As many of you know I've been working on a book about Nikon JPEG use (it’s going to be well into 2025 before it appears, so please don't pepper me with questions of "when?").
One thing that's come up in my research with users about JPEG use is that many prefer Fujifilm if JPEG files are what they are always creating. When I press these users on this, it turns out that this is partly because Fujifilm uses film names for their JPEG looks: e.g. Provia, Velvia, Astia, Classic Chrome, etc. Nikon's naming is a much more generic Auto, Standard, Neutral, Landscape, etc.
Moreover, Fujifilm's current cameras can display a full page of information about each look as you scroll through them:
Setting aside for the moment that I don't find any of Fujifilm's film simulations accurate to the way the named films depict a scene, doing things by using film names has two positive impacts for users: (1) it reaffirms the reason why they might want to use a simulation; and (2) for those who used film in the past, it matches the way they used to pick what they were using.
You might think this is a subtle difference, but consider Nikon's Picture Control naming for a moment, specifically Standard, Neutral, Landscape, Portrait, and Vivid. What if you're not photographing a landscape or a portrait, which Picture Control do you use and why? You seem to be left with the names Standard, Neutral, and Vivid to choose from, and no additional information to help you!
Things get worse with the twenty Nikon Creative Picture Controls (Dream, Morning, Pop, Sunday, etc.). Basically you're on your own, and I hope you read the manual or my book on your camera and paid careful attention to the words we used in describing those Picture Controls (tip: I use more words than Nikon, and I display the same scene with each Picture Control in my books to give you an accurate visual reference).
What I've found with a number of Nikon users is a form of analysis paralysis: the words don't give them enough information to make a useful decision, so they punt and just set Auto hoping it will do the "right thing."
Let me cut to the cheat sheet: most of the film simulations and Picture Controls differ mostly in two specific things: contrast and saturation. So let me offer you some crude not-quite-equivalents (these do the same basic things, but not by exactly the same amounts):
- Baseline: Fujifilm Provia, Nikon Standard
- Turn it up to 11: Fujifilm Velvia, Nikon Vivid
- Dial it down: Fujifilm Eterna, Nikon Neutral
The problem with both Fujifilm and Nikon is that their other choices fall in between the above in some not-always consistent or easy to describe way. The Fujifilm Pro Neg and Astia choices all take out contrast, and the Pro Neg choices also takes out saturation. There's also nothing between Provia and Velvia in the Fujifilm Contrast/Saturation chart. With Nikon, we've got Landscape in between Standard and Vivid.
Nikon unfortunately removed the function in their cameras that used to tell us how each Picture Control plotted in terms of contrast and saturation, including how far you could vary it with the sub-parameters. Now they've gone the opposite direction and, with the new Flexible Picture Controls you can create using your computer, give Z50II and Z6III users an overwhelming array of control in this regard. (If you want to see what the strange Recipes—pre-made Flexible Picture Controls by an odd assortment of creators—provides, scroll all the way to the bottom of the Nikon Japan page for Flexible Picture Controls where it says Picture Control Simulator, and click on one of the circular buttons below the sample pictures. Way to bury information, Nikon. But thanks for helping prove my point. ;~)
If you look carefully, you can see engineers trying to do the right thing, but the product marketing folk completely at a loss for how to describe and promote it, plus then removing the thing that allowed us to begin understanding what is happening. Thus, it all comes back to words, and we don't have many, so it's unclear what you do when the word doesn't match what you're photographing. For travel photography, for instance, should you use Standard, Neutral, Landscape, or Vivid? If there's a person in the image do we absolutely need to use Portrait? And what does Rich Tone Portrait do?
So what's happening with my upcoming book on using JPEGs is this: part of it is turning into a dissertation on matching Picture Controls to intent.
Fortunately, there's a practical workaround, and of all things, the best version of this just appeared on the Nikon Z50II via its Picture Control button: (1) tap the button, (2) now looking at your scene use the dial to select which Picture Control looks best (you can also use the Front Command dial or Direction pad to select sub-parameters, all while still viewing the scene you're trying to capture).
If you don't have a Z50II, you can do something similar: (1) tap the I button, (2) navigate to Set Picture Control and select it (OK button), (3) use the Direction pad to select a Picture Control and other adjustments as you view the scene. One difference compared to the Z50II besides the extra steps: you see less of the scene this way, as the on-screen control structure takes up a more significant portion of the display.
Tip: In my presentation on Black Friday I did a very brief demonstration of how Flexible Picture Controls are useful to the wildlife photographer (for when they use pre-release capture). What I didn’t say is this: on that Z50II I can disable Picture Controls I’m not interested in. Meaning that I can more quickly navigate to one of my predefined ones using that Picture Control button. Hopefully Nikon sees how useful this is and adds this small change (ability to remove Picture Controls from choices) to the other cameras.
