Nikon N-log V2 LUT Update
With the release of the Z8, Nikon created a new N-log LUT that can be used for Z8 and Z9 cameras. The LUT is now called v2, and it's identical to the V1 version of the LUT in terms of color, but it's almost a half-stop brighter in mid-tones and highlights. You can see the difference on the waveform monitor here between V1 and V2.
The problem is that Nikon Z8 uses V2 LUT for view assist for monitoring Nlog material, and custom LUTs cannot be loaded on the camera. Because of the increase in brightness, it's easy to underexpose the footage while protecting the highlights. Also, the footage will appear darker when using third-party LUTs or color space transform.
Nikon didn’t fix the issues with V2 version of the LUT. The gamma is very harsh, and it’s easy to clip the highlights when using it. It looks like Nikon created the curve to match their neutral profile because they appear nearly identical after applying V2 LUT to Nlog material.
Strangely, the REC709 transform inside N-RAW metadata does a much better job correcting the gamma, and it would make more sense to recreate it in a LUT.
Because of these changes, we decided to develop a new set of LUTs with a smooth highlight roll-off for a better match between the camera screen and color correction. The LUTs are included in Nlog 2nd gen pack.
We hope that Nikon will add a feature to allow loading custom LUTs on the camera. Given their track record and the number of improvements that Nikon Z9 received, we are pretty sure that it can be implemented via a firmware update.