MrSMW

I ‘traded’ (off-loaded to the wife) my M1 14” at the beginning of this year for an M2 Max with 64GB ram 16” because the old one was barely faster than my 7 year old gaming desktop PC. A good test was batch editing a typical wedding of say 700 raw files through DXO PureRaw tidying up noise and detail. Overnight on my PC, around 8-10 hours? Same thing failed every time I tried it on the M1 chip MacBook. With this year’s M2, 40 minutes maybe? It has transformed my workflow and as someone who spends a lot of time working away from home Apr-Sep, it’s been brilliant. I use it with 3 external SSD. One for photo, one for video, one (armoured) backup for both. My only wishes were it was slightly less laggy for video editing because yup, there is some (but that may be me not having it set up right?) and I wish the screen was bigger than 16”, but as an all in one, photo and editing machine, at home at the dining room table, or in the office or in the motorhome, it’s a great/essential tool for sure.

Something I keep going back to… Z8 or Z9 either way, it’s just a question of trading smaller/lighter/cheaper, for better handling, albeit at the expense of size & weight, plus better battery life and cooling (not that I am much bothered with the latter for my needs) and costs more…

Tinky Winky asks Totoro to hold his/her/their beer.

Indeed. I know some like to be able to add or remove a battery grip, but if there is a model with a built in, I generally prefer it. The Z8 with the battery grip just looks big and clunky and is heavier and less streamlined than the Z9 for sure! I am currently debating myself whether to pull the trigger on a Z8 now or wait until Jan...

Which is not a mirrorless hybrid so not even in the conversation. The Z9 is a MUCH better platform for those lens selections and the OP’s list of requirements and needs. Personally speaking, if only considering my own needs and if I was looking at a 2 body set up and only a 2 body set up and Nikon, hands down the Z9. But as someone who has settled on a 3 body approach (if I do go fully Nikon), based on my needs and lens choices, just a single Z8 can be one of my workhorses as part of a triumvirate (had to look up the spelling of that) of: Z8 40% of my stills work + 10% of my video needs Z6iii (assuming one appears before end of March ‘24) 0% stills and 80% video Zf faux vintage camera, 60% stills plus 10% video If I did my sums correctly, the above accounts for 100% of my stills work and 100% of my video. Ballpark figures but more or less correct.

All those wideos gone, but at least Kai and Lok live on independently elsewhere...

Tell me about it. I absolutely hate Nov-March because it is nearly impossible to practice shoot anything that I do, especially if wanting to test anything new. It’s almost impossible to ‘practice shoot’ weddings anyway for a variety of reasons. Even the odd sunny Winter day isn’t the same because it’s a different quality and angle of light plus the background colours are all different plus people’s skin tones are not the same. Always been a problem… Unless I swap hemispheres every solstice…

If you are paying 💰 sure, but actually, nah, as a set up, too big, too heavy and I don’t need 4 Nikon cameras. All I need is my faux vintage camera, a single Z8 and if flipping entirely over to Nikon for everything, then a single Z6iii. And if a Z6iii is not available and in my hands by end of March 2024, then I will be sticking with my L Mount set up for all things video. And what if Lumix pop out an S2H or S2R in the meantime? It won’t make any difference. Maybe one day down the line, but at least not in 2024 because it’s lens choices that are primarily driving my decisions. L Mount has great glass, but not for the way I work. Not without big compromise and that’s what I am sick to death of, - trying to work around it and being continually frustrated all season long. Brand affiliation is way down my list of important factors. This is a case of which tools are best suited to my specific need within a specific budget. Right now, there are two options. I’d rather go all in with one single brand (in my case single camera brand Nikon and adapted lenses from Tamron) but 99% as happy to stick with a Lumix/Sigma plus Nikon/Tamron for 2024.

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Yes, red box around the frame and you can set up a tally light also. Re. the on/off switch, - just goes to show we all have different preferences. I like where it is on the S1H and hated where it was on the S1R! I wish I could go to a 3 identical body set up for the muscle memory...but I doubt it will ever happen for me now as my next set up will either be 3 different or 4 different bodies...but hey ho 🤪

Well in that case, Options 3&4 combined… Z8 for 24-70 and primes paired with a Z9 for the bigger zoom lenses, or the 24-70 if using a prime on the Z8. It’s kind of where I have gone for stills which is having the relatively small & light Zf as my ‘candid’ workhorse paired with the 40mm f2 basically as a fixed lens point and shoot, plus having the Z8 as the platform for more serious work (landscapes, buildings, portraits etc) with a wide zoom and a long zoom. A kind of ‘lite’ version of what you might do with a Z8/9 combo. Could I use it for video also? Yes, easily, but needs a third body & lens for how I work and I’m not sure if I wish to commit to that at this time. My point being that in your case, if you make the Z9 your A unit and the Z8 your B, it should eliminate, or at least massively reduce any battery life or overheating concerns? Personally, I’m not worried about overheating on the Z8. I’ve seen the tests etc but I’ve used much smaller cameras with much shorter recording times (such as Sony RX100v and ZV1) so have a ballpark working knowledge of what to expect and as I would be shooting 5-15 second clips, maybe up to 2-3 minutes occasionally with the Z8…if I went all in on Nikon for everything, not a concern. Having said that, I do think the Z9 is the better platform. I just personally am on a smaller & lighter crusade right now.

Not used any of these cameras, but currently transitioning from L Mount to Nikon for stills and maybe the whole hog, depending on whether a Z6iii turns up, what it is and when…because I have a season and once it begins, I will not be making any changes. My current set up is: S1H + S5ii + 28-70 + 70-200 video Zf + 40 + adapted Tamron 20-40 + adapted Tamron 70-180 and waiting until the new year to purchase a Z8, for stills. ie, 2 sets of kit, one for video and one for stills. If the Z6iii comes out and is available before the end of March 2024, I will buy that, get another adapted Tamron, the 28-75 and sell the 4 pieces of L Mount I still have. Why? 3 cameras plus 4 lenses all with cross compatibility will work better for me, also a one man band, compared with 4 bodies and 5 lenses that are not all interchangeable. If I had the funds though, a pair of R3’s, one paired with the 28-70 f2 and the other with the new 24-105 f2.8. Far too much for my budget though at 18k before trade in and lacks a longer lens which I might get away with not having, but probably ought to have, so 20k+ It all comes down to our individual needs and preferences and these are mine. I think the Z9 is ‘better’ than the Z8, but I’m trading that ‘betterness’ (ergos, battery life, less likely to overheat) for being a more compact and lighter beast plus cheaper. But take cost out of it, as above, that exact Canon combo. And I used Nikon for 10 years professionally and have never owned a Canon camera. This set up is just the best currently available for my needs. At least theoretically… 😉

Had them both, RX100V and the ZV1 and both brilliant little, genuinely pocketable cameras which I have used as part of a set up or solely for wedding video. The only real issues I came across were low light performance and overheating, but otherwise great bits of kit.

I was just skimming the news this morning and the verdict was: Ukraine vs Russia South vs North Korea Israel vs Hamas...and maybe others China vs Taiwan/Japan/US A straw thatched buffoon vs an old man The United Kingdom. YouTube comments Other assorted fuckwits Random shit I think I'm going to go back to doing what I did during Covid and that is stop looking at the news completely. Because it's utterly depressing.

Plus I hate change...though it is inevitable for some things. The key to what I do though is making everything as simple as possible and as bulletproof as possible. The Rode stuff I use is 'prosumer', but in something like 200 (?) jobs, it's earned a place with me.

Batteries. Yuk. One more thing to charge and everything I own is internal battery. Thanks for the suggestions but the original Rode Micro and WG have served me well for however long it’s been, (6+ years?) and for my needs, just work. So better the devil you know kind of exercise with a large dollop of KISS.

Nothing short of total armageddon will change that. Your Leica Q3 vs my VW Golf GTi. Fight me.

I wish 2024 could be a ‘no spend’ year for me but it’s going to be a case of needing to purchase: One further body, or two further bodies with trade in, plus I need a new portable light as I lost my very expensive one at a wedding (ie left it somewhere and someone them stole it), plus need a new on board shotgun mic as I smashed mine to pieces, plus need a new Wireless Go as I also smashed one of the components of that in a ‘wedding based incident’.

In a nutshell. It’s a 28mm and 70mm f2 ‘prime’ lens at the flick of a wrist, mainly for indoor work. On that basis alone, for my specific needs, juggling stills and video all day long and having to carry and set up lighting and maybe mic up to 5 people at any one time, fast and portable is key. It’s a fat lump of a lens indeed at 1430g and really needs an integrated battery grip for balance and ergos and Canon also happen to have the lightest integrated grip body in the R3 at a tad over 1kg making a combined weight of just under 2.5kg. 2.5kg is no lightweight and I’d prefer lighter, but it does not exist at this level of capability all factors considered and is 300-350g lighter than the ‘equivalent’ unit I have been running all year, an S1H with battery grip with Leica 24-90mm f2.8-4 The R3 can also shoot internally 6k 50/60p raw and I’d very much like to explore extracting stills from 6 or 8k video as it opens up another creative and streamlining (volume of tools) option and 4k 50/60p is not good enough and 6k 25/30p no good if I want any decent slow mo. Then factor in f2 vs f2.8 and f4 and that is a HUGE difference in light gathering and creative DOF options. But not as wide, 24 vs 28 or as long 70 vs 90, but as someone who doesn’t like shooting wider than 28 (and if so, around 20mm is my preference) and longer, the second camera covers that option so not an issue. The bottom line is I am not a Canon fanboy and this combo of body and lens may not be for everyone and probably only a minority with the key compromises of weight and cost, but I could live with the former compromise if the latter one was not a deal-breaking factor. I have never owned nor may never own anything from the brand and if I ever do, it will not be any time soon as the cost is…well as mentioned above, circa 18k without trade in and I can’t justify that. It is also just one of 3 principle options either actually available or at least theoretically available. All of my options are best on my current best practice which also mentioned multiple times is based on my needs and my experience with no manual available on how to achieve what I need to achieve other than trial and error. The 3 principle options are: 1. The 2 camera/2 lens approach which is the most minimalist one, but would require the highest investment and the only brand that can best tick this box currently, is Canon. It only has one weakness in that it really needs a third lens as my pairing of 28-70 and 24-105 does not allow for anything longer than 105. Canon R3 with 28-70mm f2 Canon R3 with 24-105mm f2.8 2. The 3 camera/3 lens approach which is arguably better than the one above as with my choices it allows for lighter units and covers the requirement for the longer lens. And is MUCH cheaper. This is the set up I am debating: Nikon Zf with 40mm f2 Nikon Z6iii with 20-40mm f2.8 Nikon Z6iii with 70-180mm f2.8 3. The 4 camera/5 lens option which requires the most amount of kit as it separates video units from stills units, is the cheapest set up (as I own most of it already with just one body required) and the most familiar, at least on the video side and comprises: S1H + 70-200mm f4 video S5ii + 28-70mm f2.8 video Nikon Zf + 40mm f2 stills Nikon Z8 + 20-40mm and 70-180mm f2.8 It boils down in the end to: ‘needs’ + ‘wants’ + use case practicality + cost and on that basis, Option 01 has to remain an ‘ideal’ but because it really requires a third lens, a 20k impossibility. Options 2&3 are almost equally viable and the cost difference is negligible so comes down to which set up I’d prefer and Option 02 makes the most sense because of the cross compatibility, true hybrid nature of that set up. To conclude, specifically regarding these Canon lens ‘choices’, they simply did not exist until the last couple of years. Or weeks even on the case of the 24-105 f2.8 Things were quite a bit different in 2019 and none of us knew what was coming in 2020 or 2021 with Covid and then having an exhausting 150% volume year in 2022, made for a terrible time for changing system in so many ways, but these were the cards I (and others in their own unique ways) were dealt. 2023 has very much been a year of ‘settling down’ and fettling the system I had and has not in any way been a bad year, or system kit-wise, just not the best one for me going forward. I hate change. I like stability and I am not a gambler by nature, but more a strategic conservative player and the absolute bottom line in all of this for me is… Could I continue solely with L Mount in 2024? Of course, but with all the workarounds and niggles that I have with the system, mainly around lenses. Or I can choose to make some changes that will benefit me which is the path I have chosen. Of course better kit becomes available year on year and there will be further changes down the line, but as someone who has finally worked out the formula for what I specifically do, that learning curve and need to experiment has been massively flattened out to the point where I can for the first time, make much more informed decisions.

Need and want/would like, are two different things. There is nothing ‘weird’ about it at all. I switched from Fuji to L Mount 2 full seasons ago and have not fully got on with it. Lately, I worked out it was because for my needs, I couldn’t get the right combo of lenses per number of bodies factoring actual use case. Canon make them in RF Mount. I can’t justify or afford moving in that direction. Nothing weird about any of that.

I don’t have a problem with the bodies available in L Mount, but the lenses. I could even have lived with the S5ii for stills had there been the lenses. I have realised in the last few months that my wrestling match with my kit over the last couple of years has been lens and not body based. No fan of the S5ii shutter button feel or sound, but had there been the equivalent of anything like; Canon’s 28-70 f2, the new 24-105 f2.8, Tamron’s 35-150 f2-2.8 or 70-180 f2.8, it would very much be happy days for me. When I learned of the Sigma 70-200 f2.8 and that it was going to be light and relatively compact, I was pretty disappointed to find out that whilst optically, folks say it’s better than the Lumix equivalent, it’s barely shorter and still 1.35kg. But hey, MrSMW, have you not said repeatedly and above that you are a big fan of 2x 1kg+ lenses from Canon? Yes I have and stand by that because of the focal lengths which to me would be useable all day long 100% of the time. 70-200 is not especially a range I need. Up to 100 or thereabouts is and then something around 150, but longer, not really, so something like a 150 or 180 prime could work…but something like the Tamron 70-180 makes more sense being just as fast as any typical prime of this length (anything even available in L Mount I don’t know without looking?), is well under 1kg and relatively compact for such a focal range. Bodies, I would have liked to have seen an S2H and an S2R but I’d still have the lens issues.

I tried but as a resident of France, the only day it was on in original English language, I was in Ireland. And no way am I ever watching anything in dubbed French!

I think a case can also be made for the argument, ‘Just Because’. I’ve done it throughout my career. And life. Sometimes…most of the time, I do things the way they need to be done, but sometimes I don’t. I’ve shot an entire 4 days of Motorsport for a top team with Fuji X Pro2’s with a bag of primes, nothing longer than ‘85’mm. The pro photographers at the event didn’t bat an eye wit their massive long lenses as they had no idea what I was doing which was in fact doing something the polar opposite of what they were all trying to do. Because I could. This whole Creator/FX3 thing is a ‘Just Because’. And what a boring world it would be otherwise…

It's a bit of a 'first world problem' but a bit of a PITA when you are juggling multiple bodies and lenses. I've reached that point where though I am a prime man at heart, fast zooms make more sense (and a principle reason why I have struggled a bit with L Mount for hybrid work) but opposing direction zooms definitely slow you down as do the layout and ergos of different bodies. The latter is the specific reason I hoped to go to 3x S5ii bodies, - so it was one less thing and I am not sure now whether I will ever get to having all the same bodies, but if I can at least get the zooms rotating in the same direction, it will be something!

I don’t know and have never considered it… I always move the record video function to the main shutter button and use the video record button as an fn. I assume you have the red box on record set up? But apart from that, I have hit record before in a fast paced situation only to discover I didn’t…or double-tapped…or am actually stopping the recording but have a minute or so of blurry footage of the ground 🤪 The S1H plus the S5ii are a super good combo for video which is why I have a bit of a dilemma when it comes to shooting hybrid in 2024 and going forward.