It was bound to happen. End of the year and all. And, in a few months the D850 will not be a current model. Perfect storm.
The D780 experiment is over. It was a good camera. If it is your first trip into the Nikon world, if it fit your budget and you wanted to stay DSLR, I'd say go for it. It is sort of a mirrorless hybrid, with a F mount. But it didn't fit my hands right. And for some reason, the Nikon engineers changed some of the buttons around. I missed a few shots trying to get the BBF going only to hit the Live View. And there was no battery grip, now or planned. I won't feel bad if those aren't good reasons to switch to a D850. I posted a review of the D780 a few months ago with my reasons, and someone didn't like it. Ha.
I've had target lock on the D850 for a few years. I thought it would be replaced earlier this year, which would have put the end of model line sales late last year. And Nikon pushed it a year. Then the D780 was announced and I got a case of GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome). Anyway the D850 and the D500 share a lot of the same technology and body layout. The menus are almost identical. Batteries, data cards and data cables are all the same. And it has a battery grip. And it fits in my hands.
I also filled out my last entry on the lens wish list. The second lens in the f/2.8 trinity, the AF-S NIKKOR 70-200mm f/2.8E FL ED VR. The kit for the foreseeable future is complete. Support trinkets, not included.
Now all I need is for the photo season to open up. C'mon Covid vaccine, daddy needs to do some shooting. My screen savers are getting stale.
And in other Nikon news. In a way, this illustrates what is important in life. To me. In my youth, I followed news of cars. What was the next model out? What is next on my radar. That wasn't totally consuming - but of interest. Now, I somewhat follow Nikon. I can predict sales and the best times to buy the next piece of the kit. My advice to anyone thinking of getting into photography falls into three items. First, glass is everything. It's OK to get started with a kit lens but once the decision is made to seriously get into the hobby/business, get the best glass you can. Next, do your research into the company you choose. Nikon, Canon, Sony, Fuji all are great outfits. Once you choose one, changing mid-stream is costly. And these days, the technology is changing. Fast. Which comes to the last decision, DSLR or mirror-less. DSLRs are not dead yet, but it will be sooner rather than later. Which segues back to the Nikon news. Nikon is nowhere near the lead of the pack for mirrorless, in sales or perception. They could get a most improved over the last 12 or 18 months, but that is because they are so far behind. At least two generations. Can they make up the difference? Probably. But I'd still choose Nikon glass. Nikon glass is second to no one. I read where Nikon is moving development more toward mirrorless and the more advanced DSLRs. The phone cameras are crushing the lower end cameras. That is not news. And if you look at what Nikon is launching new, it is all mirrorless. The hobby/business is changing. I've got too much invested in the DSLRs to change. If I was ten years younger and had the income to support the move, I'd look a lot harder at mirrorless.
The successor to the D850 must have been in works for a few years. Can't pull out. My guess is it won't be much better, statistics-wise, and may not be worth the upgrade. And may be the end of the line for the DSLR. The next model may be a combo of the D850 and the D6 class for the super pro. Not me.
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