I was contemplating several readers’ comments the other day when it occurred to me that so much of what influences “opinion” these days has a temporal component. I’ve written about this in the past in different ways, but Nikon’s current slow pace in iterating Z System bodies is causing me to see responses similar to ones I’ve seen at different stages in the past (e.g. “too sluggish” and “not current”). While Nikon (and other camera companies, for that matter) tries to be up to date and state of the art, things don’t always go as smoothly in product development as the esurient customers want.
(I’ll wait for you to look up that word ;~).
A better way to look at things, I think, is to look at whether a product met the typically unslakable demands when it was introduced. I’m going to go backwards through the Z System for a reason:
- Z8 — more than fully satisfied the customer at its level.
- Z30 — mostly satisfied a new subset of customers.
- Z9 — absolutely satisfied its customers (and continues to, via firmware updates).
- Zfc — fully satisfied a subset of customers (except for lenses).
- Z6 II — didn’t satisfy the customer; seemed like a small step forward after a big one.
- Z7 II — didn’t satisfy the customer, seemed like a very small step forward after a big one.
- Z5 — fully satisfied the customer for an entry full frame camera.
- Z50 — initially satisfied a subset of customers; but has not held that up, particularly given competitor product launches.
- Z6 — felt like one generation behind Sony when launched. Firmware updates helped, but made II models look more lame.
- Z7 — felt like one generation behind Sony when launched. Firmware updates helped, but made II models look more lame.
Green is obviously “satisfied.” Red is “unsatisfied.” Orange is “not really satisfied or unsatisfied.”
Notice something about the order?
Right. The most recent Z cameras are at least succeeding fully with subsets of Nikon’s audience.
It’s the Z6 and Z7 product lines that seem problematic. Given that Sony was already fully in generation three of their A7 bodies when the original Z6/Z7 hit, being a generation behind didn’t seem like too big a problem. But the II iterations from Nikon didn’t move the bar much, while Sony has moved on to generation four and five, and arguably improved their products considerably. (On the other hand, Sony seems distracted by video these days, which isn’t going to get most legacy Nikon users’ attention.)
My suspicion is that Nikon has noticed this same thing. Instead of getting a III generation with just some EXPEED7 changes, my guess is that they’re looking to do much better than that. They don’t want a repeat of the II launches, where customers were less than thrilled. And my guess is that the image sensor is at the heart of the apparent delay, as the other side of the electronics looks to be state-of-the-art given the Z8/Z9.
So the proper question to ask is this: what would make a Z6 III and Z7 III “green” in my future similar analysis? New focus capabilities, for sure, but also likely 33mp and 61mp+, respectively. Anything else?
