Speaking with the local rep, they are working on incorporating RED Codecs in the next FW. There are no hardware limitations, just programming.
Rumors: New Nikon Z9 Firmware Update With Enhanced AF Acquisition Coming Soon (or not 🙂)
- Thread starter JAJohnson
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EricKlees
Well-known member
There will almost undoubtedly be some AF tweaks/enhancements but new features like pre-capture raw or 30fps no clue.
But I've heard rumblings from about 5 or 6 months ago that the limitation did the pre-capture may very well lie in the sensor limitations. So if that doesn't come with the next FW update i will consider that to be the case and that will be reserved for the Z9 II as a know for a fact that Nikon engineers were working on our at the very least looking into pre-capture raw back in October 2022 based on an NPS zoom call
If there's a limitation because they're basically frame capturing the video stream and can't pull RAW from that due to bandwidth constraints that would make sense as it's a camera design problem.
I'd be very very happy if they could firmware in HEIC support though with JPEGS as those 10 bit files have a lot more editing room and it would be a significant upgrade to precapture, they also look great on apple XDR and other HDR displays that support them.
If they can add RAW precapture it would stave off sales of R5ii and A1/A1ii as the Z8 is much more competitively priced so I would think that would very much be in their interest to do. They can always enchance that further in a future camera. Waiting for a new camera release would just look like catching up and being on par, releasing now is on par and the next camera can then surpass everything on the market and they can take more time to develop it.
I'd be very very happy if they could firmware in HEIC support though with JPEGS as those 10 bit files have a lot more editing room and it would be a significant upgrade to precapture, they also look great on apple XDR and other HDR displays that support them.
If they can add RAW precapture it would stave off sales of R5ii and A1/A1ii as the Z8 is much more competitively priced so I would think that would very much be in their interest to do. They can always enchance that further in a future camera. Waiting for a new camera release would just look like catching up and being on par, releasing now is on par and the next camera can then surpass everything on the market and they can take more time to develop it.
John Navitsky
Well-known member
i do think it is VERY possible that pre-capture raw may not be feasible in the expeed7 based cameras. that said, i'm skeptical that it's a _SENSOR_ issue, but rather some other sort of imaging pipeline limitation.
probably just semantics nit tho either way
EricKlees
Well-known member
I don't think it has anything to do with the processor when it comes to the pre-capture raw. I spoke to one of the main guys that worked on the Z9 team before retiring and said that they were barely at 50% of the limits of the EXPEED 7. This was after the 2.0 firmware release so maybe around the 3.01.i do think it is VERY possible that pre-capture raw may not be feasible in the expeed7 based cameras. that said, i'm skeptical that it's a _SENSOR_ issue, but rather some other sort of imaging pipeline limitation.
probably just semantics nit tho either way
I'm pretty certain is there is a bottleneck or hardware limitation it had something to do with the sensor tech.
I mean the cameras that are doing pre-capture in raw with Sony and Canon are a broken version with some fairly significant limitations ava those are with a 24mp sensor which should make it even easier
kanonka
Member
I'd take better AF over pre-capture any time of the day...
beano
Active member
Yes, I saw somewhere (maybe Ricci or Matt AU) mentioned that the Expeed 7 processor was operating at approximately 50% of max capability at release of FW 4.10 for the Z9. If true, it will have a lot of headroom for additional features, and I can easily think there might be some Red Codec goodness making its way in.
Even if it will not bring much ROI to Nikon for existing users, it will surely pave the way to eat into Canon and Sony sales, lure peeps over to Nikon, especially Sony users, seeing their glass would be compatible. Just thinking out loud, but Nikon will need to work a bit more on tracking-performance, as we have seen from various threads here over the last while.
Anyway, exciting times ahead, current users will certainly see big benefits with these free FW upgrades. Going forward, I can see Nikon maybe charge something for more significant upgrades, where new features are added. Personally, I will be happy to pay something for this SaaS-type model.
John Navitsky
Well-known member
yah, i could totally see this
this is the part that doesn't track. you can already get the images off the sensor ~20fps raw normally (no pre-capture). maybe 120fps, although maybe that's with some sort of line skipping.
so you can clearly get the content off of the sensor and get it all-the-way-to-the-card in raw today. it doesn't track that the sensor would be the limitation for pre-capture (at least up to 20fps).
more than 20fps, definitely possible.
i still feel like they are somehow taking advantage of the stream that goes to the evf for pre-capture for some reason.