Learning curve for Z7/Z6

Thom Hogan did a tally of the number of previous mirrorless cameras from Nikon. I think he indicated it was the 12th mirrorless from Nikon. They had the Nikon 1 series and the V1 was a pretty good camera. They have had an EVF and LiveView for a long time. The D850 has a lot of features normally associated with mirrorless.

I would rate the Z6 and Z7 as top rate cameras now. There are things that are a little better with the D850 and the D5, but there are also better features in the Z7 and Z6. No camera is perfect, but there are no show stoppers that would keep most professional from being able to use a Z7 or Z6 as their primary camera.

The AF performance is pretty good, but for birds in flight and aircraft I think we need more time. I have not had good enough weather to do any real testing of birds in flight. The early criticism of the AF system was mainly user related - they were not using the right settings for their tests. For fast moving subjects you would normally use either Dynamic AF or Wide Small AF - depending on whether you could keep the sensor on the subject with Dynamic. With my D850 I'd use Dynamic or Group - effectively the same choices. Wide and Group both use Closest Subject Priority so if you don't have obstructions, they work well. If you have obstructions or need precise focus that can be tracked with a focus point, you would use Dynamic.

If photographing model planes is important and AF is a challenge, I'd wait. For most other uses, I think the Z6 and Z7 are great cameras.