips on this?
Click to expand...
Yes blackout time(aka mirror up time) on the D500 is 60 percent at 10fps. If you google it there are several people who published tests demonstrating it. I'm only aware because I had the same problem. I really struggled to track fast moving BIF. Once I found out that was the problem I limited myself to shooting it at 8fps or below and it worked for me. I think I had CH set at 8 and CL set at 6. AF works better at lower fps as well. Stands to reason as the camera has more time to collect data, calculate and adjust.

Ironically one of the things that kept me from switching to MILC was the lack of blackout free VF. Now the only way for true blackout free VF is MILC. Go figure.
 
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The blackout from the mirror movement in the D500 is fairly minimal and with practice it can become much easier to deal with. Some people are more sensitive to blackout than others. I seem to be overly sensitive to it and moving to a stacked sensor mirrorless camera was an amazing experience for me. I was talking to someone this weekend about the blackout between shots and they said they never even noticed it until I mentioned it so obviously they were not sensitive to it.
 
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NorthernFocus said:
Yes blackout time(aka mirror up time) on the D500 is 60 percent at 10fps. If you google it there are several people who published tests demonstrating it. I'm only aware because I had the same problem. I really struggled to track fast moving BIF. Once I found out that was the problem I limited myself to shooting it at 8fps or below and it worked for me. I think I had CH set at 8 and CL set at 6. AF works better at lower fps as well. Stands to reason as the camera has more time to collect data, calculate and adjust.

Ironically one of the things that kept me from switching to MILC was the lack of blackout free VF. Now the only way for true blackout free VF is MILC. Go figure.
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Thanks for the tip. I'll try it at 8 fps and see if it becomes less obtrusive.
 
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note, trying 8fps is fine, but also just try other tricks like try to just “see through it”. remember cameras like the d5 and d6 are using higher frame rates and typically considered as less blackout, partially because our brain kinda fills in like looking at a flip-book. so to a certain extent you want to see if you can get your brain to compensate.
 
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John Navitsky said:
note, trying 8fps is fine, but also just try other tricks like try to just “see through it”. remember cameras like the d5 and d6 are using higher frame rates and typically considered as less blackout, partially because our brain kinda fills in like looking at a flip-book. so to a certain extent you want to see if you can get your brain to compensate.
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I can certainly see how a higher FPS could help: Kinda like the kinetograph vs modern day video camera, as an extreme example.

I think what planted the seed was when I tried out a mirrorless camera in my local CS a few months ago and I noted the strobe-like effect, and it got me thinking about the VF on my D500.
 
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John Navitsky said:
note, trying 8fps is fine, but also just try other tricks like try to just “see through it”. remember cameras like the d5 and d6 are using higher frame rates and typically considered as less blackout, partially because our brain kinda fills in like looking at a flip-book. so to a certain extent you want to see if you can get your brain to compensate.
Click to expand...
The flagship bodies don't just SEEM LIKE less blackout. In spite of the higher fps they do have less blackout time. D500 has the worst blackout of any recent Nikon camera. One reason the mirror slap is so loud in D5/6 is that they have to drive the mirror super fast to keep blackout time low. Remember keeping blackout time low is also critical for the AF system.

Doomrider74 said:
I can certainly see how a higher FPS could help: Kinda like the kinetograph vs modern day video camera, as an extreme example.

I think what planted the seed was when I tried out a mirrorless camera in my local CS a few months ago and I noted the strobe-like effect, and it got me thinking about the VF on my D500.
Click to expand...
The "strobe effect" in MILC w/out blackout free EVF isn't just due to blackout. It's even worse. Many(most?) EVFs don't actually go black. They freeze frame/lag for a few milliseconds. Which is even worse than blackout because your brain is seeing an image slightly behind reality. So it is even harder to track fast moving objects. With blackout as John pointed out you can train yourself to "see through it". It's more difficult with lag/freeze frame because you are seeing something but it's slightly behind the real target. I struggled with the high blackout of the D500 but the freeze frame effect of EVFs is a non-starter for me. Just can't deal with it at all. More to the point there wasn't any need to with awesome DSLRs that didn't have that problem :rolleyes: But now having experienced TRUE blackout free VF there's no going back for me.
 
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NorthernFocus said:
The flagship bodies don't just SEEM LIKE less blackout. In spite of the higher fps they do have less blackout time. D500 has the worst blackout of any recent Nikon camera. One reason the mirror slap is so loud in D5/6 is that they have to drive the mirror super fast to keep blackout time low. Remember keeping blackout time low is also critical for the AF system.
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yah, that’s why i used “partially” in there, combination of the amount of blackout combined with the frequency of blackout
 
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NorthernFocus said:
The flagship bodies don't just SEEM LIKE less blackout. In spite of the higher fps they do have less blackout time. D500 has the worst blackout of any recent Nikon camera. One reason the mirror slap is so loud in D5/6 is that they have to drive the mirror super fast to keep blackout time low. Remember keeping blackout time low is also critical for the AF system.


The "strobe effect" in MILC w/out blackout free EVF isn't just due to blackout. It's even worse. Many(most?) EVFs don't actually go black. They freeze frame/lag for a few milliseconds. Which is even worse than blackout because your brain is seeing an image slightly behind reality. So it is even harder to track fast moving objects. With blackout as John pointed out you can train yourself to "see through it". It's more difficult with lag/freeze frame because you are seeing something but it's slightly behind the real target. I struggled with the high blackout of the D500 but the freeze frame effect of EVFs is a non-starter for me. Just can't deal with it at all. More to the point there wasn't any need to with awesome DSLRs that didn't have that problem :rolleyes: But now having experienced TRUE blackout free VF there's no going back for me.
Click to expand...
With which camera?
 
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Doomrider74 said:
With which camera?
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the d5 and d6 both have higher fps and less blackout because they have mirror assemblies designed for maximum performance.

basically if you want to stick with a dslr, both those cameras will be better in terms of blackout (as well as a long list of ways)

OR maybe i misunderstood. do you mean which mirrorless cameras offer a blackout free experience? to a greater extent the z8 and z9, but pretty much any camera based on a stacked sensor at this point in time will either be blackout free or more or less blackout free
 
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John Navitsky said:
the d5 and d6 both have higher fps and less blackout because they have mirror assemblies designed for maximum performance.

basically if you want to stick with a dslr, both those cameras will be better in terms of blackout (as well as a long list of ways)

OR maybe i misunderstood. do you mean which mirrorless cameras offer a blackout free experience? to a greater extent the z8 and z9, but pretty much any camera based on a stacked sensor at this point in time will either be blackout free or more or less blackout free
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Thanks. I was enquiring about which camera you settled on, which you answered there. I think my next purchase will be a mirrorless, so probably a Z8: I've just bought a 500 pf so I'd prefer to stick in the Nikon ecosystem.
 
I think evey camera has some sort. Even mirrorless in electronic shutter mode has to reset the sensor to make each capture. I know on mine at 20 fps you are seeing the previous capture but at 12 fps mechanical or EFCS you see the live view before the capture. Either way is fine with me.
 
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When I shot D500 (and D850) I would use AutoAF for probably 70% of my BIF shooting and Group AF for the other 30%.

In talking to people in person and on the internet it seems most shied away from Auto AF probably because they felt it would give up too much control. But I found the Nikon AF system to do remarkably well in AutoAF. It really prioritizes the closest subject and I got the impression it prioritized moving subject. I know a couple people that started trying it after I had mentioned it and those that did switched to using it a lot of the time. I think for a diving osprey I'd use Auto AF for the entire dive. I may program a 2nd AF-Area button for Zone or Single point to target back to the osprey emerging from the water as AutoAF may get distracted by the splash and/or water ripples when the osprey is underwater.

This doesn't address the blackout but it will allow you to be less accurate holding the Zone over the bird as it dives so the blackout distraction won't cause you to lose the bird as frequently.
 
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In addition to all the above, if you're trying to shoot osprey when they are diving know that it's tough regardless of gear. I've used a D500, D5, D6, D850 and Z9 and it requires a lot of skill and patience to get results. As you know, one of the hardest things is to keep them in the viewfinder. They make fast changes to their dive path and increase their speed (almost doubling it) in the last 10 feet of the dive. Each dive is a little different in that regard, even with the same bird. Overall, I've found gear matters less than skill for diving osprey though I have had a better keeper rate with the Z9.
 
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Warren D said:
In addition to all the above, if you're trying to shoot osprey when they are diving know that it's tough regardless of gear. I've used a D500, D5, D6, D850 and Z9 and it requires a lot of skill and patience to get results. As you know, one of the hardest things is to keep them in the viewfinder. They make fast changes to their dive path and increase their speed (almost doubling it) in the last 10 feet of the dive. Each dive is a little different in that regard, even with the same bird. Overall, I've found gear matters less than skill for diving osprey though I have had a better keeper rate with the Z9.
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Unfortunately, I haven't found their fishing hole, yet, so I haven't witnessed them diving :cry:
 
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