In the last year Canon and Sony have been relatively quiet at least for those of us who are looking at nature photography tools. Salwa and I are currently quite highly invested in both of those companies with multiple cameras and a significant number of lenses for both. For the most part we are very happy with the gear that we have for photography and video work but….and this is quite a but….Nikon has been turning my head quite often with the gear they have been putting out.
The first things that caught my eye were the PF primes. The 500mm f/5.6 in particular with the Phase Fresnel design (similar to the DO or Diffractive optics from Canon) was so small and light in comparison to my Canon 500 F/4 II that the aperture reduction seemed like a very worth while thing to deal with. The price difference ($3300 USD compared to the $9000USD I paid for the Canon a number of years ago) also made that lens into something that was quite reasonable and didn’t feel like having to make a decision between it and my next vehicle. This lens seems quite sharp, not sure how it compares directly with the Canon 400 f/4 DO but those who I know that have it are very happy with it.
Nikon 500 f/5.6 PF lens, a relatively small but mighty prime.
Canon 400 f/4 DO II lens.
At the time a couple of great and inexpensive lenses was an interesting but not alluring thing especially since there wasn’t a camera to pair it with that could focus anywhere near as well as the cameras I had (A7RIV, A7IV, R5) even though the Z7 had some fantastic image quality. This brings us to the Z9 and now the Z8. Both of these cameras have upped the game for Nikon significantly and although they don’t quite match the competition in all aspects they are very competitive. It is the price that is the real game changer at the moment. With those two cameras we are getting very close to the capabilities of the Sony A1 for significantly less money, with the Z8 coming in around the same price as the A7RV. Now I really like the A7RV and it does everything I want except for fast silent shooting and up until the Z8 came around I thought that was going to be out of reach unless I wanted to shell out significantly more money for the A1….now I’m a little jealous and really waiting to see how Sony responds. My Canon R5 is mostly keeping up with the A7R5 but pretty much has the same limitations.
Nikon Z8
The latest thing from Nikon shows me that they really want to lure in nature photographers and that is the announcement of the 180-600 f5.6-6.3. This lens looks like almost a clone of the Sony 200-600 with the only real differences I can see being the extra 20mm and the black color. This is another great move by Nikon as the 200-600 lens I think is the best value lens for nature photographers at the moment. It is pretty sharp, relatively inexpensive, has internal zoom, fast (enough) autofocus and is on my camera likely 80 percent of the time. For those people who want good reach, good quality, portability but don’t have 10 to 12 thousand dollars sitting around for a fast prime this lens hits the spot. I think there is a pretty big niche of amateur and professional photographers that this lens will appeal to and now also to the Nikon version.
Nikon 180-600 f/5.6-6.3
Sony 200-600 f/5.6-6.3
Can’t wait to see if/when Canon and Sony decide to deal with this competition…currently I think Sony could come out with a camera that can compete and beat the Z8 very quickly since they likely have an equivalent to the Z8 sensor ready to go for themselves and they already have the 200-600 so they are only lacking in the Diffractive Optics area. Canon has DO technology but and are likely coming out with a higher resolution stacked sensor for the D1 but the Z8 may have changed the game on them and they may need something close to the D1 at a much lower price than they likely would like to have out there. The competition is going to be interesting again for a while, or so I hope.