Nikon Z9 + 4.1 Firmware: The New King Of Birding?

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BarkingBeansCoffee said:
FWIW - a reasonable fast way to switch, as an alternative to giving up your RSFH is to use FN4 to call up the first item in MyMenu.
Easy to use your left hand to call up choices - you see them in the viewfinder - right hand to scroll and hit ok.

Yea its sort of 3 button pushes- well is three button pushes- but it can be adapted muscle memory.
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I may go that route as well. I've used it that way in the past but found RSF faster. Now, it's time to revisit it :)
 
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Ad Astra said:
Thanks @Steve for another very useful video. After watching your 600PF review I decided to keep my copy rather than return it and buy the 400 F4.5 instead. I went with my Z8 and 600PF for its first walk today during a gap between the rain showers. I found the weight ideal on a long walk and the combo fitted in my shoulder bag that I had purchased for my 500PF.

I am also waiting for the bird detect to be ported to the Z8 :) .

Regarding recall shooting function do you think swapping between animal and bird is the best choice for the limited quantity of one for the recall shooting function? I currently have recall shooting function set to switch subject detect on or off.
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Steve said:
I'm stuck TBH.

There are times it's critical to be able to shut it off but there are also times I want to swap. I might go so far as to use two different Custom Settings banks and try to pick the appropriate one as needed (you could use a photo shooting bank too I suppose - one with SD on Birds and one with SD Off). If there ever was a time for Nikon to give us an option for shutting off SD with a push of a button, it's now.

Right now, this moment, I'm thinking about maybe changing my Fn2 button to Single Point AF and using it when I want an AF area with SD. My biggest problem with SD in the past has been for BIF work - sometimes I needed to quickly shut it off if it was getting stuck. However - so far - the new firmware is better at tracking the bird than I am, so maybe my original reason doesn't exist anymore and I can just turn it on and of using the "I" menu. Again, this is VERY subject to change!!

As a side note, I think that's one of the biggest challenges I found with the Z9 – it's always getting firmware updates, and as new features are added it causes me to completely rethink my previous configurations.
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I find that I hardly ever need to switch off Subject Recognition.

In such challenges, I find corralling the search area solves the focus challenges; whether it's a tricky case of subject resolution, clutter or risk of locking on to the wrong object in the frame.
Quite often, solving this often needs a toggle switch to Custom Area 1*1 + AFOn (assigned to Fn2).... I switched to this neat solution approx 18months ago. It's replaced any need for Single Point mode.

I keep RSF Hold for unexpected action events, and instead use the iMenu to switch between Bird and Animal categories, but I'm another who finds it's faster by far to have Subject Recognition modes setup as the first item in MyMenu, and hotkey to this with the LAN button.
 
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Many thanks for the video Steve. I've been using 4.10 since it was released and have been blown away by the improvement in bird SD. The first time I really noticed it was photographing a cormorant circling around a patch of water and the Z9 tracked it beautifully. This was a mostly black bird, sometimes fairly small in the frame, against dark trees, light vegetation, reedbed and water and I ended up with so many keepers. I've used it on herons, cranes and many small birds and it just works on everything I've thrown at it.

I also photograhed the deer rut here in the UK a couple of weeks ago using animal SD. That worked brilliantly too.

What with the amazing choice of long glass that Nikon have brought out recently and this firmware I can't imagine any wildlife photographer would want to use any other system now.
 
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DaveR said:
Many thanks for the video Steve. I've been using 4.10 since it was released and have been blown away by the improvement in bird SD. The first time I really noticed it was photographing a cormorant circling around a patch of water and the Z9 tracked it beautifully. This was a mostly black bird, sometimes fairly small in the frame, against dark trees, light vegetation, reedbed and water and I ended up with so many keepers. I've used it on herons, cranes and many small birds and it just works on everything I've thrown at it.

I also photograhed the deer rut here in the UK a couple of weeks ago using animal SD. That worked brilliantly too.

What with the amazing choice of long glass that Nikon have brought out recently and this firmware I can't imagine any wildlife photographer would want to use any other system now.
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I too have been impressed with how it handles black eyes on black birds - sometimes it sees them when I can't LOL! To be fair though, when we tested side by side with the Sony, it was just as good.
 
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Steve said:
Ahh, good to know. We tired multiple methods (and I think that may have been one of them), but didn't' record it all. However, I don't think I tried it without tracking in that particular example. Something else to try :)
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That's correct. Non tracking reduces the issue by over 90% around water reflections. It's not fool proof but it's massively better. That's why I like that sony decoupled eye focus from tracking. The issue you showed around water is something that's been a problem with the A1 since its launch - that's why your dual button set-up works so well - one tracking, one not tracking - if tracking fails, jump to the other!
 
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Steve said:
I too have been impressed with how it handles black eyes on black birds - sometimes it sees them when I can't LOL! To be fair though, when we tested side by side with the Sony, it was just as good.
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Yep, blackbirds, crows, rooks and magpies I've tried it on and that has been my experience too. I've no experience of the A1 autofocus so your comparisons are really useful. In fact I can't think of anyone else who has so much experience with both systems so I really value your opinions. It's the range of long glass that Nikon has available that puts them in front as far as I'm concerned. I got the 800PF after watching your review and just love that lens. I still use my old 500PF sometimes and am considering getting the 600PF for long walks.
 
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I always try to interpolate Steve's analysis with what I experience with the OM-1. In this video the test across water shooting Seagulls is something that I do often at Legg Lake, Wittier Narrows, Los Angeles Basin.

My experience is that the OM-1 finds the bird and the eye if the eye is visible.

Tom
 
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FB101 said:
That's correct. Non tracking reduces the issue by over 90% around water reflections. It's not fool proof but it's massively better. That's why I like that sony decoupled eye focus from tracking. The issue you showed around water is something that's been a problem with the A1 since its launch - that's why your dual button set-up works so well - one tracking, one not tracking - if tracking fails, jump to the other!
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LOL, I just have to remember to use it. My problem is I haven't used the a1 in months and was in a hurry to get the gull before it moved. Although, if that a9iii materializes, I think that entire portion of the video may be a moot point anyway!
 
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Hmmm. OM Systems says that tracking and Subject I.D. are two different processes and when both are enabled they fight each other. Their explanation is that tracking predicts where the subject will be while Subject ID simply analyses the shot like a human would and focuses. Could be the same with Sony.

Tom
 
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Great video Steve. It’s nice to see Nikon still making improvements via firmware on the Z9. The customization and AF performance has improved so much since I first purchased my Z9. Hopefully they’ll continue. Another really informative video by you. You are definitely one of the best on the internet in teaching AND explaining the whys of setting up a camera. So much better than the vast majority who are only interested in clicks. Keep up the great work!

One question….. have you ever tried just keeping Subject Detection in Auto? I was curious if there would be change in SD performance between mammals and birds. TBH, I’m generally in birds 95% of the time and the other 5% is off, and have never tried Auto. Maybe on my next trip out…..
 
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Fishboy1952 said:
Great video Steve. It’s nice to see Nikon still making improvements via firmware on the Z9. The customization and AF performance has improved so much since I first purchased my Z9. Hopefully they’ll continue. Another really informative video by you. You are definitely one of the best on the internet in teaching AND explaining the whys of setting up a camera. So much better than the vast majority who are only interested in clicks. Keep up the great work!

One question….. have you ever tried just keeping Subject Detection in Auto? I was curious if there would be change in SD performance between mammals and birds. TBH, I’m generally in birds 95% of the time and the other 5% is off, and have never tried Auto. Maybe on my next trip out…..
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I play with it from time to time but, very anecdotally, it seems like I get better results in the dedicated modes. It would be fun to test it though.
 
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Thanks for the comparison to the A1. I'm so heavy into Nikon I won't move but I've been very impressed with the AF of the Z9 since 4.10 appeared. I won't know for sure how good it is until the osprey come back in the spring but the af is now what it should have been for a flagship camera. The big test will be if it locks and sticks to a diving osprey and doesn't jump to the BG.
 
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Steve, have you switched your TSF Hold from SD off to SD mode selection? Sounds like you did from the video but the book still has SD off unless I misread the latest edition. Personally…they need to give us more SD hold options, I can’t believe they’re that short on firmware space.
 
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Anjin San said:
Steve, have you switched your TSF Hold from SD off to SD mode selection? Sounds like you did from the video but the book still has SD off unless I misread the latest edition. Personally…they need to give us more SD hold options, I can’t believe they’re that short on firmware space.
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I have for the moment, but it's more a testing thing to see if I like it better. Not sure what the final configuration will look like :)
 
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Having just installed 4.1 before I left for a birding trip to Kerala and Sri Lanka I really had a chance to test it out. I was constantly surprised by the results. About the only time AF subject detection didn't work when a bird was small and it was hard to distinguish it from the leaves around it. I mainly used Steve's suggestion of a 1 x 1 Wide Angle AF mode. What was new to me was Steve's explanation of why Recall Shooting Function will just revert to the regular setting if you change certain functions. I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. Nothing it appears.
 
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