Nikon has made its full-frame Z5 II a little cheaper and lighter by taking away one of its biggest features: the electronic viewfinder.
The new Z5 IIC keeps most of the Z5 II’s key features, including internal RAW video recording and in-body stabilisation, while dropping to 537g and a more accessible $1,400 body-only price.
The “C” stands for compact, and removing the EVF helps make the Z5 IIC nearly 25% lighter than the 700g Z5 II. It still gets a full-sized grip and plenty of physical controls, although Nikon has removed the joystick and some buttons. In its place is a fully articulating 3.2-inch 1040K-dot touchscreen, which makes plenty of sense for vloggers and solo shooters.
Video is where the Z5 IIC looks particularly interesting. It can shoot 4K at 30fps using the full 6K sensor width, or 4K at 60fps with a 1.5x crop, while 1080p can reach 120fps. More importantly, it can record internally in Nikon’s N-RAW with N-Log, alongside H.265, giving aspiring filmmakers more flexibility when editing footage.
Autofocus is carried over from the Z5 II, with human, animal, bird and vehicle detection, plus the rather unusual addition of fish detection. There’s also 7.5 stops of in-body shake reduction, which is a useful feature for a camera at this price.
Nikon has packed in a few creator-friendly extras, too. There’s a front-facing REC light, a product-review mode that switches focus between the presenter and an object, waveform monitoring, focus peaking, zebras and 15 scene modes. You also get imaging recipes, including some developed with cinema camera company RED.
It isn’t only a video camera. The Z5 IIC can shoot at 14fps with continuous autofocus in RAW and JPEG, or up to 30fps in JPEG-only electronic shutter mode, while its expanded ISO range reaches 64,000. The main compromise beyond the missing EVF is storage: there’s only one SD UHS-II card slot, compared with two on the Z5 II.
The Nikon Z5 IIC is now available to pre-order for $1,400 body-only, or $1,700 with the Z 24-50mm f/4.3-5.3 kit lens.
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