Very clever.

GREAT light.

You’re a novice, but own a Batis 2.8? I’m envious.

It was a bit more than "interesting" at the time I was shooting the party. didn't have time to skull it out at the shoot and I couldn't see squat when composing the shot. Knew I had the mp's, so I cropped loosely and hoped for the best. Fortunately, it worked out well.

Never mind. Managed to figure it out. The z8 defaults to "exposure simulation" for viewfinder. As I described, it is similar to the old "depth of field preview" button on early slr's/dslr's with optical viewfinders. There is a control in menu D8 that toggles the stopping down in the viewfinder. I can understand why Nikon defaults to exposure simulation since one of the main advantages of the EVF is the ability to make exposure changes on the fly with the results being immediately seen in the evf.


In fact the exposure simulation mode is what I would normally use unless I was using flash in dark environment, so I will simply program a custom button to toggle quickly between simulation on and off.

I went to shoot this week with my Z8 and a flash on a bracket with ttl cord. It was indoor in a dark room at f8 at 1/250th of a second at iso 3200 or 6400 and when I looked through the electronic viewfinder. the image was very dark - it was although I had pressed a depth of field preview button and the aperture stopped down to f8. Could barely make out the subjects to compose the shot. I didn't intentionally change any of the "normal" settings that I shoot with. I'm new to the Z8 and haven't shot many indoor scenes, but I have never had the viewfinder darken so much. Any idea what I actually set to get this stopped down view?

The Z8 with a Z70-200/2.8 is superb. I thought my D850 and the F mount 70-200/2.8 could never be topped for sharpness, but I was wrong. And the improved AF (especially the eye tracking) is scary good.

Be advised - this is NOT a lightweight rig. Almost as big and heavy as regular DSLR predecessor. And the battery life is substantially less than in the D850.

Before dazzling us with your brilliance, why not take the time to thoroughly read my post? I didn’t suggest not to d/l the free manual. I said I find them generally useless and recommended buying third party guides written by photographers who actually use the gear.

But of course since that doesn’t comport with your opinion, those who buy third part guides must be fools (oops - sorry, I mean photographers). It must be quite a burden to always be right!

I assumed the OP was speaking about metal prints.

I just mentioned Steve Perry’s AF book on the Z8. His Z8 wildlife guide is valuable indeed, but if you’re an experienced action photographer, while the wildlife guide is excellent, I would begin with his AF guide. It’s the AF capability that is completely different from all of my previous Nikon bodies. It is NOT intuitive. You need someone to show you.

Unless you are completely unfamiliar with cameras, particularly in the Nikon environment, I would suggest that the operation of the Z8 isn’t really all that different from the Nikon Dslr’s. I found it pretty easy to step up from my Nikon dslr’s to my Z8, except (a BIG except) for the incredible (and incredibly different) auto focus capabilities. To begin to understand what the Z8 can do AF wise, I found Steve Perry’s ebook devoted solely to the AF function work every penny.

https://bcgwebstore.com/product/secrets-to-the-nikon-autofocus-system-mirrorless-edition/

Can’t recommend it enough. If you are not familiar with general use of Nikon bodies, you may need a more general primer, but you may still want that AF book to understand the intricacies of the 8’s amazing capabilities. I am intimately aware of basic Nikon camera design, but found figuring out how to max out the numerous AF variations to be impossible without the help.

BTW - ignore the suggestion about the free Nikon guide. It’s as useless as tits on a bull.

I disagree. I found that guide to be useless unless you want to spend a month in the minutia every time you need to find something . Same for most “free OEM guides”. If the free oem guides were good, why is there such a robust market for 3rd party guides? It’s often worth the money to purchase third party books that offer “how to” advise in real world situations and conversational language.

Are you discussing paper prints perhaps? OP was asking about metal. I think the Bay sample pack is for paper finishes.

Bay for me. Lots of places produce good metal prints, but I find their customer service to be outstanding if a problem crops up.

What is a “normal” lens?