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Writer's pictureStephen Lang

The Nikon Z 6III and the YouTube Rabbit Hole: How I Became an Expert on Settings I’ll Never Use




So, I finally did it. I got myself the brand-new Nikon Z 6III. I was ready to capture the world in stunning 24.5 megapixels, with all the ISO glory I could handle. But before I even snapped a single photo, I fell into The Trap—the endless pit of YouTube videos where every photography “guru” insists they have the ultimate settings to unlock the hidden potential of your camera. Spoiler alert: my camera still has plenty of untapped potential, and I’m now intimately familiar with settings I’ll never touch. Ever.


Step 1: Optimism


It started innocently enough. “I’ll just watch one video to set up the basics,” I thought, sipping my coffee. One quick video about customizing the autofocus settings, and I’d be on my way, shooting National Geographic-level photos of my cat. But the second that first video ended, YouTube’s evil algorithm reared its head, offering another video: “The ULTIMATE Nikon Z 6III Setup Guide (Don’t Even THINK of Taking a Picture Until You Watch This)”. How could I resist?


Step 2: The Descent


Suddenly, I found myself deep in a 40-minute lecture on frame rates, bit depth, and some wizardry involving zebras. (Not actual zebras, mind you—something to do with light exposure and stripy lines on the screen. Still not clear on that one.) Before I knew it, my camera had more settings enabled than a NASA space launch, and I’d adjusted the contrast so many times that every photo I took looked like it was trying to convey existential dread.


“Should I be shooting in 10-bit N-Log with a gamma curve?” I wondered aloud. “Do I even know what a gamma curve is?!” Suddenly, I’m concerned with dynamic range in ways I’ve never been concerned with… ever. I’m Googling terms like “HDR workflow” and “color grading,” when my usual photographic expertise boils down to: “Does this look cool?”


Step 3: Panic


At this point, my camera is now so customized that I’m afraid to turn it off, lest it wipe out the 75-step setup I’ve painstakingly implemented. I’ve assigned random buttons to features I don’t fully understand. There’s now a dedicated button on the camera to bring up an astrophotography guide… because, you know, I’ll definitely be shooting constellations from my backyard. In the city. With streetlights everywhere.


Do I need to adjust the color space? Should I set up a custom Picture Control with flat profiles for easier editing later? All valid questions—if you’re filming a sci-fi epic. But here I am, just trying to get a decent shot of a sunset without the camera asking me whether I want 8-bit or 10-bit RAW output.


Step 4: Regret


Here’s where the regret sets in. After hours (and I mean hours) of tinkering, my brain is fried, and I realize something important: I haven’t taken a single photo yet. Not one! My cat has now fallen asleep on my lens, entirely unimpressed with my newfound (useless) knowledge about video codecs. “I could have just set it to ‘Auto’ and moved on with my life,” I mutter, scrolling through comments of people who totally understand why you’d ever need a custom AF-C sensitivity setting for action shots involving squirrels.


Step 5: Acceptance (Kind Of)


Eventually, I snap out of it. I reset the camera to factory settings (which takes longer than you’d think when your camera is now a maze of custom menus), and I decide to just trust my gut and use the settings I actually know. You know, like aperture and shutter speed. Stuff I was happy with before I thought I needed to master “the art of peaking levels for manual focus.”


In the end, I took a picture of my coffee cup, and you know what? It looked fine. No zebras. No gamma curves. Just a regular photo taken by a person who—despite the YouTube-induced panic—does actually know how to use a camera.


Moral of the Story?


Sometimes, less is more. Especially when the “more” involves a 90-minute video on focus stacking for macro shots of insects you have no plans to photograph. Save yourself from the YouTube rabbit hole, and trust what you know. Your Nikon Z 6III won’t explode if you don’t use every setting in the menu. Take a photo, any photo, and remind yourself why you picked up the camera in the first place—because you love capturing moments, not mastering the intricacies of zebras.


Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a cat to photograph… as soon as I remember which button I assigned to autofocus.

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