Eating My Words

Ok, I was wrong.

I made the decision a week ago, in order for me to trade a load of gear in for me to buy a Nikon Z7II, a 45.7mp high resolution beast. The big brother of my Z6II. I’m loving the output of the Nikon mirrorless system and having done extensive research, I thought I’d be the total hypocrite you now see before you.

There are several reasons as to why but they will just sound like me justifying this decision.

We have had fairly inconsistent weather in the last few days and I have been getting over a cold, so the opportunities for me to give the camera a good run out, have been limited. So these really are first impressions. Form and function, it is identical to the Z6II. It is very hard to tell one from the other apart from the writing on the front. They behave very much alike so it isn’t a steep learning curve to operate or indeed set up. Where the magic begins is the moment you start producing images. The clarity, the detail you can get from this camera is for me, off the scale. You are presented with a machine that can produce whatever you want it to/or are able to, and the choices in composition are limitless. The ability to crop an image and not lose printable resolution is really handy.

All the reasons I didn’t go for this model seem a bit far off the mark. Yes, my 24mp Z6II is probably cleaner in low light and it has a faster burst rate than its big brother but they are different tools in that sense. As a landscape camera and for general street photography, I think the Z7II should be a winner. The image above was taken at sunrise a couple of days ago. On editing the raw file, I noticed this dot in the sky. At first I thought it was a bird or a bit of debris on the lens. When I magnified it , it was a clear shot of an airplane carrying passengers to or from their holidays. It is tiny but very clear, which I found astonishing. The tree-line is sharp against the pink sky. I’ve shot with some nice cameras in my time but none have come close to capturing detail quite like this.

The black and white images in this post are taken with the Nikon z 24-70 f/4 s lens, a kit lens that is by far the best I’ve ever used. It balances beautifully on both my Nikon bodies and produces super sharp images every time. Some higher megapixel cameras have too much resolving power for some lenses but the Nikon ones pair very comfortably with the Nikon bodies. Have I been here before with previous cameras? sort of. I have used some great gear in my time but none come close to this new one.

I have sold all my Pentax gear and a couple of other pieces to fund this new body. I don’t have to wonder if I’ve made the right decision because I already know the answer to that. Yes, you can produce stunning photos on a 15 year old 12mp camera but this gives me so much space to create and does the hard work effortlessly. I fully admit I was wrong.