Camera
It’s official: Nikon announces development of flagship mirrorless Z 9
Following confirmation last week that it was working on a professional mirrorless Z-series camera, Nikon has officially announced the development of the Z 9. Scheduled for release some time this year, the Z 9 will use a ‘newly-developed’ stacked CMOS sensor and processing engine. The image accompanying the announcement shows a camera larger than the Z6/Z7 II, with what appears to be an integrated vertical grip. At present, no other images are available but we will update our coverage with additional assets as and when they’re made public.
Confirmation of support for 8K video strongly suggests that this sensor will be based on the same chip that we’ve seen in Sony’s flagship sports and action camera, the Alpha 1. That’s all we know for now, but Nikon promises that the Z9 will represent ‘ultimate usability as a tool’, which – coupled with previously-published remarks from an executive to DPReview that the new camera was ‘developed with the goal of surpassing the D6’ – hints at a professional workhorse, designed as much for ruggedness as performance.
Read our interview with Nikon’s Keiji Oishi (published March 5th)
Press release:
March 9, 2021: NIKON IS DEVELOPING THE NIKON Z 9 FULL-FRAME FLAGSHIP MIRRORLESS CAMERA
MELVILLE, NY – Nikon Inc. is pleased to announce the development of the first flagship model for which the Nikon Z mount has been adopted: The Nikon Z 9. The full-frame (Nikon FX-format) mirrorless camera is scheduled for release in 2021, and represents a significant leap in technology and performance.
The Z 9 brings together Nikon’s groundbreaking technologies to deliver the best still and video performance in Nikon history, meeting the advanced needs of professionals in a wide range of genres. It utilizes a newly developed FX-format stacked CMOS sensor and new image-processing engine. In response to the growing needs of professionals, advanced enthusiasts and cinematographers, it includes support for 8K video recording as well as various other video specifications that fulfill diverse needs and workflows. The Z 9 embodies ultimate usability as a tool, offering users an unprecedented imaging experience from capture to workflow exceeding that of previous digital-SLR and mirrorless cameras.
Information regarding the release of this product will be announced at a later date.
For more information about current Nikon products, including the Nikon Z series camera line and NIKKOR Z lens lineup, please visit www.nikonusa.com.
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Camera
A nature photography tour of Madagascar, Part 3: Kirindy Forest
In the last two articles in this series, I wrote about my visits to Andasibe National Park, where I photographed lemurs and chameleons, and Tsingy Rouge National Park, where I saw beautiful erosion-formed formations. This time, I’d like to write about my visit to Kirindy Forest.
Kirindy Forest (or Kirindy Private Reserve) is a private nature reserve located in the west of Madagascar. The forest is home to a wide variety of animals, from many species of lemurs to fossas (a very weird-looking predator) to geckos and chameleons. Numerous species of plants and trees are also found in the region, the most famous and iconic of which is the baobab tree.
Baobab trees under post-sunset glow. The gaps between the trees made it easier to compose without creating overlap.
Canon EOS 5D Mark IV, Canon 70-300mm F4-5.6 |
From a photographic point of view, Kirindy is nothing less than a paradise and was one of my favorite locations on my month-long Madagascar trip. The wildlife is surprisingly easy to find and photograph (with many highly skilled and cheerful guides available on the premises), the baobabs are easy to get to, and there are comfortable accommodation options close by. The only bad thing is the Wi-Fi connection.
Lemurs are one family of primates Kirindy has no shortage of. There are no less than eight lemur species here, from the tiny Madame Berthe’s Mouse Lemur (the smallest primate in the world, weighing 30 grams) to red-fronted lemurs, sportive lemurs and sifakas. I photographed all of Kirindy’s diurnal species in three days, which shows how easy they are to find with a good guide. As to being easy to photograph, that’s a different story.
Red-fronted lemur
Canon EOS 5D Mark IV, Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3 |
The easiest species to find in Kirindy is the red-fronted lemur. They are small and relatively common, so one could say they’re also the least exciting of the local lemur species, but I found them to be very cute and expressive subjects.
Unfortunately due to massive deforestation and climate change, Madagascar’s lemurs are losing their ability to migrate and access water. Authorities are trying to help them by giving them water. The red-fronted lemurs are, therefore, much less averse to getting close to humans. I really hope this doesn’t hurt them in the long run.
The interestingly named sportive lemurs appear not to be sportive at all. Most of the time, they rest in the trees to digest the plants they have eaten. But during the mating season, male sportive lemurs have been observed to box with each other, which gave them their unusual name.
This sportive lemur looked like it had one too many drinks the previous night!
Canon EOS 5D Mark IV, Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3 |
The crown jewel of Kirindy’s wildlife selection (in my opinion) is the Verreaux’s sifaka, a beautiful, medium-sized lemur. Its thick and silky fur is mostly white, other than dark brown patches on the top of the head, face and arms. Like all sifakas, it has a long tail that it uses as a balance when leaping from tree to tree, where they are capable of making remarkable leaps. Distances of 9–10m (30ft) are not uncommon.
Unfortunately, sifakas are very hard to photograph. They tend to stay very high up in the trees, which keeps them both far away and at awkward angles. This forces the photographer to use longer lenses, which becomes surprisingly tiresome when hand-holding the camera. I wanted to shoot at eye level but ended up shooting upward the vast majority of the time. They also just love hopping from tree to tree exactly when a photographer has finally found a good composition.
My visit to Madagascar was during baby season for lemurs, which was wonderful. I ended up seeing many species carrying very young and impossibly cute baby lemurs, and the sifakas were no different.
Again, the challenge was the distance and their tendency to move around all the time, probably even more so when carrying babies. Unfortunately, about 30% of infants are lost to predators like the fossa, a cat-like mammal, and a smaller number to raptors such as the Madagascar harrier-hawk.
I’m not much of a bird photographer, but several beautiful owl species are in Kirindy, and they were relatively easy to find.
Madagascar scops owl
Canon EOS 5D Mark IV, Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3 |
White-browed owl
Canon EOS 5D Mark IV, Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3 |
Finally, the Kirindy area was once home to a huge forest of baobabs. Not many remain, but those that are still there are huge and impressive. It was fun photographing a group of baobabs in the late afternoon and early evening, under direct light and during post-sunset glow.
I highly recommend visiting Kirindy Forest if you’re interested in Madagascar’s wildlife. The concentration of fascinating species and relaxed atmosphere are unmatched.
In the next article in this series, I will write about my journey from Tsingy De Bemaraha National Park to Isalo.
Erez Marom is a professional nature photographer, photography guide and traveler based in Israel. You can follow Erez’s work on Instagram and Facebook, and subscribe to his mailing list for updates and to his YouTube channel.
If you’d like to experience and shoot some of the world’s most fascinating landscapes with Erez as your guide, take a look at his unique photography workshops in Madagascar, Greenland, the Lofoten Islands, Namibia and Vietnam.
Erez also offers video tutorials discussing his images and explaining how he achieved them.
More in this Series:
Selected Articles by Erez Marom:
Camera
DPReview Rewind: the birth of the Canon EOS D30, its first ‘home grown’ DSLR
In the early days of digital, cameras were big, bulky, expensive and mostly out of reach for people unwilling to shell out professional-level MSRPs. Then came the Canon EOS D30, a landmark camera that introduced a slew of film photographers to digital, inspiring photojournalists to give up high-end film cameras and a new generation of wedding photographers, portraits and landscape artists to dip into the DSLR pool.
At $3000, it was not cheap, but it was within reach of a new category of camera buyer, the ‘prosumer.’
During our 25th anniversary year, we’re looking back at some of the milestones in camera history. On this day in history, on May 17, way back in the year 2000, the D30 was announced as Canon’s first built-from-the-ground-up in-house DSLR. Up to this point, Canon’s DSLRs (the EOS D2000 and EOS D6000) were joint ventures with Kodak. These cameras married Kokak internals with Canon bodies.
With the new camera, Canon was doing it all themselves, including designing a new body, its own sensors and processors and the introduction of its own RAW and JPEG engines. It would also become the first DSLR with an APS-C format CMOS sensor, a blistering 3.25MP beast capable of 3 RAW image bursts (or 9 Fine JPEG) and a full day of shooting on a single charge. It was pretty cutting-edge for the time.
The camera would arrive on store shelves in time for the holidays. In our review, dated Oct 10, 2000, we noted the monumental task that Canon had taken on. They had not only taken on building a camera on their own and decided to use a relatively new high-resolution CMOS sensor at a time when CMOS struggled with high megapixel builds, but they also had to know consumers would be comparing their camera to the previously announced, although not yet released, Nikon D1.
But Canon had pulled it off, and we were impressed, writing: “Canon’s engineers, designers and developers haven’t let them down, the D30 WILL go down in history books as a very important camera, breaking a price barrier and opening up the digital SLR market (more so than Fujifilm’s S1 Pro) to a new wave of users, both new and old. From the minute you pick up the D30 … you get a feeling of quality you weren’t expecting.”
Camera
DPReview Rewind: the birth of the Canon EOS D30, its first ‘home grown’ DSLR
In the early days of digital, cameras were big, bulky, expensive and mostly out of reach for people unwilling to shell out professional-level MSRPs. Then came the Canon EOS D30, a landmark camera that introduced a slew of film photographers to digital, inspiring photojournalists to give up high-end film cameras and a new generation of wedding photographers, portraits and landscape artists to dip into the DSLR pool.
At $3000, it was not cheap, but it was within reach of a new category of camera buyer, the ‘prosumer.’
During our 25th anniversary year, we’re looking back at some of the milestones in camera history. On this day in history, on May 17, way back in the year 2000, the D30 was announced as Canon’s first built-from-the-ground-up in-house DSLR. Up to this point, Canon’s DSLRs (the EOS D2000 and EOS D6000) were joint ventures with Kodak. These cameras married Kodak internals with Canon bodies.
With the new camera, Canon was doing it all themselves, including designing a new body, its own sensors and processors and the introduction of its own RAW and JPEG engines. It would also become the first DSLR with an APS-C format CMOS sensor, a blistering 3.25MP beast capable of 3 Raw image bursts (or 9 Fine JPEG) and a full day of shooting on a single charge. It was pretty cutting-edge for the time.
The camera would arrive on store shelves in time for the holidays. In our review, dated Oct 10, 2000, we noted the monumental task that Canon had taken on. They had not only taken on building a camera on their own and decided to use a relatively new high-resolution CMOS sensor at a time when CMOS struggled with high megapixel builds, but they also had to know consumers would be comparing their camera to the previously announced, although not yet released, Nikon D1.
But Canon had pulled it off, and we were impressed, writing: “Canon’s engineers, designers and developers haven’t let them down, the D30 WILL go down in history books as a very important camera, breaking a price barrier and opening up the digital SLR market (more so than Fujifilm’s S1 Pro) to a new wave of users, both new and old. From the minute you pick up the D30 … you get a feeling of quality you weren’t expecting.”
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