From ISO 100 to 64,000: the Nikon Zf Side by Side

The Zf has a native ISO range from 100 to 64,000.¹ That wide range comes in handy for the types of varied lighting conditions that many Zf shooters will find themselves in. It is, after all, a camera that leans heavily into on-the-fly street or travel photography.

That’s the native range, not the whole dial. Below ISO 100 the camera offers a Lo setting equivalent to ISO 50, and above ISO 64,000 there are boosted settings running up to an ISO 204,800 equivalent. Nikon labels those as equivalents for a reason: they’re pushed or pulled in processing rather than genuine sensor sensitivity, which is why the samples here stay inside the native 100 to 64,000 range.

But what does that actually mean in practical terms? And how does it fit with your expectations and preferences? Of course, every photographer is going to have a different set of preferences for when the image quality is too degraded, and it’s also going to vary from scene to scene and the use it’s being put to.

The range also shifts depending on what you’re shooting. For video, the Zf’s native range tops out at ISO 51,200 rather than 64,000, with boosted settings above that up to an ISO 204,800 equivalent. And if you set the tone mode to HLG, the camera restricts you to ISO 400 through 64,000, so the bottom of the range disappears. Everything below was shot as stills in SDR tone mode.

I’ve posted a separate collection of sample images taken with a Nikon Zf at high ISOs. I’ve also posted some more general Nikon Zf sample images. Here, I’m adding some side-by-side examples through the ISO range, including at lower ISOs.

Technical notes about how these images were created

It’s worth explaining exactly how these were generated and what you’re seeing here.

These were all shot on the Nikon Zf, and these files are all straight out of the camera without any post-processing. That last point is worth emphasizing because, under normal shooting conditions, I’d be doing at least some post-processing, even if that’s just tweaking contrast and brightness. But these have had nothing done to them outside of the camera. They were shot with the RAW + JPEG fine* setting in SDR tone mode. The RAW recording is set to the default (High efficiency✭).

The original RAW files for the images in this post are available to subscribers to my newsletter on the RAW file downloads page. The page is password-protected; the password is in the newsletter’s welcome email. The JPG versions linked in the captions stay free.

The High ISO NR setting is at Normal (the default setting). That’s a particularly important point, because that affects both the JPG files and the JPG previews used within the RAW files. This is the setting that controls the camera’s own internal noise reduction processing. And because the images embedded in the page below are using the JPG files, you’re seeing the effects of that in-camera noise reduction in these display versions (which is why I’ve also included links to the RAW files). And the in-camera noise reduction is pretty darn impressive.

The in-camera noise reduction is also relevant to the RAW files but in a different way. This setting does not affect the underlying RAW data in the NEF files. But when you first open a RAW file to view, you’ll most likely see the preview file that’s embedded within it. To get past that and see the underlying RAW file, you’ll need to regenerate the preview thumbnail; whichever RAW viewer/editor you’re using will have a way to do that manually or automatically among its functions.

In many cases, I’ve included several shots of the same or similar scene at different ISOs so you can do some direct side-by-side comparisons.

You can click on each image below to open a full-size version from the JPG or use the links in each caption to download the original straight-out-of-camera RAW (NEF) and JPG files. The NEF files range from about 30 to 37 megabytes each. ²

Nikon Zf ISO Range Sample photos

These were all shot hand-held.

Sample set #1

Sample set #2

Sample set #3

With this set, there are some obvious variations in the tree lights in the background. That’s the result of faster shutter speeds creating problems with the flicker of LED lights.

Sample set #4