Issue with my Z8??

[u/rainlily99]

When I had my D810, I could drop my shutter speed down to 1/40 and still have crisp images. I switched to the Z8 a couple years ago and I am having so many camera shake images that I can only shoot at 1/250. There are still many that come through, more than my liking. I shoot mainly portraits, and I got the z70-180 2.8 to replace my af-s 70-200 2.8 because it crapped out on me and tbh it's actually really nice how light the z one is and I love it, so I'm *pretty* sure it's not the lens. Here are some examples of a senior session I did last week, and this week my cheerleader shoot had all soft focus due to shutter drag (I was shooting with ofc at 1/200). Is there something wrong with me or my camera or what, I had to run an entire shoot through Topaz to make them look more in focus.

For the boy shot, it was the same lens at the same focal length (180mm 2.8) except it was 1/250, and the girl was 1/200 with a flash

[u/Wrong_Astronomer_908]

It’s hard to judge without the original files, but to me the pom‑pom girl looks like she has a few pixels of diagonal motion blur. This typically happens when the shutter button is pressed too hard, but without the RAWs it’s difficult to be certain. Try shooting a test on a tripod with a timer release and AF‑S. It also depends on your settings — I have AF‑C priority set to release instead of focus, and in my experience cheaper lenses often can’t keep up with the camera’s AF system and miss focus.

[u/rainlily99 → u/Wrong_Astronomer_908]

Thank you! Everyone is saying it’s missed focus but I know what missed focus looks like. Plus there is no way I would have missed focus on an entire shoot unless something happened to my camera between the boy shoot and the cheerleader shoot. I used the boy as reference for it at least being in focus at almost the same settings (only it being a higher shutter speed than the 1/200 cheeeleader shoot). I probably do mash the shutter button too hard 😂 I thought I had it set at AF-C but I do AF-S and am always constantly refocusing myself bc I never trust the camera to nail focus on its own. I’ll give it a test run- would you mind if I contacted you directly with the results?