Eric Calabros

1 hour ago, Django said:

I LOVE that they haven't switched to flip-out displays

I like flip-out displays but I know people who work in repair shops and they told me they see a lot of broken ones. Most of the times the data cable can't handle the usual wear and tear. What is completely absent in long term camera reviews are technical opinions of the guys who repair these stuff several months after their release.

3 hours ago, cookietub said:

My guess is that Red realized there was a good chance they could lose the case. Rather than risk having their patent taken away, they walked away instead.

Isn't it putting them in a more vulnerable position? The next attacker will be DJI. Whats the point of having a patent you can't defend? 

11 hours ago, Marcio Kabke Pinheiro said:

The RAW case was dismissed, and Nikon is free to keep it.

They're free to keep it for Z9, but we don't know they're also free to use it in Z8.

I don't think Nikon has anything in tech IP to offer that may be useful for RED. They don't want Z mount. And almost all of Nikon's sensor patents are based of long time collaboration with Sony Semi. Masked AF pixels, stacked fabrications, all are covered by Sony IP too.

However I don't think they just agreed about a license payment. RED's language in this lawsuit was very harsh. It was like they wanted to punish Nikon, regardless of claimed damage. 

Note that this was not a "Voluntary Dismissal" by RED like it was in Kinefinity case.

Anyone here knows what's the difference between settled case and dismissed case? 

27 minutes ago, Django said:

Especially if they include RAW/ProRes.

ProRes is expected, but RAW in smaller body, and with law suit going on? I don't know.

They put themselves in a strange position with stacked sensor. If they update Z6 with non stacked one, it looks like a downgrade. If they update that with stacked one, it will be costly for Z6 price range. 

20 hours ago, Kino said:

 

I liked the DR in this shot

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

 

The problem with Japanese camera makers is that they don't know how to make money anymore. You want to attract younger customers, you have to support the platforms that encourage them to use dedicated cameras. That's about a combination of knowledge and culture. Its a shame that these days its Apple, the king of parental "auto everything", that advocates manual control for its iphone cinematic mode. The Apple way of "manual" of course. Soon they change the taste of an entire generation to believe 60fps is artistic! Dedicated camera needs its own narrative to survive, and we're losing the narrative. 

I noticed a significant drop in user engagement in the forums. Maybe the site's real traffic numbers are not as high as we think it is. Of course its still higher than other photography related websites.

Since January they didn't even bother to cover the news of firmware updates. It doesn't take too much effort to write an article that Z5 got a new firmware update that adds eye AF in video!

OVF is lovely... until its dark. 

You make it look more complicated than what its. Z9 sensor is noisier than A1 sensor, and using 12bit ADC to read out a noisy sensor doesn't give the best image quality. Nikon use the same raw codec for high efficiency raw still images, and photographers have no problem with that. BTW, raw recording benefit is not just correcting huge exposure mistakes in post. First, log profiled compressed images gonna suffer from banding. Its inevitable. Second, raw preserves the bayer pattern, so there will be freedom to use state of the art demosaicing algorithms in future, which are getting better and better with AI. Third, who doesn't hate baked-in white balance? 

Different body for raw support makes sense, but different body for just prores? I don't know.

- Multi level pixel saturation capacity to get more capability in highlight recovery 

- Dual read out to get the base ISO DR at highest ISO

- 16 bit logarithmic raw with 16:1 compression

- internal SSD 

- internal wireless transmitter to send AV1 video to smartphone 

I think there is always a debate in Sony headquarter office about "what should be our flagship?!", Canon has more experience in defining the flagship position and defend that clearly defined position. While I don't like Canon lineup, and its cripple hammer, I understand its logic. 

If rumors are true about Z8 being Z9 without grip, there is hope we'll have a winner 8k camera. 

For me, cinematic has a straight forward meaning: a quality of cinematography that I never notice the cameraman. What these people do is exactly opposite of that, the only actor I notice during the video, is the cameraman.

Remember the rumors circulated for so long people consider it as fact? "Sony will release the first 100MP full frame camera and crush the competition". Turned out Nope, they have to reuse their old sensor cause new stacked ones are way more expensive. 

We always underestimate our ability to handle pain of losing someone. Never say "I can't". Time will be your ally in this fight.

16 minutes ago, hoodlum said:

While Nikon is licensing their mount, it looks like they are charging a large fee based on the difference in pricing for Tamron lenses between Nikon and Sony.  This will not bode well for both Nikon and Canon

Initial price+inflation 

Why you need 3:2? 

1 hour ago, MrSMW said:

I think Nikon are so far preserving their own native lens lineup also?

Nikon is no different. They have filed a lot of patents for Z mount communication. They wouldn't do that if they wanted to make it open, or less restrictive. Even the content of the patents indicates a long term plan is integrated into the mount, since they have defined a generation compatibility. Its like Gen2 body uses the most potential capabilities of Gen2 lens, but can't use all capabilities of Gen3 lens, or something like that.  

5 hours ago, Django said:

Yeah bummer but not really surprising considering Canon is trying to hard sell its RF lenses. They even quit EF production in effort to push RF sales..

Continuing EF would send a mixed message to their customers, also glass production capacity is very limited these days. Otherwise a $2500 EF lens profit margin is not lower than equivalent $2500 RF one. 

Digital stabilization works better with higher shutter speed; cause you don't see the micro motion blur. For serious video production we can't use any shutter speed we like. But for YouTube, sure its good enough. 

Some of us knew its coming tho

Imagine Nikon or Panasonic do this.. yelling thumbnails with "seriously?" title on them would explode in our YouTube home page.