Nikon’s Z-Mount is Finally On a Cinema Camera: That’s Kind Of a Big Deal

If you had told me four years ago that Nikon would not only be in the business of making true, honest-to-goodness video gear but would also own what is arguably the most disruptive player in the truly professional, Hollywood-production-ready market, I would probably have laughed in your face.

Don’t get me wrong. I love Nikon, I always have. As a company, the company has a track record of releasing absolutely excellent hardware both in its own right and in terms of its value proposition compared to other manufacturers, even if that hardware takes a little longer to actually arrive in the hands of the consumer. But let’s not delude ourselves here: before two or three years ago, Nikon had never really been known for its video chops. Sure, you could shoot video on your D750 or your first-generation Z7, which I absolutely did, but it always seemed like an afterthought; it was something tacked onto the rest of the camera because the engineers responsible for it didn’t want to leave features on the drafting room floor.

And yet so far in 2025, Nikon has not only released its own Swiss Army video lens in the 28-135mm f/4 PZ but has also added the Z-mount onto two of the most commonly-used full-fat cinema cameras amongst independent creators and filmmakers in the RED Komodo [X] and the RED V-Raptor [X].

Make no mistake, a lot of us plugged into the greater photo and video industry absolutely saw this coming the moment it was announced that Nikon had acquired RED, the company behind a long line of “affordable” cinema cameras that have been a force to be reckoned with since the original RED One. At the same time, there was always a question as to how much crossover and tech-sharing there would be between the two companies, and I’m excited to see that the answer seems to be, “a lot of it, and a lot sooner than we were expecting.”

Of course, the benefits offered by the option to get your new RED with a Z-mount are many. Given that the Z-mount itself is both larger and has a shorter flange distance than almost anything other than a medium-format mount like Fugifilm’s GFX or a specially designed cinema mount like ARRI’s LPL, owners of the new flavors of the Komodo and V-Raptor will be able to not only use native Z-mount lenses for the first time but also have greater choice in adapting other third-party options. In addition, due to the design of the mount itself and tighter integration with the camera’s firmware, RED has been able to more effectively take advantage of the features of the lenses and offer greater customization for how they behave.

For me, though, as a creator and a professional in this industry, none of these nuts-and-bolts things matter as much as the idea that Nikon as a company is now a pretty major player in the professional video industry.

It’s no secret that until the last generation or so of products, Nikon lagged behind much of the competition in what it could offer someone who needed either a hybrid camera as a solo operator, or something more specialized on a larger production. Even now, the Z9, Z8, and other bodies in the mainline product stack do not enjoy the same level of aftermarket support as offerings from Sony or Canon, despite being, by many people’s standards, the best value in their category, if not the best performer outright. Thankfully though, that seems to be changing — slowly but surely.

Nikon has really stepped up to the plate and has a strong desire to buck the stereotype that, “you don’t buy a Nikon product to shoot video.” With the release of the Z9 and its subsequent firmware updates, that for pretty much any other camera would have been a paid upgrade or an entirely new product revision altogether, Nikon proved that they were able to deliver a truly excellent product for the ever-expanding hybrid market. Then, after that tech began to trickle down into the more affordable offerings in the lineup, and after Nikon’s acquisition of RED, we got a LUT pack designed to color-match N-RAW to RED footage (which looks incredible, by the way).

And now, just a few months after that, we have the fully-featured Z-mount, compatible with all of the features of Z-mount glass, on a few serious pieces of video kit. Not only that, but new buyers even have the option to order a Z-mount Komodo [X] with the newly-released 28-135mm f/4 PZ video lens, so it’s very obvious that Nikon is going all-in on this new part of their business.

As a Nikon enthusiast (what some would call a fanboy) I’m always excited when I get new toys to play with and new ways to create things. Of course, as a general consumer, I know that product competition is objectively a good thing. Rather than each company in the market resting on its laurels and trying to attract buyers with lifestyle marketing or other tactics that do not speak to the overall quality of the product, all players force each other to push the envelope and offer new features, designs, or new product categories entirely. Not long ago it was a pipe dream that one would ever be able to get even serviceable video from a camera designed primarily for a still photographer. Not only is that now the norm, but the hybrid offerings on offer today put even dedicated video cameras from a decade ago to shame, and that progress has been driven by each major player trying to outdo the others.

I’m very excited to see what the future holds in this space. If it’s anything like the past couple of years, maybe in a couple more I won’t get weird looks from clients when I tell them I shoot Nikon. I think I’d like that.