(11-18-2019, 11:23 AM)davidmanze Wrote: I never even knew the Nikon 1 system, but it was the beginning and they had a way to go ........ just like Sony made poor/crappy cameras at the start ......
Surely you can give Nikon a bit of a break JoJu ..... the Zs have only been out 16 months ...... they've an adapter for F mount so as not to brick your old glass ..... and the lenses are arriving at a reasonable pace, faster and better than I expected.
Also I'm not so sure that everything has to be F1.4 these days, the new Z glass is excellent at F1.8 ..... for 90% of folk that will do nicely.
I would like to know what Z glass you are using and how good you find it?
The D500 and D850 are probably the best two APSc/ FF DSLRs ever made and were the dream of many a photog ....... yet after such a short time many are relegated to the wardrobe ..... and like yourself folk are using the Z ..... so it can't all be bad !!
To be honest I'm more impressed by the Z glass than the Z cameras !!
And you also don't know the Z system by actually using it, right?
It's 14 months (very much to my own surprise). Did you compare the lens selection of Nikon with the one of Canon? Nikon has more lenses - by numbers. Canon has more interesting lenses - by far! A 35/1.8 macro (although "only" 1:2), 50 and 85 f/1.2, 28-70/2.0 (right from the beginning), a much more versatile 24-105/4 (whereas Nikon just doubles their 24-70s), and a 24-200 FF.
On Nikon's side, the number of available (so no 58/0.95) FF lenses is just one (!) more, which is one of the 24-70s, else than that only primes. Oh - forgot the 14-30/4. Yes, probably all of them are sharper as their F-pendants. None of them, except the 24-70/2.8, features a distance scale or at least an EXIF distance entry.
My opinion about my Z-lenses.
35: Nice, but not better than the Sigma 35/1.4 at f/1.8
85: Nervous bokeh wide open at certain distances, but compared to the (sharper and more bokehlicious) Art 85/1.4 a lightweight. Hunts in low light.
14-30: Sharp - but not as good as the Art 14-24/2.8. Horrible distorsions, awkward extension: @ 14 mm the tubes are in it's longest position, @ 24 mm in their shortest. To retract the tubes (for transport) I first need to extract it to the max, then it starts to retract. Weird.
24-70/4: Better than the lousy F 24-85/3.5-4.5, good for close-up (but not as good as the Canon 35).
Both zooms can show colour blobs because reflections between rear element and sensor are not perfectly eliminated. These are harder to treat than "normal" lens flare. And I haven't seen it when F-glass was adapted.
The good thing about all primes is their lightweight and weather resistance, silent focus drives.
The less good things are: too much different filter threads, no reliable distance scale (neither in-camera nor on the lens), zooms are depending on massive software correction and Canon's idea of an additional function ring (for aperture or VV-correction) did only find it's way in the expensive 24-70/2.8.
Then there are two more lenses because marketing found it cool to start an APS-C line. Actually if their Z 50 would have featured a tilt-swivel display, I would have jumped on it. Would have been awesome.
The adapter. One of the weirdest devices. Again, look at Canon's design (extra control ring or drop in filter or nothing of all) and then see what went wrong with the stupid idea to integrate a tripod socket on another level than the camera's bottom plate. In practical use it's a nightmare to switch between F and Z glass when the camera is on tripod in a quick-release. They just copied the FT1 adapter (at the time a pricey device) and blew it up to scale. Nothing learnt. I can understand the tiny wheeny 1-mount needed all kind of (tripod) support to not rip it out when mounting an average FF lens, but the Z mount is bigger and includes more screws.
There were apparently not enough brain cells involved to donate an Arca compatible socket, but that stubborness is to be seen in all Nikon tripod collars - one big reason for me to buy Tamron or Sigma instead.
In short: If someone with a good set of Nikon DSLRs and nice lenses would ask me if it's good moment to buy into the Z-system, I would hesitate a "yes".
To get the curve towards the thread subject: Yes, there's a lack of reviews of Nikkor Z lenses. But there are much fewer alternatives than in other systems, so its really not that much of an issue.