File numbering Nikon Z7, Z8

[Edwin Barkdoll]

While reviewing some files from the other day, I noticed that the numbering had restarted at NZ7_0001 after hitting NZ7_9999. Is there no automatic way around this potential file name duplication, e.g., by incrementing the letters Z7a --> Z7b?

Ditto question for the Z8.

I have d7 set to ON in both cases.

Thanks

[ShunCheung]

I believe that is limited to 4 digits, but the camera will switch to a new folder after 9999.

[bgelfand]

As far as I know, all Nikon digital cameras do the same thing; they are limited to four digits in the image name. 

This will result in duplicate names only after the images are imported to your computer; I doubt there are any cards large enough to hold 9,999 images on the camera. When I started using my D750 and Lightroom, I set up an import preset for the D750, that among other things,  appends the date the images were taken to the name resulting in a name DSCnnnn_YYYYMMDD e.g. DSC2491_20230210. Unless I take more than 9,999 images in one day (very, very unlikely for me), I will never have a duplicate name. If you do take more than 9,999 images in a day, append the time as well as the date to form the name.

[ShunCheung]

Each HE* RAW file from the Z8 and Z9 is about 30MB. Therefore, it is fairly easy to have more than 10K images on a 325G memory card, especially if one shoots JPEGs. Currently my highest capacity card is a 1.3TB Delkin, but I mainly use that for video capture. As I mentioned before, it is necessary to have different folders if one shoots a lot, and perhaps with date and time coding if those images have to all go into one folder.

I have shot as many as 2000 images within an hour, but that was a very unusual hour and I was using a D5 in "machinegun" style, and that was all in an hour. Don't think I have shot as many as 10K images within the same day. A friend of mine went to Brazil recently with a couple of Z8. He was there for two weeks and came back with some 70K images. 

[Edwin Barkdoll]

Seems an easy fix to extend the character limit – it's even more limited than the old DOS filename limit of 8+3 characters > 40 years ago.

Thanks for the comments.

[bgelfand]

7 hours ago, ShunCheung said:

Each HE* RAW file from the Z8 and Z9 is about 30MB. Therefore, it is fairly easy to have more than 10K images on a 325G memory card, especially if one shoots JPEGs. Currently my highest capacity card is a 1.3TB Delkin, but I mainly use that for video capture. As I mentioned before, it is necessary to have different folders if one shoots a lot, and perhaps with date and time coding if those images have to all go into one folder.

I have shot as many as 2000 images within an hour, but that was a very unusual hour and I was using a D5 in "machinegun" style, and that was all in an hour. Don't think I have shot as many as 10K images within the same day. A friend of mine went to Brazil recently with a couple of Z8. He was there for two weeks and came back with some 70K images. 

I stand corrected. I still think the 64MB cards in my D750 are large. 😉

As you pointed out if there are over 9999 images on the card, they would be in separate directories on the card and the directory-name would be unique while they are on the card. Problems arise only when they are loaded to your computer. For me, simply appending the image date to the name forming the name for the file on the computer will suffice. If you do shoot more than 9999 images in a day, then appending the date and time measured to the minute should produce a unique name for most photographers.

Your friend with two cameras has another problem. It is possible for two different cameras to duplicate a name, although less probable if time as well as date are components of the name. The solution for him is to append not only the date and time to the original file name but also the camera model and serial number (all available in Lightroom during import). It will be a long name, but it should be unique and supported by most modern computer operating systems.

Now a question about your friend who took 70K images on one trip. A "back of the envelope" calculation shows it would take over 19 hours to "look" at each image for one second. Actually less than one second "look" time since part of the second would be use to focus on the next image. Sub-second looks do not allow much time for judgement. If he/she spent five seconds per image, it would take about 100 hours or around 2.5 weeks of 8 hour work days (with no lunch, coffee, or bathroom breaks 🙂 ) for just a very cursory examination of the images . So what good are most of those 70k images? Will they ever be truly looked at? Will they even be skimmed over?

Edited November 4, 2023 by bgelfand

[Dieter Schaefer]

I am still using a little program Downloader Pro to rename the image files while importing them from the card to the computer. For each of my cameras, I changed the usual DSC prefix to something camera-specific - like Z9A or D5B. Upon import, I created the filename from the date of the shoot, the camera-specific prefix and the actual number of the shutter count to arrive at something like 2023-10-12-Z9A-79584.NEF. Always a unique filename, never an issue with files being imported out of order (like I heard from several others being an occasional issue when importing into certain software).

[joseph_smith3]

Like Dieter, I also use Downloader Pro to avoid  images with the same name/number. I do not add a token to identify the camera body in each image file name that is created by Downloader Pro. But I do add a token to identify the camera body in the file folder name. My naming convention is pretty simplistic: 

File folder: 2023_11_10_Smith Oaks Rookery_Z9

File name: 231110_Smith Oaks Rookery.001

To get Downloader Pro to recognize Z9, I had to enter this token  in Preferences: C:\Users\Photo\Pictures\Saved Pictures\Download 2023\{Y}_{m}_{D}_{J}_{T8}

This creates the file folder name. 

{J} is Job Code. In my example Smith Oaks Rookery.

{T8} is the token for Z9. This required some experimentation and help from Breeze Systems.  

I started using Downloader Pro before Nikon developed Nikon Transfer. Nikon Transfer can do about the same things. It is part of NX Studio. 

Downloader Pro is for windows Pcs only. 

[Edwin Barkdoll]

It turns out there is a simple solution for mac users. Select the files you want to rename in Finder. Depending upon how current your OS is there will be the familiar "gear" symbol or 3 dots in a circle. Clicking either will bring up a menu which includes a Rename option that allows one to add an incremental number, a date, or other text.

This works across folders/directories which is handy.

If you screw up, CMD-z undoes the name changes.

[bgelfand]

3 hours ago, Edwin Barkdoll said:

It turns out there is a simple solution for mac users. Select the files you want to rename in Finder. Depending upon how current your OS is there will be the familiar "gear" symbol or 3 dots in a circle. Clicking either will bring up a menu which includes a Rename option that allows one to add an incremental number, a date, or other text.

This works across folders/directories which is handy.

If you screw up, CMD-z undoes the name changes.

If you use Lightroom, be sure you do any OS level renames BEFORE you import the images into Lightroom or you will have a catalog with many "missing" files.