The current state of Nikon DSLR video?

D

deltoidjohn

Veteran
Hi all,

I've had a call from one of my big clients, and due to some possible sponsorships, they might be required to shoot everything on Nikon cameras moving forward (they do print & web as well as video/tv so it makes sense in the broader context... just not really for video!).

It's been a while since I paid any attention to the DSLR video world, and even back when I shot on DSLR's it was never on Nikon. So I have a lot of catching up to do in the world of Nikon-for-video.

So far my biggest concern is shooting with the reversed focus rings of Nikon lenses, but is there anything else I need to be aware of? What is the best Nikon camera for video (price not an issue, as it'd likely be loaners anyway)? Does the D850 best the higher-up D5?

A couple of things I'm particularly curious about:

- Is the 1080p slow-mo usable? Or is it pretty much the same 5DmkII-level 1080p we've had for nearly 10-years?
- Is there any benefit to an external recorder? I'd likely add one if for nothing else to get XLR audio inputs & better monitoring.
- What are the colour profiles like? Is there anything close to a log profile?
- Any quirks with manual control? (If I recall correctly the early Nikons worked better with fully manual lenses otherwise you didn't get accurate DOF or exposure preview)

I'm not expecting the Nikon's to be proper video or cinema cameras, but I've shot on the 5DmkII & mkIII in the past and am hoping things have improved a little since then.

Looking forward to being schooled on all the ins and outs of shooting with Nikon!
 
I can't offer you any sensible advice; other than to say that after 30yrs of using Nikon for stills, I hope they go the way of the dodo :(

For a company that has NO professional video lines to protect; they are the most arrogant in their failure to understand that many of us want/need video features.

5 yrs ago, all 3rd party manufacturers only cared about Nikon & Canon. Now, they make their products to also suit Panasonic & Sony; theres a reason why those two have become hugely popular.
 
The Nikon D5/D500/D7500 all pretty much have the same video features. I think there's a crop on top of the crop for the D500/D7500, so you may want to research that.

The big one is the D850, which has the full-frame 4K. (Hard camera to find for the correct price.)

They all have a headphone and microphone input, and Nikon's 'FLAT' profile (it's not LOG).

I haven't spent time with any of them, but these are the only Nikon cameras worth considering for video. They are missing a lot of modern day features other cameras have, but the colors have always been beautiful IMO.

Some videos:

NIkon D850 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMgbYEc6Sjk&t=58s

Nikon D5 - https://vimeo.com/161794693

EOSHD has a nice write-up on the D850 too: https://www.eoshd.com/2017/10/nikon-d850-vs-everything/
 
Yes, the D850 is the one to get. It's not up to par with Sony (in terms of DR) or Panasonic (codec), but it's not bad at all.
 
Thanks, so it looks like I'll be asking for a few D850's then.

I'd already read that post from EOSHD, but to be honest, I take anything he says with a grain of salt.
 
I mainly use it for stills, but the D750 video has nice colors and DR. Quite soft though. Flat profile seems to have a legit 12 stops or so. Codec is decent for how tiny the bitrate is.
 
Looks like I'll be getting a few D850's in July.

Until then, is there anyone with a D850 who can help answer the following questions:

1) How is the 1080p? Is it better than the 5DmkII/III? Close the to A7s? Or is this cam only really only useful when shooting 4K?
2) Can it put the 120p slow-mo out over the HDMI? Or is HDMI limited to 60p?
3) How do you normally grade the FLAT profile? Any good LUTs for a REC709/standard look?
 
Here's a video I came across when researching the 850. There is more info in the description, but in short it was mostly shot in 120p (some 4K) with a tweaked FLAT profile (graded in post too)...maybe you can get an idea of what the camera can do.

I use the FLAT profile from a D7500 and it's actually really nice. These newer modern DSLRs are producing some nice images (video).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFzECPYBv_0&t=2s
 
The D850 actually produces some incredibly nice images (with good glass) considering the 8-bit 4:2:0 limitations. I've shot a short run-n-gun handheld project and a couple of long interviews, one with green screen.

For hand-held without any stabilization, it's obviously not so great. I did have a folded monopod attached to help, and was using a couple of the rare Nikon lenses with image stabilization, but due to size/weight/form factor it was very shaky--mostly for this I was shooting 1080p120 so that of course made the shots stable. The sensor has some strong rolling shutter fx.

For the first interview I shot out ProRes HQ to an Inferno. The subject had fairly weak lighting with the background being a window on a sunny day. I was impressed with how much I was able to retrieve from the highlights in the background--again, given the 8-bit 4:2:0 limitations. Shot 1080p24.

The second interview was cut to 25 minutes, all green screen. Also shot 1080p24 out to an Inferno, running 2 mics through a zoom, into the camera and then into the Inferno (I didn't want to deal with offsetting the sync lag by going straight from the zoom to the Inferno's xlrs). Got a really nice key with 5 chroma and 1 ultra key. Footage also held up well to color grading to match different scenes.

Did some test 4K test shots but that's it so can't comment on 4K performance. It's a good camera for stix and probably gimbal, not good for hand-held or whip pans.

I've just ordered an FS5m2 to be my A Cam, with kit lens and an active adapter to utilize the image stabilization of the Nikon ES lenses. This will be used for all run-n-gun, as well as studio shots, going out up to 4Kp60 ProRes Raw. The D850 will be my B Cam.

EDIT: I should mention that the still images from this sensor are absolutely incredible.
 
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Thanks for the info Saddler.

Have you done much shooting with the D850/Inferno combo?

One thing I just can't get confirmation on from anywhere is whether the D850 can output the 120p over HDMI - any chance you've tested this with the Inferno?
 
deltoidjohn said:
I'm not expecting the Nikon's to be proper video or cinema cameras, but I've shot on the 5DmkII & mkIII in the past and am hoping things have improved a little since then. !
Click to expand...

The good news is Nikon is way way ahead of Canon's old 5Dmk2/mk3 cameras! In fact Nikon had been ahead of Canon DSLRs in many areas for years and years now.

The bad news: still not going to be as great as shooting with say a Panasonic or Sony, or a dedicated video/cinema camera.

However if you at least pair it with a good camera op monitor such as a SmallHD Focus or SmallHD 502 then you'll be pretty sorted for some of your needs at least.

Oh and get a Sound Devices MixPre3 as well if you'd like a very portable/compact rig paired with an audio recorder which will be automatically triggered over HDMI.

deltoidjohn said:
- Is the 1080p slow-mo usable? Or is it pretty much the same 5DmkII-level 1080p we've had for nearly 10-years?
Click to expand...

Haha! No, it is better than that for sure. Don't worry, if you're coming from Canon DSLR shooting I think you'll have the potential to be perfectly happy shooting with Nikons! (aside from the lack of DPAF & ML)
 
I've used cameras from both companies consistently, and see no difference in quality with 60p from the D850 and the newer Canons like the 6D Mark II, 5D Mark IV, and 1DX Mark II (4K/60p doesn't count in this case).

IMO, the perception of the quality will most definitely be determined by lenses, lighting, depth-of-field (shallow DOF makes everything look nicer), and whether you're shooting close-ups or wide-shots (since of course wide-shots will look worse in 1080p).

I don't remember the 5D Mark II/III anymore, but IMO both companies produce nice results, but the Nikons are not really ahead of the Canons in almost anything.

The D850 has full-frame 4K recording, a 4K output, and zebras...that's about all I can think of on the video side that may be considered advantageous.

But everything else...4K Motion JPEG is by far superior to any 4K Nikon camera format, the Nikon video auto-focus is terrible all the way to the D850, and the in-body image stabilization is worse with lots of 'warpy' artifacts.

Neither company has any other video features/specs compared to the loaded Panasonic and Sony cameras. Even the focus peaking in the D850 only works in 1080p and not in 4K (at least as of last month...not sure about any firmware updates).

If slow-motion is important, the 1DX Mark II is light years ahead of anything from Nikon.

---

Edit - P.S. Some links...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlLkigjAnmI

https://vimeo.com/158004101

https://vimeo.com/192756025
 
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IronFilm said:
However if you at least pair it with a good camera op monitor such as a SmallHD Focus or SmallHD 502 then you'll be pretty sorted for some of your needs at least.

Oh and get a Sound Devices MixPre3 as well if you'd like a very portable/compact rig paired with an audio recorder which will be automatically triggered over HDMI.
Click to expand...

I'll be pairing it with a Shogun Inferno which also has a an XLR input/adapter, so that should take care of both the monitoring and sound recording problems with one device.


IronFilm said:
Don't worry, if you're coming from Canon DSLR shooting I think you'll have the potential to be perfectly happy shooting with Nikons! (aside from the lack of DPAF & ML)
Click to expand...

I'm coming from Sony FS7/700 using external recorders, but I'm plagued by bad memories of my Canon days pre-2013! It was great when they first came along in 2009 - when things were mostly going to the web in 720p or to DVD - but by the time I stopped using them as my main cameras they had been left in the dust and were a pain to use for most types of work!
 
Thanks for your input and the links, NorBro.

I'm sure they've both got their pros and cons, but for this project, I'm locked into Nikon only. If I had freedom to choose my system, I'd be going nowhere near any of the DSLR's!
 
Thanks... exactly what I was looking for!

I also don't know of any cameras that actually do output 120p over HDMI. It does seem as though the ability to record 120p on the Atomos HDMI-only models is a bit superfluous. They update their product line fairly frequently so you wouldn't even consider it 'future proofing' on their part.

The annoying thing is this means I've got to dump & sort two lots of cards each day - the SDD from the Atomos with the ProRes files (and XLR audio), plus the cameras SD card, with all the slow-motion stuff. And then I'll probably transcode all those internal recordings to ProRes as for editing as well.
 
I haven't done much more shooting on the D850 since I last posted. The Inferno shooting was a green screen shoot--I both shot and delivered at 1080p, so it did take some extra care in keying as to be expected since the output of the D850 is only 8-bit and either 4:2:0 or 4:2:2. Something I found is that if I recorded directly from the Inferno, the D850 would eventually shut down, so I had to enable record control in the camera and use the camera to start and stop recording to the SD card as well as the Inferno to prevent this. There might be a workaround to this in the menu, I don't know.

I had some fun shooting slo-mo with this--what I really liked is that the menu makes it really easy to quickly swap frame rates and resolution on the fly. That being said, I just received my Sony FS5m2 which will be my A Cam for slo-mo, recording out to ProRes Raw once it's supported in Premiere. The D850 will be a B Cam always on stix, and recording out to my second Inferno if it's warranted.

The D850 unfortunately doesn't have sensor stabilization like the Sony mirrorless cams. So the internal stabilization is just doing a real-time software stabilization--turn that offf and stabilize in post or use lenses with IS/VR.

EDIT: For the D850 with Inferno shoot I recorded a wireless lav and shotgun on a Zoom, fed that into the d850 for sync which then went out to the Inferno through the HDMI.
 
Thanks again Saddler.

Interesting point about the D850 shutting off - what makes this really a nuisance for me is it sort of locks me in to recording everything to the SD card. I was hoping I could record just the slow-mo stuff on the internal card for easy logging.

I always avoid IS anyway (even with lenses that have it) and prefer to have a nice heavy rig which tends to smooth things out nicely. Usually I prefer a shoulder mount setup with VCT plate but for this rig I might use an easyrig, because getting a DSLR properly balanced on a shoulder mount is a joke.
 
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