The Nikon Z9 court battle is no more, and it was a quite predictable ending. The two companies, RED and Nikon, came to an out of court settlement recently. This week the case was dismissed on request of both parties.
This means there has was a behind the scenes agreement, most likely a technology transfer deal, or patent licensing which enables Nikon to continue to offer internal RAW recording on their cameras, to the satisfaction of RED. This could be done in a similar way to the agreement between RED and Canon that’s already in place. The details of which is also a secret. Canon have been offering internal C-RAW recording for a while, with RED in return also using certain Canon technologies – such as RF mount on the Komodo.
The out of court agreement means the pop corn spectacle of a jury trial previously scheduled for January 2024 won’t now go ahead.
Presumably Nikon did not simply settle in a way that withdraws N-RAW from future cameras. That would be a pathetic throwing-in of the towel, and perhaps Nikon should clarify that they will continue with N-RAW.
RED presumably did not settle on the basis that their patent no longer holds up, it has previously won vs Sony, Apple and others. Nobody seems to be able to knock it over. Not even using EOSHD Forum arguments and Nikon’s lawyers tried to do.
It might be that certain Nikon technologies could be turning up on RED cameras – perhaps patented technology related to sensor development and design, or optical design. The stacked sensor in the Z9 would make for a very nice 8K/60p full frame Komodo wouldn’t it?
Meanwhile as an N-RAW user myself I am not that bothered either way whether it stays or goes.
It isn’t really much different to a good H.265 LOG format as evidenced here on EOSHD:
