Garfield
Well-known member
For those that might are interested in the Z6III and have too much time on their hands 
here's a 10min video of three uninterrupted cuts of some Osprey diving action I took today.
I bought the Z6III specifically for the HD240p and wanted to see how it performed, since I really missed having it since I sold my Sony gear and the Z8 & Z9 don't support it.
Basic specs are:
Camera: Nikon Z6III
Lens: Nikon 180-600 + 1.4xTC (840mm)
Codec: H.265 10-bit HD 240p
Settings: f10, 1/500s, ISO floated 500-2000
AF-C, Custom Wide (maxed), Subject detect=animal, AF speed=5 (fast), Tracking sensitivity=4 (neutral)
Processed using Davinci Resolve: Graded (sharpened, contrast, saturation, no noise reduction). Stablilized
Output @HD 24fps (10% slow-mo)
Apologies for the less than perfect tracking...this was my first outing this year shooting the local Osprey "Bob".
I don't normally run long slow-mo reels like this but wanted to study the AF/tracking and this is the best way to do that.
I'm pleased with the quality of the HD, which I think it slightly superior to Sony's version.
AF overall is pretty good but far from perfect. If you watch the video very carefully you can see where the camera will sporadically lose focus for a micro-second. It also seems to have problems with water droplets, but generally recovers fairly quickly considering this is 1/10 slow-mo. I'll have to play with Tracking Sensitivity, but in general my experience is that this setting doesn't have much of an effect when it comes to video.
Cheers!
HD version:
Uprezzed and regraded 4k Version:
EDIT Notes:
(1) When going over the video I noticed that when the contrast detect AF failed (and it wasn't due to my sloppy tracking) it was often when the osprey flew in front of some bare trees/branches...likely the camera got confused between the brown trees and the brown osprey feathers. But it always recovered very quickly.
(2) Although HD 240p is full-frame only (likely binned, but with excellent ISO performance), it doesn't offer a DX option which would have been handy for the extra reach. Since you can't really crop when shooting HD, you need to be able to fill the frame to get acceptable results.
(3) I wish the Z6III had dedicated bird subject detect mode ... I'm getting the impression the combined animal subject detect is not as good for birds. Hopefully Nikon will split them up, but I'm not sure they will for this level of camera.
(4) ISO noise performance on the Z6III is excellent -- ISO ran up to 2000 at times and I didn't need any NR in post.
here's a 10min video of three uninterrupted cuts of some Osprey diving action I took today.I bought the Z6III specifically for the HD240p and wanted to see how it performed, since I really missed having it since I sold my Sony gear and the Z8 & Z9 don't support it.
Basic specs are:
Camera: Nikon Z6III
Lens: Nikon 180-600 + 1.4xTC (840mm)
Codec: H.265 10-bit HD 240p
Settings: f10, 1/500s, ISO floated 500-2000
AF-C, Custom Wide (maxed), Subject detect=animal, AF speed=5 (fast), Tracking sensitivity=4 (neutral)
Processed using Davinci Resolve: Graded (sharpened, contrast, saturation, no noise reduction). Stablilized
Output @HD 24fps (10% slow-mo)
Apologies for the less than perfect tracking...this was my first outing this year shooting the local Osprey "Bob".
I don't normally run long slow-mo reels like this but wanted to study the AF/tracking and this is the best way to do that.
I'm pleased with the quality of the HD, which I think it slightly superior to Sony's version.
AF overall is pretty good but far from perfect. If you watch the video very carefully you can see where the camera will sporadically lose focus for a micro-second. It also seems to have problems with water droplets, but generally recovers fairly quickly considering this is 1/10 slow-mo. I'll have to play with Tracking Sensitivity, but in general my experience is that this setting doesn't have much of an effect when it comes to video.
Cheers!
HD version:
Uprezzed and regraded 4k Version:
EDIT Notes:
(1) When going over the video I noticed that when the contrast detect AF failed (and it wasn't due to my sloppy tracking) it was often when the osprey flew in front of some bare trees/branches...likely the camera got confused between the brown trees and the brown osprey feathers. But it always recovered very quickly.
(2) Although HD 240p is full-frame only (likely binned, but with excellent ISO performance), it doesn't offer a DX option which would have been handy for the extra reach. Since you can't really crop when shooting HD, you need to be able to fill the frame to get acceptable results.
(3) I wish the Z6III had dedicated bird subject detect mode ... I'm getting the impression the combined animal subject detect is not as good for birds. Hopefully Nikon will split them up, but I'm not sure they will for this level of camera.
(4) ISO noise performance on the Z6III is excellent -- ISO ran up to 2000 at times and I didn't need any NR in post.
Last edited:
