Recommended Nikon Z6 II Settings

 

The second-generation Nikon Z6 II is a general-purpose camera aimed for portraiture, event, action, and everyday photography needs. While the Z6 II shares the body and ergonomics of its predecessor, there are numerous internal changes that have been implemented to make it a very compelling choice among mirrorless cameras today. Although the base specifications of the camera stayed the same (same 24.5 MP sensor, IBIS, etc), Nikon significantly improved the processing power of the camera by using dual EXPEED 6 processors, improved viewfinder blackout, significantly increased the camera buffer, added an SD UHS-II memory card slot, and delivered a number of important firmware improvements (for more information, see my Nikon Z6 II vs Z6 comparison). In this article, I will provide detailed information on what settings I recommend for the Nikon Z6 II and explain what some of the camera buttons and controls do.

 

Before we go into the camera menu, let’s first check out the exterior controls. The Nikon Z6 II has a lot of menu options, but there are some things that you can only control via specific buttons and controls.

 

Table of Contents

Camera Mode Dial

EVF Mode Button

Other Top Buttons

Back Buttons

Playback Menu

Photo Shooting Menu

Movie Shooting Menu

Custom Setting Menu

Setup Menu

Retouch Menu

My Menu

U1, U2 and U3 User Settings

U1 – Portrait

U2 – Action (Sports and Wildlife)

U3 – Landscape

Download Nikon Z6 II Settings

Camera Mode Dial

On the top left side of the camera, you will find a standard “PASM” dial with a lock button on the top. Aside from the standard Program Mode, Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority and Manual modes, the camera also offers an “Auto” mode, as well as U1, U2 and U3 user settings that you can save your settings to (more on that below).

 

Nikon Z6 II PASM Dial

 

Once you get to know your camera better, I recommend exploring these user settings, as they could save you a lot of time when switching between different environments, such as when switching between photographing landscapes to people.

 

EVF Mode Button

The electronic viewfinder (EVF) mode button sits on the left side of the viewfinder, to the right of the PASM dial. The button cycles through the following modes:

 

Automatic display switch: This mode makes the camera use its EVF eye sensor to automatically toggle between the EVF and the LCD screen.

Viewfinder only: This mode enables only the EVF and turns off the LCD completely.

Monitor only: This mode enables only the LCD screen and the EVF is turned off completely.

Prioritize viewfinder: This mode makes the camera work similar to a DSLR camera, where the LCD screen is turned off by default and the EVF is enabled. Once you playback a picture or press one of the buttons that engages the camera menu, the LCD screen turns on.

Personally, the two modes I use the most are “Automatic display switch” and “Prioritize viewfinder”. The first one is useful for shooting with both the EVF and the LCD but does end up wasting battery life because either the EVF or the LCD is always turned on. I mostly use this mode when shooting landscapes and doing travel photography. When shooting landscapes I can use the EVF for hand-held shooting, and when I am shooting from a tripod, the LCD is automatically turned on. The “Prioritize viewfinder” mode is more practical to use in situations when I want to preserve battery life as much as possible since neither the EVF nor the LCD is engaged by default. If the EVF does not detect an object at proximity, it goes blank, while the LCD will not do anything until I fire up the camera menu or playback an image.

 

Other Top Buttons

On the grip of the camera, you will find three buttons: “ISO” for changing camera ISO, video recording button (with a red dot) and Exposure Compensation button. Since the video recording button does not do anything useful in stills mode, I kept the default setting of this button, which is to clear the screen of any information (a new feature on the Z6 II that sadly does not exist on the Z6).

 

The ISO button allows quick change of ISO with the rear dial, and the front dial allows switching Auto ISO on and off. Exposure Compensation works in a similar way as ISO, except the front dial duplicates the function of the rear dial to tweak your exposure.

 

Back Buttons

Aside from the standard buttons such as Playback, Trash, and Menu, the Nikon Z6 II has a few extra buttons on the back of the camera that are worth going over. The first one is the button/switch with the “DISP” label on it. The switch is for toggling between stills and video, but the DISP button is particularly important – it is used for switching between different display modes in the viewfinder and the rear LCD.

 

Nikon Z6 II Back

 

When pressing the “DISP” button, the camera cycles between the following:

 

Indicators on – shows camera mode, exposure information, as well as other relevant information

Simplified display – only shows metering, exposure information, number of shots remaining, and battery level on the bottom of the camera

Histogram – displays a live histogram

Flash info – displays information related to a mounted flash (not available in EVF)

Information display – displays the same information as the “Info” button on DSLRs (not available in EVF)

Virtual horizon – displays a virtual horizon in the center of the viewfinder / LCD

Here is the graphical representation of all this:

 

Nikon Z6 II DISP Button Modes

 

Rant: I really wish Nikon incorporated the uncluttered view into the DISP button instead of having to dedicate a separate button for it. This is a huge oversight on behalf of Nikon engineers, something I wish was done before the original Z6 and Z7 were released.

 

Personally, I prefer to use an uncluttered view with minimal information when composing my images, so I use the “Simplified display”.

 

The other two important buttons are on the right side of the LCD. The “i” button is there for accessing some menu options, and it can be useful for doing quick adjustments to the camera. The options shown on the screen are customizable, which is great (more on how I customize this screen below).

 

Below the Menu button, you will also find the “Release Mode” button. If you press this button, you can rotate the real dial to toggle between different release modes such as Single, Continuous Low, Continuous High, Continuous High (extended) and Self Timer (2, 5 and 10s using the front dial).

 

All the other buttons are fairly standard, similar to those you can find on many other Nikon DSLRs.

 

Alright, now that we have gone through all the important buttons, let’s go through the camera menu and customize the settings.

 

Playback Menu

I rarely ever touch anything in the Playback menu, since that’s only used for displaying pictures on the rear LCD or the EVF. The only two settings that I ever mess with are “Playback display options” and “Rotate tall”. The “Playback display options” can be useful when reviewing images. When you press the playback button on the back of the camera, you can press up/down buttons and you will be able to see different types of information. To keep the clutter out, I have three things turned on: “Focus point”, which allows me to see where I focused, “Highlights” to show overexposure in shots (a.k.a. “blinkies”) and “Overview”, which gives me a summary of my exposure (shutter speed, aperture, ISO, focal length, etc). I always turn the “Rotate tall” setting off, because I do not want my camera to rotate vertical images to horizontal when I review them – it is much easier to rotate the camera to see a vertical image, rather than having to zoom in every single time. Everything else is at the default.

 

Photo Shooting Menu

Let’s now go through the Shooting Menu, which is the first place that I usually go to when checking my settings. I will first provide my values, then talk about the most important settings:

 

Reset photo shooting menu: – –

Storage folder: default, don’t change

File naming: DSC (default), don’t change

Primary slot selection: CFexpress / XQD card slot

Secondary slot function: Overflow (see below for more info)

Choose image area: FX

Image quality: NEF (RAW)

Image size

JPEG/TIFF: Large

NEF (RAW): RAW L Large

NEF (RAW) recording

NEF (RAW) compression: ON (Lossless compressed)

NEF (RAW) bit depth: 14-bit

ISO sensitivity settings

ISO sensitivity: 100

Auto ISO sensitivity control: ON (see the next section below)

Maximum sensitivity: 12800

Maximum sensitivity with flash: 12800

Minimum shutter speed: Auto

White balance: AUTO (AUTO1 Keep overall atmosphere)

Set Picture Control: SD (Standard), Default values

Manage Picture Control: – –

Color space: Adobe RGB

Active D-Lighting: OFF

Long Exposure NR: ON

High ISO NR: OFF

Vignette control: OFF

Diffraction compensation: OFF

Auto distortion control: OFF

Flicker reduction shooting: ON

Metering: Matrix Metering

Flash control: – –

Flash mode: Rear-curtain sync

Flash compensation: 0.0

Focus Mode: AF-S (Single AF)

AF-area mode: Single-point AF

Vibration reduction: ON (turn off on tripod)

Auto bracketing:

Auto bracketing set: AE bracketing

Number of shots: 0F

Increment: 1.0

Multiple exposure: OFF

HDR (high dynamic range): OFF (grayed out)

Interval timer shooting: OFF

Time-lapse movie: OFF

Focus shift shooting: OFF

Silent photography: OFF

While there are a lot of different settings here, do not worry – you won’t be changing many settings very often. Let’s go through some of the important settings.

 

First up is the “Primary slot selection” menu option. Now that the Z6 II has dual memory card slots, you get to choose which card slot the camera will write to first. In my case, since I own CFexpress and XQD memory cards, I kept the default selection to write to that media first. I load the second slot with an SD memory card, and for the “Secondary slot function” menu option I normally pick “Overflow”. This way, once my CFexpress / XQD memory card fills up, the camera will automatically start using the second memory card. However, if I know that I am doing an important job and I cannot risk losing any data, I would change it to “Backup”.

 

Next is “Image quality”, which you should set to “RAW”. “NEF (RAW) recording” is always set on mine to 14-bit Lossless Compressed. I choose 14-bit to get the best image quality the camera can deliver and “Lossless” compression results in much smaller files than “Uncompressed”. “White Balance” is Auto and all other settings like Picture Controls, Active D-Lighting, HDR, etc. are turned off, since none of them (with the exception of “Long Exposure NR”) affect RAW images. Remember, RAW files contain non-manipulated data and require post-processing, so the above settings only impact images displayed by your camera’s LCD screen (each RAW file contains a full-size JPEG image, which is what is used to display images on the LCD) and if you use Nikon’s proprietary software like Capture NX-D, those settings can be applied to RAW images automatically. Since I use other third-party software to store and process my images, the second part does not apply to me. Everything else is turned off.

 

Although color space does not matter for RAW files, I use AdobeRGB because it gives a slightly more accurate histogram (since the camera shows histograms based on camera-rendered JPEG images, even if you shoot exclusively in RAW).

 

The big menu setting that I frequently change is “ISO sensitivity settings”. When shooting hand-held, I mostly use Auto ISO, because it is a great feature that saves me a lot of time. Instead of specifying ISO for every shot, I just have it set on Auto, with its base ISO set to 100, Maximum sensitivity set to 12800 (my personal limit for “acceptable” noise levels), and Minimum shutter speed set to “Auto”. The “Auto” minimum shutter speed setting is great because it reads the focal length of the attached lens and automatically adjusts the minimum shutter speed to the focal length of the lens. If you have shaky hands, you can change the Minimum shutter speed Auto to be one step closer to “Faster”, which basically doubles the minimum shutter speed.

 

For example, if you have a 50mm lens mounted on the camera, your minimum shutter speed will go from 1/50 to 1/100 of a second with one step up. If you move it all the way to the end (Faster), it will double the shutter speed again to 1/200 of a second. When using in-body image stabilization (IBIS), which is referred to as “Vibration Reduction” in the camera menu, the “Auto” setting should work quite well, although you can often safely push it to “Slower”. Unfortunately, Nikon has not yet implemented a way to automatically compensate for image stabilization, so you have to adjust this setting based on the lens you are using. When photographing landscapes or architecture with the camera mounted on a tripod, you should turn Auto ISO off and use base ISO 100 to get the highest dynamic range and lowest noise levels.

 

When it comes to camera metering, Matrix metering works really well in most environments and that’s what I use most of the time, but sometimes other metering modes can come in handy.

 

Focus mode by default is set to AF-S (Single AF). I won’t go into too much detail about each focus mode, since it is all explained in detail in this article. Here is a quick recap:

 

AF-S – this mode is called “Single-servo AF” and it is used only for stationary subjects that do not move. When you half-press the shutter button, autofocus lock on the subject and if the subject moves, the focus will not change, resulting in a blurry picture. Only use this mode for photographing stationary subjects (landscapes, architecture, etc) and when shooting in extremely low-light situations and need the camera to engage the AF assist lamp.

AF-C – known as “Continuous-servo AF” in Nikon’s lingo, this setting is used for photographing moving subjects. When you half-press the shutter button and your subject moves, the camera will re-acquire focus.

MF – the last mode is “Manual focus”. In this mode, autofocus is turned off completely.

Other menu items such as Multiple Exposure, HDR, Interval Timer Shooting, Time-lapse Movie, and Focus Shift shooting are all used to engage specific tools and effects. I am not going to go through these settings since they go over the scope of this article.

 

The last menu item is “Silent photography”. You should keep this turned off by default because turning it on will engage the electronic shutter (and you should only use the electronic shutter for non-moving subjects).

 

Movie Shooting Menu

Reset movie shooting menu: – –

File naming: DSC

Destination: CFexpress/XQD card slot

Choose image area: FX

Frame size / frame rate: 2160 p24 (3840×2160); 24p

Movie quality: HIGH

Movie file type: MOV

ISO sensitivity settings

Maximum sensitivity: 25600

Auto ISO control (mode M): OFF

ISO sensitivity (mode M): 100

White Balance: Same as photo settings

Set Picture Control: Same as photo settings

Manage Picture Control: – –

Active D-Lighting: OFF

High ISO NR: Normal

Vignette control: Normal

Diffraction compensation: ON

Auto distortion control: ON

Flicker reduction: AUTO

Metering: Matrix metering

Focus mode: AF-F (full-time AF)

AF-area mode: Auto-area AF (people)

Vibration Reduction: Same as photo settings

Electronic VR: ON

Microphone sensitivity: Manual 10

Attenuator: OFF

Frequency response: WIDE

Wind noise reduction: OFF

Headphone volume: 10

Timecode: – –

I am not going to go through the movie recording features, because it highly depends on what you are trying to do. Some of the features won’t work depending on what FPS you are going to shoot, so if you see anything grayed out or not working, you might need to switch to different video sizes in order to enable them.

 

Custom Setting Menu

This is where a lot of people get lost since there are so many different settings. Here are the settings that I personally use:

 

Autofocus

AF-C priority selection: Release

AF-S priority selection: Focus

Focus tracking with lock-on: Blocked shot AF response: 3

Focus points used: ALL

Store points by orientation: ON

AF activation: ON – please read below on this setting

Limit AF-area mode selection: (all checked, default)

Focus point wrap-around: OFF

Focus point options

Manual focus mode: ON

Dynamic-area AF assist: ON

Low-light AF: ON

Built-in AF-assist illuminator: ON

Manual focus ring in AF mode: ON

Metering/exposure

EV steps for exposure cntrl: 1/3

Easy exposure compensation: OFF

Center-weighted area: 12mm

Fine-tune optimal exposure: – –

Timers/AE lock

Shutter-release button AE-L: OFF

Self-timer

Self-timer delay: 2s

Number of shots: 1

Interval between shots: 0.5s

Power off delay: 10s, 1m, 4s, 30s

Shooting/display

CL mode shooting speed: 3 fps

Max. continuous release: 200

Sync. release mode options: Sync

Exposure delay mode: OFF

Shutter type: Auto

Extended shutter speeds (M): ON

Limit selectable image area: All checked

File number sequence: ON

Apply settings to live view: ON

Framing grid display: ON

Focusing Peaking: Peaking Level -> 1 (low sensitivity), Peaking highlight color: Red

View all in continuous mode: ON

Bracketing/flash

Flash sync speed: 1/200*

Flash shutter speed: 1/60

Exposure comp. for flash: Entire frame

Auto ISO sensitivity control: Subject and background

Modeling flash: ON

Auto bracketing (Mode M): Flash/speed

Bracketing order: Under > MTR > over

Controls

Customize i menu

#1 Top – Focus Mode

#2 Bottom – AF Area Mode

#3 Top – Metering

#4 Bottom – Auto bracketing

#5 Top – Interval timer shooting