Nikon Z 50
Despite the full-frame hype, APS- C still has a lot to offer
FOR ALL the hoopla around Nikon’s new full-frame mirrorless system, there’s one important point that’s barely been discussed. The most ‘affordable’ of its new cameras is the Nikon Z 6, which will set you back £2,100 for the body alone, before you even think about buying a native lens or two. If mirrorless really is the future, and SLRs are on the way out, that’s never going to be within reach of photographers making the first step up from shooting with a smartphone. But without appealing to such people, how can the company attract the new blood it’ll always need?
The answer is pretty obvious: by producing a much cheaper offering with an APS- C (or in Nikon-speak, DX) sensor. After all, Sony has its Alpha 6000-series models and Canon has its EOS M range. Surely Nikon has to produce something along the same lines, and do so sooner rather than later?
This brings us to another of the lesserconsidered points of the Z system. Nikon claims that its large 55mm mount diameter facilitates the design of faster lenses. But Sony has countered this by saying that its E-mount can easily cater for f/1.4 primes, whereas Nikon’s Z mount limits the prospects for small camera designs. Who is right? I suspect it’s six of one, half-a- dozen of the other; Nikon should be capable of making just as small a camera as the Canon EOS 200D, with its 54mm- diameter EF mount.
DX mirrorless
I’d like to see Nikon make a Z-mount APS- C model to go head-to-head with the likes of the Fujifilm X-T20 and Olympus OM- D E- M10 III, which I consider to be the most attractive models of their type. It needs to be compact and tactile, with twin control dials, a decent viewfinder and a tilting touchscreen, but ideally hit a price around £700 complete with a basic kit zoom. This would bring Nikon mirrorless within reach of the kind of budding enthusiasts who could well go on to become lifelong customers.