Sony introduces the a9

[Les Olson]

You seem to imply that it is equivalent to put stabilisation in the body or the lens. Why do you think that it makes no difference?
I would be interested to see similar recordings for other cameras. To my knowledge, not all cameras are affected by vibration issues to the same extent. Do you think that Nikon's efforts to improve the D810 mirror mechanism were due to them believing in an "urban myth"?

I didn't say they are equivalent, just that they are the two options. Because you hold a camera + long lens and a camera + short lens differently the movements caused by physiological tremor are different, so there is a theoretical advantage to stabilising the lens, but I have not seen any evidence that performance is materially different. 

As for some cameras being more affected than others, if any camera was going to be, it would be a medium format camera - because if a 35mm SLR has mirror slap, a medium format camera has mirror crash.  If vibrations from the mirror were important in 35mm, they would be more important in medium format.  They are not.  It is a non-issue.  Hasselblads, eg, have always been known for their spectacular mirror slap, but a lot of dam' fine images have been made with hand-held Hasselblads.

What improvements to the D810 mirror mechanism? 

[Les Olson]

Why is there a mirror-up feature on most DSLRs?

Ansel Adams says in The Camera (p180) that you should use mirror lock-up for macrophotography at "high magnifications".  The other use would be landscapes using a long lens. 

[bjornthun]

Ansel Adams says in The Camera (p180) that you should use mirror lock-up for macrophotography at "high magnifications".  The other use would be landscapes using a long lens.

And any shooting when you deem a tripod necessary to avoid vibrations, m-up should be used.

[Les Olson]

The test was done with D200 and 85/1.4 combo attached on the Kirk BH3 ballhead, which means that the body is directly mounted on the ballhead.  The vibration caused by the mirror may stay longer when the camera is attached to, say, AF-S 300/4.0 mounted on a tripod.  The tripod collar of AF-S 300/4.0 is known to be a bit too flimsy. 

Sure - tripod mounting will have no effect at all unless there is effective mass coupling between the camera and the tripod, and the collars provided with Nikon lenses are very unlikely to achieve it.   Does a single 1/4" screw really provide effective mass coupling?  Maybe, but I doubt it. 

In any case, the recording shows quite clearly that the vibrations caused by the shutter itself are much stronger than those caused by the mirror, and they are at their peak while the shutter is open.  Even if the vibrations caused by the mirror decayed half as fast as in the recording, they would still be small compared to the shutter vibrations while the shutter was open.   

[simsurace]

Sure - tripod mounting will have no effect at all unless there is effective mass coupling between the camera and the tripod, and the collars provided with Nikon lenses are very unlikely to achieve it.   Does a single 1/4" screw really provide effective mass coupling?  Maybe, but I doubt it. 

In any case, the recording shows quite clearly that the vibrations caused by the shutter itself are much stronger than those caused by the mirror, and they are at their peak while the shutter is open.  Even if the vibrations caused by the mirror decayed half as fast as in the recording, they would still be small compared to the shutter vibrations while the shutter was open.

I see where you are coming from, but the measurement was done at the hot shoe. It should be done at the sensor. Moreover, the question of long vs. short lenses is important, since waves can travel back and forth on a long lens, prolonging the effect of vibrations.

I would be interested to see more measurements on recent cameras.

Which would mean the vibrations would decay twice as fast (all other things being equal).

I don't follow your reasoning here.
It is not the mirror that is the primary vibrating mass. The mirror hits other stuff and causes waves to travel all over the camera, lens, and tripod legs (put your ear on a tripod leg while the mirror moves and you will hear a rather loud sound). The shutter by itself does not cause such a loud sound.

What improvements to the D810 mirror mechanism?

The mirror slap must have been recognized by Nikon as a source of vibrations. See Section 3 on this page:
http://www.nikon.com/news/2014/0626_dslr_01.htm

[Akira]

According to the review of Imaging Resource, the shutter lag of D200 is 57msec and that of D800 is 44msec.  So, the shutter shock may occur before the vibration caused by the mirror settles.  Nikon deliberately slowed the shutter lag of D810 (54-56msec, according to Imaging Resource) to slow down the mirror movement sequence and thus to reduce the shock.

Also, on D800, the direction of the vibration initiated by the shutter could be the same as that of the remaining vibration caused by the mirror, which could recover the vibration "effectively".

[Ethan]

So according to whomever, the shutter speed goes to few trillions of a second with no blackout.

I was interested to note that when the buffer fills up at high shutter speed, the buffer needs 1 or 2 minutes to write to the memory card.

Helloooooo, Two flipping minutes to purge the buffer. And what are you supposed to do in the mean time? Tell the sport athlete to stop and pick up again? Shoot hovering helicopters or frozen tossed pasta?

I mean, the whole thing is advertised for fast motion with the highest shutter speed and no blackouts.

I guess it will work alright for shooting landscapes at 20fps with a locked down camera. Dohhhhh.

I'll stick with the legacy D5 and 1Dx.


Sony, Yeah, right   

[bjornthun]

So according to whomever, the shutter speed goes to few trillions of a second with no blackout.

I was interested to note that when the buffer fills up at high shutter speed, the buffer needs 1 or 2 minutes to write to the memory card.

Helloooooo, Two flipping minutes to purge the buffer. And what are you supposed to do in the mean time? Tell the sport athlete to stop and pick up again? Shoot hovering helicopters or frozen tossed pasta?

I mean, the whole thing is advertised for fast motion with the highest shutter speed and no blackouts.

I guess it will work alright for shooting landscapes at 20fps with a locked down camera. Dohhhhh.

I'll stick with the legacy D5 and 1Dx.


Sony, Yeah, right   

No, 36 seconds, Tony Northrup corrected his previous statement of two minutes.

[Ethan]

No, 36 seconds, Tony Northrup corrected his previous statement of two minutes.

That is correct and incorrect.

When writing to one card it is in the 36secs mark with the fastest super duper expensive card but when writing to two cards, the writing time jumps up.

Whatever it is whether 36secs or more, it still down time and you missed crucial shots while purging memory.

36secs is a lot of downtime for the singing and dancing Sony who are positioning the camera as a speed demon!

Let's see what other hidden downfalls will come to light. (Hello Sony, tracking motion at fast speed with spot focus on the eye? Tell me how is this going to be achieved and the number of missed shots? Of course the tests do not use spot focus but cluster or whatever they call it focus. So you shoot the sequence and enlarge the image to find out that the eyes are not in focus. Luv it!
N.B. The shooting sequence was a Hockey game where the players outfit was colored and the background white or faded. Even my Lego camera can track that. It is called in good English: Taking the piss.

Sony, the Art of Untruth.

[Akira]

Even the 36 seconds should seem to be eternity for a professional sport photographer on site.  Of course, he/she should have another A9 body for such assignments.  Remember that the camera doesn't respond to any operation during that 36 seconds.

Funny that Sony didn't employ XQD cards they developed.  Maybe they wanted to keep the camera as small as possible.  I'm not sure if that was the good decision...

[MFloyd]

And be aware that the speed is capped at 12fps if you shoot 14-bit uncompressed RAW files....

[David H. Hartman]

It is not the mirror that is the primary vibrating mass. The mirror hits other stuff and causes waves to travel all over the camera, lens, and tripod legs (put your ear on a tripod leg while the mirror moves and you will hear a rather loud sound). The shutter by itself does not cause such a loud sound.

I don't recommend placing your ear against a tripod leg with a Nikon F2 or FM2n. You might suffer permanent hearing loss.

Dave

[David H. Hartman]

... However, when the action is not impossibly fast to time for, I would at least personally shoot in single shot mode as it allows me to give due consideration to the subject I'm shooting and choose a moment based on prior evolution of the events. ...

Thank you for commenting!

Something I've done for a long time is speed up my slow continues frame rate to something comfortable like 5 or 6 frames per second and then squeeze off single frames. If I want a series I can hold down the shutter release. I'm not comfortable leaving the decisive moment to chance at 5-8 fps. I hate to think about editing a series of 20 fps bursts. Squeezing off single frames in CL advance mode will remain the norm for me.

Dave

The fastest camera I've ever owned is 8 fps. I've had zero opertunities to shoot sports in the last few years. I wish I could shoot motor sports occasionally.

[pluton]

I note that the referred to test was done on a carpeted floor. 
I can report that [at least some]mirrorless cameras have a low-vibration advantage over SLR:
If I set up my AF-S 300/4(with Kirk A-S collar) clamped into the RRS BH-55 head, on the Gitzo GT2531 tripod(a light-weight tripod) standing on a rigid floor or piece of ground, and then add the D800 camera in normal firing cycle,  I get image destroying camera-shake in the well-known 'danger zone' shutter speeds(approx. 1/125 down to 2 sec or so).
If I engage mirror lock up on the D800, the vibration is reduced, but the image is still harmed by a small amount of camera-shake blurring.
If I then switch the camera to my Fuji XE-1(via Novoflex mount adapter), there is no image-destroying vibration on this setup.  None.  I can freely shoot at 1/30, 1/4, or any shutter speed and have zero camera-shake induced blurring.
This is great for those of us who do not have the budget for several thousand dollars worth of professional fluid head video tripod.

[David H. Hartman]

If one fills the buffer in a D500 how long does it take the D500 to write all to memory? Is shooting suspended for the duration or can one start shooting when there is enough buffer available to hold a file?

Dave Hartman