Modifications enabled with A and B firmware Ver. 1.01

Bright spots were sometimes noticeable with movie recording of especially dark scenes or subjects. Occurrence of this issue has been reduced.
*After the firmware is upgraded, bright spots may be visible in the monitor while the camera is autofocusing with the shutter-release button pressed halfway in live view mode. However, these bright spots are not recorded with still images and movies and are not visible in the monitor while the camera is autofocusing during movie recording.

http://nikonasia-en.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/6938
Yanping

It works, too. I had several spots visible in video and they're gone with the revised firmware.

Bob

Bob
Phoenix, AZ

How do you update firmware? Download, save to SD card, and upload via menu? Or something else (eg. Body attached to PC via USB)?

>How do you update firmware? Download, save to SD card, and
>upload via menu? Or something else (eg. Body attached to PC
>via USB)?

That is correct. Save to SD card, update from camera menu. The update takes about five minutes. I'd make sure the battery is fully charged before you start.

Bob
Phoenix, AZ

Maybe some of those thousands of D7000 turned in by lens cap shooters will be available soon as "refurbished" for a discount. They must have a warehouse full of these perfectly good cameras.

Stan
St Petersburg Russia

Visit my Nikonians gallery.

I don't do video with my D7000 so will not be updating.

Visit my Nikonians gallery.

>I don't do video with my D7000 so will not be updating.


That might be a good approach, along the lines of, "if it ain't broke..."

But sometimes other good things are added to fireware updates that aren't "official"...

www.billkeane.zenfolio.com

What have I done wrong?

According to Nikon instructions:

Once the file has been save to a formatted SD card, place the card in the primary slot, turn camera on, setup menu to Firmware version, highlight "update", select "yes", and the update will begin.

In my camera, at the Firmware version screen there is no "update" choice, just "done".

Am I missing something?


http://www.nikonians.org/dcfp/user_files/183328.pdf

UPDATE: I JUST SAVED THE .BIN TO THE FORMATTED SD CARD, IT WAS THE ONLY FILE ON THE SD CARD. IT LOADED THE UPDATE WITHOUT A PROBLEM. I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT A "ROOT" THING IS, I DO NOT KNOW IF IT IS A "PC" THING OR NOT; HOWEVER, IT DOES NOT MATTER NOW.

----
Gary

Visit MY Nikon Gallery: http://images.nikonians.org/galleries/showgallery.php?cat=13361&ppuser=0

Attachment #1, (pdf file)

The Update choice will only appear if a legitimate .bin file has been copied to the top level directory, i.e. at the same level as DCIM, not in DCIM.

It's a quick process, did it on my D7000, the camera won't let it start if you don't have a sufficiently charged battery, although it's good practice to charge the battery beforehand.

And it's simpler than in previous DSLRs (I've done firmware updates in D70/D200/D300s), the A and B are done in one pass rather than requiring two separate operations.

Richard Southworth

The thing that catches many people out is not saving the .bin file to the Root Directory of the memory card.

As Nikon's instructions state:

Important
Be sure to copy the XXXX###.bin to the root
directory of the memory card.
The camera will not recognize the new firmware
if it is placed in a folder under the root directory.

Brian
Welsh Nikonian
Check out the Nikonians Team pages

Brian,

The problem I've run into trying to describe the proper location is the word "root", not everybody understands it refers to the top level of the "drive". Some interpret it as the top-most named directory, in the case of the Nikon cards "DCIM".

I guess all photographers should receive UNIX training, or some such.

Richard Southworth

I'm one of those few every bodies. So, what do you do - put an SD card in the slot and direct the download to that drive location? Thanks for the info.

John

Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others. <><

>I'm one of those few every bodies. So, what do you do - put
>an SD card in the slot and direct the download to that drive
>location? Thanks for the info.
>
>John


Put your formatted card (formatted by the D7000) into the card reader.

Open Windows Explorer. You'll see a D7000 listed...

Copy the BIN files only (.bin) to the D7000 listed in Windows Explorer. Either by right clicking and selecting copy/paste, or by clicking and dragging...

After that's done, place that card into the D7000 and refer to the Nikon instructions. It's very easy.

www.billkeane.zenfolio.com

No, you can't download directly to the sd card. At least for Windows the download comes in the form of a xxx.exe file. Once on your computer (preferably desktop so you can find it) run the program, it will then generate a folder. Inside the folder is the .bin file that should be copied to the sd card.

Richard Southworth

>No, you can't download directly to the sd card. At least for
>Windows the download comes in the form of a xxx.exe file.
>Once on your computer (preferably desktop so you can find it)
>run the program, it will then generate a folder. Inside the
>folder is the .bin file that should be copied to the sd card.
>


Thanks for making that clearer than I did... I assumed the download had already taken place...

www.billkeane.zenfolio.com

Bill and Richard,

Thanks for the information; lots of help.

John

Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others. <><

>It's a quick process, did it on my D7000, the camera won't let
>it start if you don't have a sufficiently charged battery,
>although it's good practice to charge the battery beforehand.

I just did it on my D7000 and it started okay with battery charge listed at 88% and finished in less than 2 minutes.

- - Phil
D7000, D300s, 10-20mm HSM Sigma, 16-85mmVR, 18-200mmVR
F4s, 20mm f/4, 50mm f/1.8D, 24-85mm f/2.8-4.0D, 70-200mmVR f/2.8. 80-400mmVR f/4.5-5.6D

>Maybe some of those thousands of D7000 turned in by lens cap
>shooters will be available soon as "refurbished" for
>a discount. They must have a warehouse full of these perfectly
>good cameras.

LOL

I guess since the hot pixels are visible during shooting (I presume in the rear LCD) but not in the video file, the on-board processor is interpolating them out.

Peter

>I guess since the hot pixels are visible during shooting (I
>presume in the rear LCD) but not in the video file, the
>on-board processor is interpolating them out.
>
>Peter

That is interesting because it means the LCD is somehow receiving a different or unfinalized stream (perhaps after the downsize or interpolation that causes the problem but prior to the interpolation that fixes it?)

Since I believe it was the downsize/interpolation (or absence of normal hot pixel suppression logic?) that is causing the problem in the first place it is only sensible that they fix this by an improved interpolation process.

My sense is that with video our nearest next neighbor photosite is much further away than when using all photosites for stills and this video shortcoming was then evident. If you read Thom's D7000 review he seems to confirm that Nikon is not pixel binning to reduce resolution down to 1080P from the far greater still sensor resolution. A DSLR that did pixel binning to produce the video stream would not have these same interpolation issues. Maybe we just need a Cray computer in our Expeed 2 server farm and we would be good to go.

Best regards, SteveK

'A camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.' -- Dorothea Lange
My Nikonians gallery
My Nikonians Blog

>I guess since the hot pixels are visible during shooting (I
>presume in the rear LCD) but not in the video file, the
>on-board processor is interpolating them out.
>
>Peter

I had one hot pixel that did show up in the video I took in the closet with the lens cap on. I repeated the experiment after applying the firmware update and the pixel now does not show up.

That may well be the last video I take with this camera. I certainly don't envision shooting video - am having too much fun relearning photography to become a cinematographer!

Hillbilly Harry - in the Missouri Ozarks.

D7000
D40X
AF-S 10-24
AF-S 18-55 VR
AF-S 55-300 VR
AF-S 50 1.4G
AF-S 35 1.8
SB400
Nikon closeup attachments 0, 1, 3T, 4T

Visit my Nikonians gallery.

>That may well be the last video I take with this camera. I
>certainly don't envision shooting video - am having too much
>fun relearning photography to become a cinematographer!

Me too. I have a hard enough time getting a good frame every once in a while let alone 30 of them per second!

Peter

Hi Steve. Yeah, like I said, I am only guessing. Perhaps the image chip and downstream processors generate two video feeds: one for LiveView and one for video creation (of whatever format chosen by the user as in PAL/NTSC/resolution/fps, all independent of LiveView). In this case the latter will have had the firmware changed to colour in the hot pixel with neighbouring pixels (what I call interpolation). I wish a Nikon engineer were in the room! Peter