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A full-frame DSLR, the Nikon D850 is designed for photographers who want to capture photographs with a high resolution without sacrificing burst shooting. This eagerly anticipated D810 replacement, which was unveiled in August 2017, features a new back-side illuminated full-frame sensor with 45.7 Megapixels, no low-pass filter, and a base sensitivity of 64 ISO. It also offers continuous shooting at 7 frames per second, which can be increased to 9 frames per second with the optional battery grip.
The flagship D5’s 153-point AF system, which includes 99 cross-type sensors and low-light sensitivity down to -4EV; 15 AF points also function at f8, is carried over to the D850. The D850 will be just as alluring to sports and wildlife photographers when combined with 7fps burst shooting and a buffer of 51 frames in 14-bit RAW or 170 in 12-bit lossless compressed RAW.
Part One of the Nikon D850 review: the viewpoint of a landscape photographer and D810 owner
Thomas, the lens tester for Cameralabs, has been a longtime Nikon user, having previously owned the D810, D800, and D300. He has been using the new D850 for a few weeks now for both his own work and lens testing, so for Part One of this review, I spoke with him to learn his thoughts on the quality and handling from the perspective of a landscape photographer and from someone who is upgrading from the D810 or D800. I’ll get into the sports and movie capabilities in Parts Two and Three, which will be published soon.
What physical differences exist between the D850 and the D810? Do your hands have the same sensations? Is the construction quality the same?
What about the levers? What else has been added besides lighted buttons, and can D810 owners start working right away?
A: It largely performs as expected for D810 owners. However, there are a few minor adjustments that I personally found bothersome, most notably the moved ISO and mode buttons. The ISO button has moved to the top right corner, behind the ON/OFF switch. I use this button frequently enough to find the awkward action you must now perform to turn Auto-ISO ON or OFF annoying: To do that, you must press the ISO button with your thumb and use your index finger to jog the front subcommand dial. Using any finger, press the ISO button on the left of the D810 camera.
The D850 now has a touchscreen that can tilt and be touched. Did either prove helpful to you during shooting? How does Live View composition with the screen compare to D810 composition? Although I am aware that the contrast-based AF technique still used in Live View makes it less reliable than an embedded phase-detect system, is it now faster or is the image sharper? What about including focus peaking? Do you think it was helpful?
A: I adore touching and leaning together! In Live View, I frequently shoot at hip level. Since I no longer need to squat in front of the tripod or lie in the mud for some shots, being able to watch the screen from above is a huge convenience.
The flagship D5’s 153-point AF system, which includes 99 cross-type sensors and low-light sensitivity down to -4EV, is carried over to the D850. As a prior owner of a D810, did you notice much of a change in focusing speed, AF options, low-light performance, and overall handling in day-to-day use? I know you primarily shoot static subjects, and we’ll be providing a separate report on autofocus and continuous shooting for sports soon.
A: From my perspective as a landscape and macro photographer, there isn’t a significant change when compared to the D810. However, Nikon was able to make a number of improvements. I primarily use manual focus while shooting static targets and need the best focus possible, right on the spot where I need it with the best possible confirmation.- unfortunately, only manual focus is available on some of the greatest lenses! For that, two things are most crucial: first, I need an in-focus indicator that is more sensitive than the one on the D810 when I use the viewfinder with manual focus lenses. I get that from the D850, albeit it’s still not perfect, and even manual focus lenses require some AF fine-tuning to function at their best. And even if Nikon removed the greatest (200%) magnification in a tit-for-tat move, I still prefer the better resolution of the LCD panel while utilising Live View to assess sharpness. But they also included focus peaking, which can be turned off entirely or modified to three levels of sensitivity. I’m still learning how
Have you used both memory card slots? Will XQD eventually be used in your workflow?
A: I use both of the camera’s card slots. A 128GB Sony XQD card of type “G” (440MB/s read, 400MB/s write) is installed in the main slot, and a 128GB SanDisk Extreme Pro (95MB/s) is set up in the second (SD) card slot as overflow storage for when the primary XQD card runs out of space. The good news is that writing to the XQD card is not slowed down by the system’s SD card. Consequently, you benefit from the greatest write speed possible as long as your photographs fit on the XQD card. The D850 took 7 seconds to shoot and finish writing 20 huge RAWs plus beautiful large images in my test.
Regardless of whether the SD card was inserted or not, JPGs (a total of 1.6GB!) were written to the XQD card.
The second benefit occurs when you upload the photos to your computer: Using my Lexar XQD 2.0 USB 3.0 reader, I can transfer 822 NEF files totaling 44GB from the XQD card to a 2TB Samsung SSD 850 EVO in just 3:15 minutes. This translates to a transfer speed of 4 NEF files per second or 225MB on average. The D850 produces larger files, with the RAW files averaging 54MB in 14bit lossless compressed quality. This is by far the fastest file transfer from an external card I’ve observed on my machine.
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You should use a specialised card reader though for the fastest transfer speeds. I tried directly attaching the D850 to my computer over a USB connection, and the transfer of 82 NEFs, totaling 4.4GB, from an XQD Card took 48 seconds. That is 2.5 times slower than a transfer using a card reader at 90 MB/sec or 1.7 NEFs/sec.
You should use a specialised card reader though for the fastest transfer speeds. I attempted to attach the D85. The D850 offers upgraded electronic shutter choices that are more useful than those of its predecessor, as well as an updated shutter mechanism that should lessen the possibility of vibrations. Any of these helped you with your assignment, right?
A: The electronic front curtain shutter was available on the older D810 model, but it was only compatible with mirror-up shooting. Now, with the D850, it also functions in Q(uiet)-mode AND is compatible with a 0.2-second exposure delay (or 0.5 seconds if you think the mirror slap needs more time to dampen down). This enables you to track a subject with your eye in the viewfinder or confidently
You should use a specialised card reader though for the fastest transfer speeds. I attempted to attach the D85. The D850 offers upgraded electronic shutter choices that are more useful than those of its predecessor, as well as an updated shutter mechanism that should lessen the possibility of vibrations. Any of these helped you with your assignment, right?
A: The electronic front curtain shutter was available on the older D810 model, but it was only compatible with mirror-up shooting. Now, with the D850, it also functions in Q(uiet)-mode AND is compatible with a 0.2-second exposure delay (or 0.5 seconds if you think the mirror slap needs more time to dampen down). This enables you to track a subject with your eye in the viewfinder or confidently compose your photo.
With nearly no shaking, you may take a shot while steadily framing your shot or following a subject through the viewfinder. This ought to finally address the micro-blur issue that the lightweight Nikon 300/4.0E VR created on the D810 in my tests at shutter rates of roughly 1/100 second. Although I haven’t had a chance to test the D850 with the 300/4.0 in depth, I feel rather good about it and have been using Q mode with a 0.2 second delay and an electronic first-curtain shutter virtually exclusively on my most recent trip. When employing the electronic first-curtain shutter, take note of a few restrictions. The fastest shutter speed has a limit of 1/2000 seconds.
In order to prevent unintentional overexposure, it is best to turn off the electronic shutter when capturing quick action or when using a wide aperture in bright light. Since I don’t typically shoot sports or other quickly moving subjects, I just switch to the standard single-frame or continuous shooting modes (S, CL, CH), where the electronic shutter is immediately turned off and only the 0.2-second exposure delay is left. The lack of extended High ISO settings, which restricts the maximum sensitivity to 25600 ISO, is the second restriction.
Two options for shooting in complete silence when using Live View both use a fully electronic shutter (front and back curtain): I was able to record in mode 1Two options for shooting in complete silence when using Live View both use a fully electronic shutter (front and back curtain): I could record 30 full-resolution RAW photos in mode 1 in under 5 seconds (6 fps). You are only able to capture 3600 x 2400 photos in JPG normal* quality in mode 2. But you may capture up to 3 seconds at 15 or 30 frames per second. The D850 has an advantage over the D810—as well as Canon DSLRs—in that it can shoot in quiet, even with some limitations. Shooting in Live View on the older D810 always resulted in shutter noise. Of course, the majority of mirrorless cameras have had choices for a fully silent electronic shutter for a while now.
