PrimaLuce Nikon Z5 Full-spectrum camera review

[nfoto]

Come to think of it, Photo Ninja itself is prone to make a vague "tile" pattern across images heavily processed.

[nfoto]

The native Z-lenses tend to be problematic for IR due to the hot spot issues they present. Not all Z lenses are bad though, and with some judicious attention to details can be used for quite impressively sharp IR stuff. They also do AF to a high degree of accuracy, however not as fast as when used without any filters.So far I have concentrated on the 24/1.8 and 50/1.8 S-Line Nikkors. The tendency to have colour shifts towards the periphery means it's best to present the outcome in black-and-white, which is the practice I have followed for a while now.

 

I wanted to learn how these lenses behave in conjunction with the PrimaLuce Z5 if used without any filter at all. This implies they respond to the full spectral range and hence any tendency to focus shifts or chromatic errors across the spectrum would be exacerbated. We already know the colour balance is way off for the modified camera, but that's not the issue for testing here as one can build a suitable session profile in Photo Ninja or similar software. This at least would ensure some (albeit not perfect) resemblance to the stock camera's colour rendition.

 

 

Weather is unpredictable at present in my neighbourhood, rapidly oscillating between -10 C and snowfall, to +2C, thaw, fog, slush, and rain. Not weather conditions I personally favour , but what one wouldn't do for the team.

 

This snapshot from my local "centre" shows the 24/1.8 S-line is remarkably free of focus shifts and chromatic nasties. The local commuter train and my little red Peugeot in the background add ample red to the overall scene, but colour fringing is absolutely non existing. Very interesting.

 

 

Here is another snapshot of a snow-covered bus stop sign, again confirming the apparent good chromatic correction of the 24 lens.

 

 

 

(edit: deleted the images that no longer showed up after the UVP outage, hopefully I got the correct replacements ... )

[nfoto]

--- Anyway, the Z5 certainly does seem to be more promising for UV/IR work than that a Z6 or a Z7 with their banding problem.

 

I have concluded the modified Z5 is the mirrorless equivalent of the DSLR Nikon D600/610. Both provide essentially the same functionality and performance is pretty similar as well.

[Andy Perrin]

Come to think of it, Photo Ninja itself is prone to make a vague "tile" pattern across images heavily processed.

Yeah, I've seen this occasionally. I haven't been able to predict what sets it off, but it's apparently related to the de-mosaicing operation, in particular the way it attempts to balance the two green channels of the Bayer filter. If you uncheck "Balance G0/G1" under the "Demosaic ARW file" tab, you can get rid of those artifacts.

[nfoto]

Point noted. I'll check this further.

 

Otherwise I must say the Z5 is even easier than the D600/610 for UV/IR, as the EVF definitively is a big step ahead of the LiveView of the DSLR. Meaning not that it is better for viewing than an optical finder, far from it, but one does see the image quite clearly and is able to ascertain focus even trough dense filters, and that is what matters most for "invisible" work. With the DSLR one had to mount a Zacuto extra finder or similar and the view became dark and grainy. For ordinary visible work I still prefer the optical finder as it is much easier on my eyes.

[Andy Perrin]

The difference can be dramatic:

 

 

[nfoto]

Andy: your pictures no longer show after our site outage. Consider deleting the attachments and upload new ones. I did notice these were samples of Sony ARW files, not Nikon NEFs, but the issue they illustrated are common to raw files of both brands.

[Andy Perrin]

Andy: your pictures no longer show after our site outage. Consider deleting the attachments and upload new ones. I did notice these were samples of Sony ARW files, not Nikon NEFs, but the issue they illustrated are common to raw files of both brands.

Fixed. And yes, I forgot it's from different RAW formats, but the cause of the issue is actually PhotoNinja's handling of the conversion, so it's the same way in either case.

[nfoto]

Striping occurs also on the Sony NEX-5N monochrome through the Monochrome2DNG & Photoshop pathway, though rarely as evident as seen with my Z6.

[Andy Perrin]

I would imagine the root cause is the same? Conversion algorithms all have to handle the two greens somehow, and if they differ for some reason that could lead to similar errors? I am still not sure of the exact conditions that bring about this green issue.

[nfoto]

A "litmus test" for a new camera is whether one starts to use it for its intended purpose, i.e. recording images. The Z5 has grown on me and I have used it quite intensively over the last weeks. The camera is far from perfect, but it has its merits.

 

These days of late have been simply awful: dark, extremely mild nowhere near or below the freezing point one should expect at the season, wet, bleak, negligible snow, sky is livid (in the alternate meaning of 'livid' as we use in botany, ie. lead-coloured) and blankets everything in a gloomy mood. Depression runs rampant in the community. No wonder the photography is afflicted as well.

 

The Cosina-Voigtländer 25mm f/4 Skopar S (Nikon RF mount) is a little gem and is perfectly and unobtrusively seated onto my PrimaLuce Z5. This scene on the parking lot when I went shopping today is typical for the current circumstances; all the wetness and gloom one might *not* wish for, all cars are grey or electric or both, and people are all masked-up. Yours truly included, which makes a hassle for shooting by the way.

 

 

The darkness forced me to use f/4 @ISO 3200, a setting for which high-contrast scenes are not optimal. Thus in the brighter areas of the frame there is little perceivable noise, however it might be very visible in the darker parts if the image needs to be brightened. In this case I had nearly two stops underexposure to keep the highlights, so a lot of post-processing massage took place. The final image survived - tolerably. Which is a tribute to the dynamic range of the sensor more than the skills of the photographer, I'm afraid.

[dabateman]

Ha still stocking up on toilet paper I see.

I have a Pen-f which is really growing on me with monochrome mode. But one day when the z5 drops below $800, it looks to be an excellent camera.

[otoien]

Ha still stocking up on toilet paper I see.

...

 

From the time COVID started, 12 packs are still the smallest amount one can buy around here, so the stocking up is really obligatory.

 

Nice reflection in the mirror, the dual view really makes the image.

[Andy Perrin]

The Neat Image plugin can substantially help with the noise there. Showing only a portion of the image as an example:

[nfoto]

Neat (sic). Problem as always is to avoid the plasticky surface look.

[nfoto]

Sometimes, the graininess induced by high ISO (and inclement weather) is not that bad. In fact, for IR rendered as black-and-white, it can add to the overall image impact.

 

 

Taken with the AFS 24mm f/1.4 Nikkor, this scene reminds *me* eerily of the ancient psychothriller film "Pond of the Dead" which to my generation of Norwegians at least is very familiar. Fog hung almost to the ground and everything everywhere was dripping wet.

 

I would set the range of ISO for which noise is very acceptable to 100-1600, with possible excursions to 3200 ISO or even higher. Thus a camera not as ISO-compliant as the Z6/Z6.2, but more than sufficiently capable for most requirements.

 

Among Norwegian nature photographers, the ever-present occurrence of power lines along any inland water body is an insider joke. You can probably see the presence here is as expected, too. One tends not to see this issue during the actual shoot, but surely expects to see the "law" in action later on during image processing.

[nfoto]

I have seen in practice that filtration causes significant trouble with many lenses on the Z5, the issue being either a pronounced "hot spot", or more commonly, uneven colour rendition across the frame. Selecting rear instead of front filtration alleviates the issue in some cases, but many combinations of lens + filter(s) continue to be troublesome.

 

Two examples are shown below, from a series I did on the encroachment of urban development into agricultural areas. For Norway, a country in which scarcely 3% of the land area is arable, avoiding exploitation of such resources are paramount, but tends to be forgotten by politicians, plan makers, and authorities on all levels from local to national. In my neighbourhood this near-sighted policy is being conducted all too often, in the current case, making housing and roads on one of our most productive fields, the argument being it is "much cheaper to develop here than using a forest upland area", which is only true if the equation neglects impact to the future community and loss of vital food supplies. Feeding livestock on imported soya beans from overseas is not sustainable economy, but authorities are blind to this simple fact. Oh well.

 

I used the AFS 24mm f/3.5 PC-E Nikkor and the AFS 200mm f/2 VR, both lenses with rear filtration. I admittedly had not used the 24 PC-E much for IR/IE on my modified DSLRs, but the 200/2 had seen regular use mainly for IR without causing any issue.

 

 

 

Even after spending a lot of editing time to remove or smooth out the uneven colours, some remnants can be seen, in particular in the sky areas. Below is the uncorrected image with the 24 PC-E, for comparison.

 

 

I will try the 24 PC-E with front filtration next, but unfortunately, this is not an option for the 200/2.

[nfoto]

An interesting newcomer to the playing field is the recent Laowa 11mm f/4.5 ultrawide lens in native Z mount. The lens is rather tiny compared to most native Z-lenses and despite its enormously wide viewing angle of 126(!) degrees can use 63mm filters. Rear filtration might not be possible in this case.

 

I just got the 11mm and commenced testing it yesterday. Weather here is pretty inclement at present and going outside with an ultra-wide lens is an invitation to fill the front with rain drops. So I started inside. I probably shall write a separate and more in-depth review of this lens later, but for now it suffices to state you get a very good optical quality with some inevitable caveats, these being vignetting and sharpness fall-off towards the periphery. Sharpness in the centre area is excellent and geometric distortion is quite low, although some moustache distortion can be spotted on occasion depending on focused distance. The low level of chromatic aberrations is most welcome for a such an über-wide lens.

 

 

A quick view of my bleak, wet, and miserable surroundings taken with the lens wide open on the PrimaLuce Z5. The view point is due south so the "hot" region is actually the sun hidden by blanketing clouds.

[nfoto]

The AFS 105mm f/1.4 is marginal in terms of colour unevenness with the PrimaLuce Z5, but doable if the lens is not stopped down too far. Having a motif that calls for a rough, gritty rendition of course is helpful.

 

 

(the white stuff on the felled logs is snow, and the entire scene is blanketed by dense frost fog)

[Andy Perrin]

Pretty! Question: are you hitting the "details"slider really hard, or is that just how the camera renders things? Especially around the trees I am seeing some halos.

[nfoto]

The colour unevenness, and my general attitude towards the subject(s), necessitate some massage of the RAW file. Low contrast fog details might suffer as a consequence.

 

The sensor itself is as detailed in its rendition as one can expect from 24 MPix.

 

I compared results with the AFS 105/1.4 Nikkor obtained with the D600 (full-spectrum) vs the PrimaLuce Z5, and the Z5 apparently renders slightly sharper images. Both are 24 MPix. However, the D600 does not have the colour unevenness issue. Or, to be precise, I could not detect that issue on my earlier photographs with 105/1.4 + D600, but only direct A:B setups can conclusively deliver the answer.

[Andrea B.]

Translation: She loves detail enhancement. It's part of her particular style. :lol:

(Remembering the tram & tram-conductor-in-snow image with the lovely enhanced snow detail.)

[Andy Perrin]

Translation: She loves detail enhancement. It's part of her particular style. :lol:

(Remembering the tram & tram-conductor-in-snow image with the lovely enhanced snow detail.)

Got it.

[nfoto]

"Particular style" -- only when required, Andrea !!

 

Here is a typical photo with the AFS 105mm f/1.4 Nikkor on the D600, using the same false-colour processing as the forest clearing example with the Z5. If there is a colour unevenness by this combination like the Z5, it is far from obvious ... will do a direct comparison when the rain that currently is bucketing down, pleases itself and us drowned inhabitants by stopping.

 

 

There is some kind of interaction camera/lens going on here that needs clarification. Earlier test shots with the Z5 using longer "old" lenses have failed to demonstrate the obvious colour issues by some (all??) modern Nikkors.

[nfoto]

An example of an old, long lens that doesn't make any colour unevenness with the PrimaLuce Z5. This is the Zoom-Nikkor 180-600 mm f/8 ED, which is a fine performer and is so highly corrected it has no IR focus dot.

 

 

Our neighbourhood has been spared the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic side effects, but we cannot escape the tasteless of season's decorations I'm afraid. Extremely mild for this time of the year, no snow, but bucket-loads of rain. Climate changes ushering in a Greener Future?