Nikon Z7 in Lightroom

[brucec6773371]

Possible major quality issue / bug here: I've not yet search the forums, but I've done enough testing now, even loaning Z7 and lens from Nikon to confirm, that Lightroom CC (and what appears to be Bridge also) just don't support the quality resident in the Z7 (I'ved not tested Z6). I've dozens of images to compare with, on D800, D750, and tests with 27-70 2.8 G v F4 Z, plus tested the Nikon loan camera, so ruled out product variations / body or lens issues.

I took this issue up with Nikon itself, until we diesoverd it was Lightroom itself. A relief to them, but no help to us.

In a nutshell, I totally lost confidence as a pro shooter (portraits etc) on the Z7, until radomly, during testing, I decided to install the trial of another RAW converter / editor  and was totally blown away by the detail I knew should have been there all along

If this issue has not yet been reported, I'm astounded, but I feel this is an urgent issue to address. A simple dropping of a high res, quality file (say a portrait at 100%) will instantly show the comparison. I don't want to have to purchase / learn other software, but I'm gutted to work with soft images. I've tried all varations of sharpenning, noise control etc etc, until I simply opend the file in another converter, and there was the detail that blew me away.

Is Adobe aware of this issue? It runis the output of this expensive camera, and defeats the purpose of working with quality, high-res files, where the D800 and 750 run rings around it in Lightroom output.

Gladly like to hear that this is reported and worked upon?

[Jao vdL]

Capture one has sharpening in several places. By default it will do a "Diffraction Correction (deconvolution sharpening)" sharpening which is meant to correct for the diffraction sharpness loss automatically that we talked about. I believe it automatically adjusts the amount and radius based on the image resolution, f-stop and focal length you used. The sharpening that you zeroed is sharpening that is applied on top of that. So if you zeroed sharpening there is still considerable sharpening being applied. That is a neat feature that Lightroom Classic doesn't have so in Lightroom you just have to do it manually with the standard sharpening controls and sharpen high f-stop images more than low f-stop images. When you zero sharpening in Lightroom there is no sharpening whatsoever applied and you see the real raw image acuity that the sensor captured. Lightroom's demosaic is pretty much state-of-the-art and the sharpening works really well. There is no other raw converter that can extract significantly more detail from an image. Capture one is quite good but not significantly better at this (i've tested basically every raw converter out there). The automatic sharpening features are quite neat though.

In fact my workflow is to cull images first based on composition, facial expression for portraits, and whether the focus point is where I want it or in landscapes whether I have enough depth of field. Then the very first thing I do is exposure correction followed by hitting the detail sliders. You need to do the detail sliders very early in the development workflow. It is meant to be a capture sharpening - i.e. to correct for aperture diffraction and Bayer mosaic sharpness loss. You do this at 1:1 zoom. After that I don't touch the sharpening anymore and just work on the lighting and style of the image.

[brucec6773371]

Thank - yes, I usually apply deconvolution sharpening in a plug in I have, once in PS.

That would explain the enhanced sharpness in Capture if it does to this step prior.

My question would be this in regards what we have reached at this point in discussing this potential issue: from what you are saying, the 'zeroed' images of Z7 in Lightroom are in fact accurate representations of the Z7 imaging pipeline from the sensor, directly to screen (via LR) - and that is where my issue probably still lies. If the Z7 raw conversion is accurate, and shows the full detail of the Z7 as recorded to sensor by the camera / lens cobo, then I just can't get over how soft and ugly it is!

My question is this: why do d800, d750 record to sensor so much better, than the latest gen Z?  It shoudl look EXACTLY like a d850 sensor. So if someone with a D850 could post a zeroed LR RAW screenshot of their camera, and comapre that to the Z, I believe that we would see different images, unless there is still something up in my system.

The only other possiblity as far as I can see it, is that LR is not bringing in the true starting point of either Z7 images, or it is enhancing the true starting point of my D800 and d750's (and other cameras I've viewed in LR).

Why not rather bring in the file at the full acuity of the sensor in the fist place, or have they taken a NEW approach with the Z series, and applied less sharpening to imported files? I can't see that it woudl be the difference soley betwen 36mp and 45mp on the two high res cameras?

So I'm still confused here as to the difference in 'starting points'. As you can see in previous screen shots, the zeroed images on the z surely cannot be displaying the true acuity of the sensor? Where would sensor testing labs be able to start? For the d800 I owned was far sharper when zeroed?  Where can we actually see a represenation of a RAW sensor, that is equally processed all things considered? Has Adobe's handling of the Z RAWs taken a new approach perhaps? Or it still could be my machine?  

However, as you say, the detail can be restored (at least apparent detail) via software, but it is still an uneasy feeling to have to apply this in post in what I consider a much harsher measure to achieve what previous cameras revealed much earlier on in the sharpening regieme, and even when zeroed.

[Jao vdL · Accepted solution]

Files from a Z7 look identical to those from a D850 if you compare comparable lenses and f-stop. From a D750 your images will look sharper at 1:1 simply because you are zooming in far less when you go 1:1. Even in your files, if you compare the D800 file with the Z7 file and scale the Z7 file down to the same resolution as the D800 as I did in the screenshot below and set the sharpening and noise reduction to zero, they look identical in detail and sharpness. These are the only two actually comparable images in your set. You HAVE to compare equal 

detail from the D800:

Detail from the Z7 when scaled to the same resolution:

That is to my eyes absolutely identical acuity as you expect for diffraction limitation.

This is the Z7 at its native size:

This looks exactly like you expect from the f-stop you used. It is limited by physics, not the sensor or the raw converter.

What you are looking at is inherent limits of physics at high f/stops.

Here is an example D850 file I found on the net. Shot at f/16 with a very sharp lens but turning off all sharpening. You see diffraction induced softness exactly like you expect.

https://www.photographyblog.com/previews/nikon_d850_photos

Andf here is one of my own Z7 files at f/16

Exact same amount of diffraction softness. This is unavoidable if you have to shoot at high f-stops.

[brucec6773371]

Thank you. Appreciate your time and help. So you are saying size differential plus diffraction in this case. I'll think on that. I dont want to raise it with support until I'd looked into it more.  I'll try presharpening on import. It's a matter of having confidence in camera /software. This has been a useful process. Thanks again for your time. 

[Jao vdL]

Yes exactly. To be able to take advantage of the resolution of very high resolution cameras like the Z7, you need to shoot at low f-stops (at or below f/8), use very sharp lenses and shoot on a tripod. If you don't do one of these (the tripod can be taken out if you're very steady or you use vibration reduction) you will see softness when zoomed to 1:1 and you are going to need to sharpen.

[Jao vdL]

Why not rather bring in the file at the full acuity of the sensor in the fist place, or have they taken a NEW approach with the Z series, and applied less sharpening to imported files? I can't see that it woudl be the difference soley betwen 36mp and 45mp on the two high res cameras?

Z7 files come in with the full acuity in the file. Adobe have not taken any new approach. NIKON is forcing very low default sharpening on Z7 files. This is caused by the xmp metadata section Nikon puts in every single NEF file from a Z-series camera as in the following example:

<rdf:Description rdf:about="" xmlns:xmp="http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/"><xmp:CreatorTool>NIKON Z 7 Ver.01.01     </xmp:CreatorTool><xmp:CreateDate>2019-01-01T16:25:38.05</xmp:CreateDate><xmp:Rating>0</xmp:Rating> </rdf:Description><rdf:Description rdf:about="" xmlns:crd="http://ns.adobe.com/camera-raw-defaults/1.0/"><crd:Exposure2012>0.00</crd:Exposure2012><crd:Highlight2012>0</crd:Highlight2012><crd:Shadows2012>0</crd:Shadows2012><crd:LuminanceSmoothing>26</crd:LuminanceSmoothing><crd:LuminanceNoiseReductionDetail>75</crd:LuminanceNoiseReductionDetail><crd:LuminanceNoiseReductionContrast>0</crd:LuminanceNoiseReductionContrast><crd:ColorNoiseReduction>10</crd:ColorNoiseReduction><crd:ColorNoiseReductionDetail>50</crd:ColorNoiseReductionDetail><crd:ColorNoiseReductionSmoothness>50</crd:ColorNoiseReductionSmoothness><crd:Sharpness>8</crd:Sharpness><crd:SharpenRadius>2.00</crd:SharpenRadius><crd:SharpenDetail>25</crd:SharpenDetail><crd:SharpenEdgeMasking>0</crd:SharpenEdgeMasking><crd:Contrast2012>0</crd:Contrast2012><crd:Saturation>0</crd:Saturation><crd:CameraProfile>Camera_Standard</crd:CameraProfile></rdf:Description></rdf:RDF>

You see that <crd:Sharpness>8</crd:Sharpness> part. That is the Nikon camera forcing Lightroom to apply sharpen 8 as the default (crd stands for camera raw default) for this file. Needless to say that is incredibly low and will never be enough for a f/16 shot image.

[brucec6773371]

OK - I've since found the correct sharpening tools in Capture, and can confirm that there is indeed very little difference between LR and Capture on othe Z7 files with both zeroed, apart from perhaps a slight increased in perceived sharpness in Capture, due to the previusly discussed deconvolution sharpening Capture automatically applied upon import. See for yourself here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/axaysihcg58j5tu/AADAlVlf3veGdXkLUjbHIKE4a?dl=0

So I'm now satisfied with the image output of the Z7 and subsequent RAW rendering in LR (ACR).  I'm glad I went through this process as it restored confidence in the systems I use.

[D Fosse]

Interesting discussion, thanks all. Learning points to be picked up by everyone here 🙂

On a slightly different note, this completely deflates the Capture One marketing, which has always been about "the undefinable magic", the fantastic skin tones and so on. Frankly, the skin tones in the C1 examples here are pretty bad IMO, Lightroom looks a lot better out of the box. And then there's the half-baked DNG support, and an interface that hurts the eyes. No thanks, even if they have a nifty auto sharpening.

[steve22015484x9de]

Im about to give up on my z711  i have tried everything and the images are not there. 
there are lots of people that have a lot of reasons why.

i have an d 850 and it is wonderfull, the colors are great sharp have depth, so the images are indeed not the same.

i dont need to do side by side test. , its too evident. Settings reset  color space . You name it.

if you can figure it out i would love to here it. 

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

You’ve posted to an ancient thread. It is highly unlikely that the issue described in this thread, though not impossible, is the same one you are currently experiencing. Rather than resurrect an old thread that is seemingly similar, you are better off posting to a new thread with fresh, complete information, including system information, a complete description of the problem, and step-by-step instructions for reproduction. 

If the issue is the same, we will merge you back into the appropriate location. 

Thank you!