aolander
Well-known member
What do you Z9 owners think of this?
Mirrorless focus issues
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StefanSC
Well-known member
1) All mirrorless do it in one way or another...
2) Panasonic has AF-On Near/Far function that forces the camera to focus on the nearest/farthest subject, thus working around this issue... let's hope that Nikon brings group AF to the Z9.
2) Panasonic has AF-On Near/Far function that forces the camera to focus on the nearest/farthest subject, thus working around this issue... let's hope that Nikon brings group AF to the Z9.
Strodav
Well-known member
Thanks for sharing. I found it useful and informative. Now I know how to deal with the issue should it show up on my Z9.
My work around is simply dropping focus to ground closer than bird, then refocusing. If you know this is the solution, it's pretty quick. With Sony 70-200 mark 2 you have a setting that keeps manual focus ring active so you can change it that way, though I think just quickly dropping to ground close to bird works just as well for e.
abc123brian
Well-known member
Every mirrorless camera I have shot has that issue. Since it is using the sensor to focus, if the actual subject is so blurred out due to the focus on the background, it can’t see the intended subject to perform the focus. I’m not sure I experienced the issue with having to go all the way to close focus like he mentioned, but either need to be focused close to subject or in front of subject to get it to grab focus.
IainD
Well-known member
I found this to be much more noticeable with my 300pf than with my 70-200fl or my 500pf. I started to look online for people reporting problems with the Z9 and 300pf, but nothing specific. I seem to be ok with my other lenses and the Z 105 f2.8, my only native lens so far. Interesting video.
I do face this issue withy my A1 when the subject is close. I simply focus on the ground near me & it worked always.Initially i used to think it was a big deal Now is it is just a quirk with a ready work around/ solution & no more losing sleep over it.
My Nikon/Canon/Sony agent puts it down to the small line-only PDAF sensors getting confused.
On the A9 even if AF gets a brief initial lock, with a small static bird in midground it usually racks out to infinity and EXIF doesn't record a focus point.
A moving small bird is more likely to get a lock.
Same with the A7R III.
If I need record shots, I take the D500. It's much more reliable for this kind of subject.
On the A9 even if AF gets a brief initial lock, with a small static bird in midground it usually racks out to infinity and EXIF doesn't record a focus point.
A moving small bird is more likely to get a lock.
Same with the A7R III.
If I need record shots, I take the D500. It's much more reliable for this kind of subject.
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abc123brian
Well-known member
I wonder if the new OM-1 resolves the issue with its quad pixel AF. It’s the only area mirrorless AF is still inferior to DSLR but it’s usually a minor issue.
A most gobsmacking video.
Kjellis
Well-known member
This is a known issue with mirrorless cameras…
I would have liked to see him trying the many settings the z9 has for how strongly to hold on to a subject once focus is acquired. He totally ignored that aspect so in my mind the video does not prove anything just yet. Also, how is the camera supposed to read my mind and know what my subject is? What if the subject was in the background?
abc123brian
Well-known member
I think the purpose of his video was to highlight the issue mirrorless cameras have in that situation more so to even offer how to avoid it. The place he positioned the bird was done specifically to ensure the problem would be at its worse. Single point can often find the subject better than what it appeared in his video but it means knowing where to put the focus point to trigger it. The other settings wouldn’t really change anything other than holding onto the subject longer before jumping to the background when you move the AF point off the bird.
Think of it as similar to shooting through a chainlink fence. Once you get the focus far enough away from the fence, the camera basically ignores the fence and the larger Aperture makes the fence mostly invisible to the image sensor. Same thing is going on here except it’s ignoring the subject and the subject is a little farther away. If you get the focus closer to the subject instead of the distant background, it will focus on the subject.
Yes. Exactly and this is the reason I think videos like this, at best, show a lack of imagination on the part of the author.
Shooting through fences, or through nets for sports, is an essential feature in any camera I use.
This video turns what many regard as a feature into a bug, when in actual use the experienced shooter will not be slowed down by it and will find that this type of focusing behavior is essential to getting extraordinary images.
I guess we'll see.
Panasonic uses only CDAF and my G9 failed regularly but not in this way.
My point was the camera has no way of knowing what subject is in our minds. It doesn't know we want to shoot the foreground or the background, it's just pixels to the camera, we have to do the thinking.
Yes. If there was no workaround for always focusing on the closest eye there would be many complaints.
If there was no way focus to eye focus through a net, or through a crowd of people, there would be at least one complaint (me).
These are not bugs. To use this camera, one needs to know how it behaves and how to exploit it. When someone complains about something like this and represents it as a flaw, it means they aren't creative enough to fully exploit this camera. It means they can only make a video that takes 13 minutes to repeat the same thing over and over again without understanding how great an opportunity it actually creates.
YouTube makes it easy for anyone to make and distribute videos...and the more spectacular the innuendo, the greater the hope for wider distribution. They mostly say more about the abilities of the videographer than the camera.
Probably pinpoint or small AF area simply doesn't provide enough data, and mirrorless relies heavily on data.
Don't know how Nikons do it but Sonys first use PD to get in the ballpark and then CD to fine tune. What happens with this particular fault is that PD fails and it's left to CD to work. That's a software calculation of where the area with the most contrast between adjoining pixels is as that's characteristic of focus. Midground is blurry (low contrast) while infinity or near it is less blurry, so it gets the prize.
Don't know how Nikons do it but Sonys first use PD to get in the ballpark and then CD to fine tune. What happens with this particular fault is that PD fails and it's left to CD to work. That's a software calculation of where the area with the most contrast between adjoining pixels is as that's characteristic of focus. Midground is blurry (low contrast) while infinity or near it is less blurry, so it gets the prize.
In tracking a Sony will give priority to what's central in the frame, closest and has distinctive colour and pattern. Often this will be your subject, and if you know how Sony works you can use them to tell the computer what your subject is.
abc123brian
Well-known member
Maybe I’m miss understanding what you’re saying, but it’s not that the camera jumped to the background. He intentionally made it jump to the background to show once the bird “subject” is completely out of focus because focus was on the background, the camera wouldn’t reacquire it without first focusing on something in front of the bird. The camera wasn’t losing the subject and going to the background, but once internationally on the background not coming back to the subject. Considering the bird almost disappears in this example, not much of a surprise.
FB101
Well-known member
He didn't cover it in the video, but if you go through the comments on YouTube he explains that he did try changing AF stickiness and it made no difference on his finding.
I think your other comment below is spot on, the camera can't read our mind (although at times it seems like it does) and when the intended subject is "too far gone" the AF can't recognize the blurry cloud as something of interest.
With current technology the solution would be to have the lens go through a wide range of focusing distances to "see" if there is something interesting underneath... and then we would all complain that focus acquisition is too slow as the lens racks through a wide focusing range.
Probably the short term fix will be to able to assign a custom button to change the AF priority to find a subject from near to far... Many Nikon lenses already have the ability to set a custom focus distance recall on the custom button of the lens and if you set that at maybe minimum distance + 3 feet, it would probably take care of 95% of issues (still a work-around but not too much of a constraints). Now the Sony 200-600 can't do that for some weird reason... one of its few serious flaws (and no manual focus override either).
FB101
Well-known member
Maybe before you throw the guy under the proverbial bus you should check his work. Ray is one of the most artistically creative wildlife photographers out there and he does extensive use of blurred foreground and background in his images (actually one of the trademarks of his style) - when he says it's an issue for his style of photography and he misses shots because of it, it's not because he is not creative, it's because the camera doesn't adapt to his style as effortlessly as he needs it to.
The reality is 6 months from now he'll be posting amazing shots from the Z9 - but what he is demonstrating is real and requires changing technique and for some aspect of his photography will make his life more difficult.
But if one actually reads everything he posted on the topic, or listens to the conclusion of the video, everything the Z9 brings is worth the switch and he is dropping the D4s... but it's not the same thing as saying the z9 is better at everything for what he does. It means the Z9 is better in balance and worth the upgrade but it's not flawless.
And by the way, it's not a Z9 issue, he'd run into the same problem with the A1 or R5 or R3...
Below is just one example of his shots - maybe you can see why he might find the propensity to get stuck on background problematic? And BTW, this was shot with a Z6ii so I am pretty sure he is very adept at work-arounds.
Maybe before you throw the guy under the proverbial bus you should check his work. Ray is one of the most artistically creative wildlife photographers out there and he does extensive use of blurred foreground and background in his images (actually one of the trademarks of his style) - when he says it's an issue for his style of photography and he misses shots because of it, it's not because he is not creative, it's because the camera doesn't adapt to his style as effortlessly as he needs it to.
The reality is 6 months from now he'll be posting amazing shots from the Z9 - but what he is demonstrating is real and requires changing technique and for some aspect of his photography will make his life more difficult.
But if one actually reads everything he posted on the topic, or listens to the conclusion of the video, everything the Z9 brings is worth the switch and he is dropping the D4s... but it's not the same thing as saying the z9 is better at everything for what he does. It means the Z9 is better in balance and worth the upgrade but it's not flawless.
And by the way, it's not a Z9 issue, he'd run into the same problem with the A1 or R5 or R3...
Below is just one example of his shots - maybe you can see why he might find the propensity to get stuck on background problematic? And BTW, this was shot with a Z6ii so I am pretty sure he is very adept at work-arounds.
I think you are putting a lot of words in my mouth.
My critique is about the video, and the implied limitations of the Z9 which are not correct. It is not about his body of work.
dwillar
Active member
I don't have a Z9 yet. I would try setting the AF ON button for BBF AFC S and cause the camera to focus on the background. Get the camera on target and engage AF ON. Should focus on the lost target and releasing AF ON should pick up on the eye (eye detect) if that was the normal focus mode you were using. May not work but there has to be reason why the Nikon engineers put an AF ON button under your right thumb in both landscape and portrait positions. Somebody please try this and report your results here. I expect that releasing the AF ON button will force a software restart of whatever AF mode was in use when the camera first went out of focus. 