Learning curve for Z7/Z6

How did I miss this thread? Lots of great information. I too have been shooting with both the D850 and the Z6. I love them both, but they are different cameras, and not really very interchangeable. It's nice to be obsessed enough with photography to be able to shoot both, but if I had to choose one it would certainly depend on the kind of shooting I'd most want to do. I think I'm going to start a new thread on exactly that question. Stay tuned!

I shoot a lot of action... birds in flight, planes in flight, race cars. Regarding focus area I like to start as small as I can - point focus if I can track well, and only add area as necessary. I love the d9 setting on the D850, and find the jump to Wide AF on the Z6 to be a bit too much. It's relatively easy to hold focus, but not as clear where that focus will be; the bird's neck instead of its eye for example.

The wake-up time lag is the biggest thing I've had to get used to. There's just no opportunity to capture the fleeting moment. I was going to ask others about work-arounds, but it sounds like short of keeping things live and getting reduced to Sony-like battery life there's not much option.

I'm generally finding I prefer to pick up the D850 for any serious motion-tracking. Buffer size is ultimately what controls frame rate in a sustained burst, and there simply isn't enough physical space for a bigger buffer on the mirrorless cameras. While the advertised frame rate is very impressive the actual frame rate drops off quite a bit faster. If I'm trying to track a bird in flight I much prefer a constant frame spacing, so intentionally turn it down to about 3 fps, although admittedly I do the same thing on the D850 with about 5 fps. Those are not scientifically determined - just what appear to be "safe."

I hope none of this comes across as negative about the Z6. It's a fantastic camera. I was an early adopter of mirrorless, and did a couple of rounds with Sony, so I certainly appreciate what Nikon has pulled off. But there are still places where the DSLR holds advantages. Perhaps over time this will change, but certainly not yet.

Kevin