Background

I’m sometimes asked when chatting with people “what do you photograph?” and I frequently give the same answer “Birds and Bears”. And while that’s not 100% accurate, there’s no question that birds and bears are what I enjoy photographing the most. So, on paper it seems weird that i’d be willing to give up 100mm of focal range, when most bird photographers will never find a lens long enough for their needs. However, there are three main reasons why i’m considering this and i’ll go into each below.

Reason 1: Nikkor Z 600mm F4 TC

The main reason i’m considering moving on from the 500pf is simple. Since i’ve switched to mirrorless, I always knew at some point i’d want the mirrorless version of the 600mm f4 lens and that it would replace my 500pf. A 600mm F/4 is the de-facto standard for wildlife and bird photographers. This lens was announced in November of 2022 and I quickly was added to a pre-order list. It could be well over a year before I receive the 600mm lens; but this is the ultimate wildlife lens for me. Another part of knowing the 600mm lens will eventually get here is looking at the focal ranges behind it and realizing I may have to make some adjustments. My current & future long lens setup is below:

Based on the graphic, you can see that there is a 320mm gap in my future lens lineup and it’s in that critical 400-500mm range. I do have a 2X teleconverter that I could put on my 70-200 and that would fill some of the gap but having a light, relatively small 400mm with excellent optics would be a better solution, especially when you want to travel light or go hiking.

Reason 2: All "Z” mount lenses

This may seem trivial to some, but the 500PF is the only “F” mount Nikon lens I still own. I basically have the FTZ adapter permanently attached to it and that’s really not an issue. The FTZ adapter works great (minus some play in the connection that bothers me). The bigger benefit to having all Z mount glass is with using teleconverters. I own both the 1.4x and 2.0x extenders for the Nikon Z mount. However, I do not own any F mount teleconverters. The optics on the old F mount converters were a little suspect and I really didn’t want to spend the money or add the weight/space to my camera bag by carrying two sets of extenders. This however, has caused some issues while out in the field. There are many occasions where i’d want to use a 1.4x on my 500PF for the extra reach and to fill a frame and can’t because I didn’t own one. Replacing the 500PF with the Z 400 F/4.5 could be a huge advantage going forward as it provides more flexibility and the optics on the Z teleconverters is generally excellent. It would natively cover 400mm and with a 1.4x TC get me to 560mm.

Reason 3: Aperture F/4.5 vs F/5.6

I’m a bit of a light snob. Most of my nature and wildlife photos are shot either in the early morning or late evening. That’s not to say I never take mid-day photos, but when i’m out shooting, i’m usually out before sunrise and packing thing up by 9-10am at the latest. Also, I would guess 90% of my wildlife photos are shot with a wide open aperture. As much as I love my 500pf, an f/5.6 lens is tough to work with early in the morning when photographing moving subjects. I often find myself shooting at ISO 12,800 and sometimes even above. While shooting at high ISO still produces usable images, being able to shoot the same subject but 2/3rds of a stop faster (ISO 8000 vs 12,800) and then just cropping a little due to the focal length differences could be very beneficial.

Testing & Results

This is a good spot to reiterate that i’m not an optics engineer, so my testing steps are pretty straight forward and mainly subjective. I focused my time in two ways:

1. Testing the optics with a lens chart that I downloaded and printed.

   • Comparing the 500mm PF vs Z 400mm F/4.5 lens.

   • Compare base 400mm against same lens with 1.4x and 2.0x TCs

2. Field testing the new 400mm lens with teleconverters.

Methodology for optics test

1. I downloaded and printed a standard lens test chart. The B&H link in the resources section is a place to find one if you don’t already have one. This was printed on normal printer paper on my home printer and then hung on a flat wall surface.

2. All shots were taken on my tripod using a 5 second delay. The tripod was moved around to fill the frame based on the focal length.

3. These photos were taken indoors with auto ISO on (This is my normal setting for wildlife). To equalize the result I changed the shutter speeds so the each shot was was done at wide open aperture, with an ISO of around 125. The shutter speed for each photo will vary based upon the aperture.

4. I took two photos of the target with each lens/combo. Those photos were then loaded into Adobe Lightroom with no adjustments made and then cropped portions of the image so they can be viewed at 100% in the article.

Nikon Z 400mm F/4.5 vs Nikon 500pf

My first test is comparing these two lens at max aperture. I’ve taken each image, and cropped the center portion, and the top corner of the lens chart to 100% below.

Comparing the above photos for sharpness I would say it’s pretty close. Both lens are very sharp. In the center I don’t really see any difference between the two. In the upper right corner, the 500pf may be just a touch sharper but it’s also very close.

I do, however, see a difference in contrast. The Z400 lens seems to show more contrast. The blacks look slightly darker, while in the 500pf they are slightly lighter.

In general, these are both excellent and that’s basically what I expected going into this test.

Z 400 F/4.5 with teleconverters

This is the test that I was most interested. In order to replace my 500pf I needed to see really good results on the 1.4x TC and usable results on the 2.0x TC.

Center Images

Corner Images

As you can see above the lens without teleconverters and with the 1.4x TC are pretty close. The 1.4x teleconverter may be slightly softer, but it’s very minimal. There is some softening with the 2.0X teleconverter, which is to be expected; but it still usable.

Nikon 400mm F/4.5 sample photos - Field testing with teleconverters

As you can see from the photos below. Both the native 400mm and the TC 1.4x produced nice sharp images. These photos where all imported into Lightroom with no sharpening or editing minus some minor cropping.

As you can see from the images above all images are usable and the lens is able to render fine details in feathers of the birds in each photo. The last image with the 2x teleconverter is a little softer than the other two, but nothing that can’t be cleaned up a bit in Topaz Sharpen AI.

Final thoughts and resources

I started this test in the hopes that I would be able to trade out my wonderful 500pf for this new Z 400mm F/4.5 lens and that the optics would produce images just as sharp and usable even when using teleconverters. In that regard, this lens is a success. It produces nice, sharp images and has great contrast. While I didn’t test this, I also suspect i’ll see better backlight performance due to the non-PF glass in the lens.

There two things about the lens which are of minor annoyance. First off, it’s incredibly light. I would say it’s almost unreal how light it is and while this is a huge benefit for hand holding (which is mainly how i’d use this lens), when attached to my Z9 it’s very back heavy and i’m not sure it would balance on my gimbal head when on a tripod. That’s not a deal breaker for me, but if you’re someone who spends a great deal of time in a blind with your camera on a gimbal, I could see this being annoying because you’ll be constantly tightening/loosening the gimbal. Secondly, I think much of that weight savings comes from the fact that there’s a good bit of plastic in this lens. I won’t say it feels “cheap” but I do have concerns about it’s long term durability compared to my 500pf which is mostly metal. For a $3000+ lens that’s in Nikon’s “S” line I would have liked to see a similar build quality to my other “S” line lenses. Time will tell how problematic that may be, but it will be something i’m conscience of when in the field and will be careful not to bump it around too much.

Overall, this Nikon mirrorless 400mm lens is a fantastic addition to the Nikon Z system. It’s light, sharp, compact and accepts teleconverters well. As much as i’ve loved my 500pf, I believe this is going in the bag and the 500pf is going on eBay.

Resources

• Interested in a more technical review? - Thom Hogan’s Review

• Learn how to do a lens test - B&H how to lens test