Nikon Z7 II sample gallery (DPReview TV)

If colour science was a myth, every photo would be identical other than WB.

What a weird thing to claim doesnt exist.

Every cameras standard jpg is that brands colour science. Or, if you believe they just allow whatever colours be to be you could say colour voodoo.

It's exactly the opposite. If it was science, then it would be perfectly (identically) reproducible on all cameras. And the fact that every camera makes a different color "mess" proves that no science was involved in camera calibration. It was made to look nice to someone at the "factory". Nothing more, no science. It's just a preset. If you want science, you calibrate it yourself.

I dont mind the term science magic as long as it is accepted that engineers are deliberately generating the hues they want. Which is, kind of "sciency".

It's kind of absurd really.

What exactly is absurd?

Your problem is that you need to be last and feel like youve won the thread maybe?

What did I say that could be considered absurd? Again, odd reaction by you.

I need you to realize that there's truth and there's nonsense and you can't have and preach your special personal truth. The actual truth is universal. It is in perfect harmony with reality, physics, common sense and logic. And believing all sorts of BS that make you feel better is actually bad for you and everyone you preach it to. It's poison for the intellect.
OK, let's say you have a different definition of "science" (you meant "magic" or something) and be done with this topic. These ignorant mantras come and go anyways. Let's hope that the "micro contrast" myth dies together with 'micro four thirds'. And don't be mad. I'm just trying to make photography more scientific, easy and clear to everyone. Because there's too many superstitiously ignorant folks who invent all sorts of esoteric BS nonsense and preach it as some valuable knowledge. I went through most of it and it doesn't hold water when you put it to the test. Camera companies are just exploiting human stupidity to prosper.

Engineering colour to the Standard ooc off the sensor and CFA is science. Demosaicing. Sorry to you to not understand that.

The colours do not have to match perfectly to be science.

You cant even comprehend the simple math from the other thread. Dont preach what science is to me.

Although i do understand what you are saying also.

@D Novak. Serious question: I do not know what a color science looks like. Can you please post a link to a photo wherein you have detected a color science.

It’s subjective science. Like alternative facts.

Eh, there is science behind it. There are many tests ran to come up with the colors that companies believe to be the best for their customers, and keeping it consistent within their product lineup. For us end users, there is no science. It's just subjective feelings and we choose the camera that best aligns with our views.

Color science is about reproducing natural colors, realistically. Not whatever looks nicer.

It's important to realize (pun intended) that photography has very little to do with reality. Since it is an art form, it is a very subjective medium. Add to that subjective interpretation of viewers and delivery, and you soon realize that what may look real/good to you, is very different to others. Yes, that's a short dip into the philosophic mindset.

As a form of art, the question you might want to ponder over is whether the images you create with this tool or another does evoke the emotional response for you and your audience. Is this how you want to deliver an image? Some camera manufacturers fit one's anticipation of a scene better than others; you may call this a sales approach, marketing or R&D prowess, but scientific it most certainly is not.

Of course, this conversation becomes highly academic if we focus on scientific applications. Wavelengths have nothing to do with color- that's just one's brain interpretation.

Many of you have all gone too far in many directions than necessary.

Brands dont bring in some bass guitarist to set the colours.

It is a highly technical endevour from the sensor, CFA, demosaicing, to our viewing device.

Engineers do this work. It is not left up to chance. They define every single hues response. It isnt WB. There is a lot going on.

Impulses, no of course. I mean I agree.

As well, how many of us, especially men, think they are seeing hues correctly even with a calibrated display?

I make sure ive taken a couple hue eye tests before arguing about colour. Fortunately I can still correctly determine between hues.

Mostly that is for arguing skin tonality. Where hue changes are quite fine.

@Impulses - Then why not just call it 'Color Presets'?

@Relaxed - Photography is not art, it's a tool. And you can capture art with it, if that's your thing. And it has everything to do with reality, for me at least.
Are you suggesting that all those weird color presets are someone's brain failures? :)

@SteveAnderson - Yes, there's a lot going on. And then they offer you some reality denying presets :), because they failed to do it perfectly right, becasue it's not possible to do with a 14 or 16 bit camera and quite primitive color guessing tech and weak AI. That's why we have to perform "science" with each shot individually in post.

I beg to differ. For me, Photography is a form of art. Cameras and lenses are tools, just as brushes or hammers. You can of course, look the term up. Here- I’ll make it easier for you: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photography

For you, photography might only amount to gear acquisition.

There is no brain failure, only different presets. Some tools may fit your preference more than others, but there is no absolute perfection, nor absolute failure. Color is subjective.

Im not not on your side in some cases though.

I really wish each camera had a 0.0de mode.

And why are Neutral and Faithful so wildly different and inaccurate? Each word sounds like it should mean accurate.

I have calibrated IPS displays, and my eyes pass hue tests 100%.

I dont know how much youve tested cameras. I have pain-stakingly tested multiple brands and models. With known lighting, locations and persons.

Sensor and CFA are hardware, they vary massively in colour. Engineers need to wrangle colour. Canon CFA are stronger/thicker, different.

It is so stupidly hard to match colours from different brands in an identical shot scene. Especially skin. No matter what software we use. Even macbeth charts cant match every hue.

@SteveAnderson
Exactly right (the second part). That's why "color science" is a myth :). It's just a marketing slogan.

Ahh, the time honored DPR pursuit of arguing with Ecka84 in the forums..

If color science is a myth, then how come Fuji keeps paying all those engineers from their film days to painstakingly recreate, using science, the colors from their films into their digital camera film sims? Fuji made their own custom CFA in part to help them capture those proverbial greens of summer..

<lights fuse, walks away>...

Mr Bolton, Thank you for confirming my suspicion. Its like knocking my head against concrete.

Bass guitarists, AI, Children, do not painstakingly massage 1000s of hues from complex hardware sensors and CFA to a brand Standard ooc profile.

Engineers do this. It makes no difference that the result is not a 0.0de profile.

" Then why not just call it 'Color Presets'? "

Isn't that what they're called in most cameras? I've never seen a camera that advertised 'color science' in the interface, not that it'd bother me but I know little things like that would make using a simple tool quite insufferable for you... I did have one with 'art filters' which were separate from the color presets, those were fun for a minute. At some point you're just arguing over semantics...

Why are you telling me this? "Color science" is a myth :). They call it color profiles in cameras and apps. Only the true "natural/lifelike color" profiles do not exist, therefore "color science" is bogus and no camera can reproduce reality realistically by default, with same exact colors. You may argue all you want about how different people can see colors differently, but when the same person is seeing different colors in reality and on a calibrated screen, there's no excuse, no "color science", only BS and naive foolishness.

You have forced me to call you dense in 2 threads now ecka.

Art students do not create the profiles. Scientists do. How focking dense are you?

The act of managing hues from the sensor and CFA is science, done by engineers.

If it was trivial, Sony would never have created such awful skin tones on every camera a6300 and prior. Only a7III has decent skin tonality but still tends yellow to green unfortunately.
This colour stuff isnt hue sliders. It is hardware based.

If you want to get ridiculous, Psychology is also science. You lose no matter how you look at this.

There is no myth about anything.

Eventually you get to software. Sliding hue channels. To profiles. But before we can do that, they must contend with the sensor and CFA.

Except magenta. Magenta is, in fact, a myth invented by the human mind :-D

The original post was nonsense. Even the original poster immediately abandoned it. Any discussion of it can only follow the same nonsensical pattern (which it has).

40 messages ago you could have just admitted your only purpose here is to be an insecure brat needing to have the last post.

No matter how stupid it is or how wrong you are.

You are a troll. Nothing more or less. Enjoy talking to a mirror now.

It is about showing camera performance, or what? And sharpness when tracking is a very important aspect of image quality!

All cameras can do static shots, but tracking autofocus takes a bit more.

They save the tracking photos for the reviews, apparently. The gallery seemingly serves the same purpose as a picture book for kids--to flip the pages and ooh and aah at the shots.

The purpose of dpr galleries, other than to just keep people visiting the site, is to demonstrate:

Sensor quality (sharpness, noise control, dynamic range, moire)

Lens characteristics (vignetting, onion-rings, cat's-eye, sunstars, CA, barrel/pincushion distortion, curvature).

They also serve as a reminder to gearheads that cameras as to be used and enjoyed for taking *photographs*.

Magnar W: "It is about showing camera performance, or what?"

No, it's not. Like I said, the gallery is about image quality. It's not about battery life, build qualitry, AF performance, handling, etc ...

@ Photo_AK: So sharpness when tracking fast moving subjects is NOT about image quality?

I don't know how you can tie aspects like battery life to image quality, though.

I think my request for action photos is highly relevant for a test gallery.

Magnar - There would be absolutely no point in including an AF tracking test within a normal dpr gallery, as it would tell you nothing about how the performed in *comparison* to other models. And it would tell you nothing about the *keeper rate*.

dpr already has AF tracking tests in most reviews, so why not just check them out?

There is an AF tracking test right here in the review of the Z6ii, which has an identical AF system to the Z7ii:

https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/nikon-z6-ii-review

Magnar W: "So sharpness when tracking fast moving subjects is NOT about image quality?"

No, it's not. It's about AF performance. The image quality on successfully focused shot is IDENTICAL to image quality on an unsuccessfully focused image. The quality of a shot, a photograph is of course different.

Just stop being silly, OK?

@ Photo_AK: So asking for action shots is silly? LOL!

Personally I find unsharp action photos useless, no matter other aspect of image quality. Actually, these galleries can't be used to compare cameras anyway, since the scenes are unique for all of them.

You don't need to compare to other cameras to find if tracking fous is up to the task or not. Just make a pretty standarised test precedure, and shoot. At least this will reveal if tracking is bad or good. Mission completed.

Magnar - Why don't you just check the Z6ii review link that I posted, and stop being silly?

@ entoman: Well, their "Nikon says ... " isn't tht helpful. I prefer real world reports. Or do you think that is silly too?

Magnar - What I think is silly, is ignoring a review that I posted a link to, which perfectly demonstrates the AF tracking abilities of the Z6ii (and therefore the a7ii).

And I also think it's silly to expect dpr to include totally unnecessary images, that no one else sees any value in, in a gallery that serves an entirely different purpose.

@ entoman: So a variety of pictures in a camera gallery is a waste? It is silly, and should be avoided? LOL!

Magnar - I give up on you, sorry.

They'd have to label an action sequence pretty carefully and either include the whole 12+ shot sequence, or make notes of keeper rate and other relevant data, as already noted. They'd also have to state whether they used tracking or kept the AF point over the target, there's just a whole bunch of variables...

Frankly that would balloon the gallery size and I don't think anyone really wants to flip thru a sequence like that within the gallery format, the numbered tab/shot format they use for displaying C-AF and/or tracking results within the reviews seems a lot more informative and like a more concise way of relaying that info.

(continued)

I'm all for more standardized/in depth AF testing (beyond the classic bike example they use in many reviews), and DPR has been saying "we're working on it" for a bit too long, but to be fair it's not a super easy thing to set up and I don't see any other site doing a better job of it. With the computationally trained systems some brands are using, the potential for cheating in any standardized test is high IMO.

And no, I don't think it's beneath one of the big players to train their system on a target that a site could decide to use consistently, seen far worse with synthetic tests on PC hardware.

@Magnar - The accompanying review provides detailed coverage of the performance of the focus tracking in this camera. It clearly lags Canon and Sony in this regard. But you new that when you posted this, you simply cannot help yourself.

A Owens - "you simply cannot help yourself". Yes, unfortunately that appears to be the issue here.

Keep taking the tablets, Magnar 🙄

No Magnar -what "tells all" is the *single* poster who just seems incapable of letting go of a worthless argument.

Rainy weather can be very beautiful too :)

Just enjoy the RAWs :)

When demonstrating DR, we often push the shadows excessively to show what the camera is capable of.

There are before and after shots so you get the best of both worlds.

Reilly, Not sure if its your first day on the internet but we can not tell which post you are pointing or looking at above which you think is nonsense.