article : M43 vs full-frame

[Bennybee]

I found this an interesting article and thought I'd share it :

http://lindsaydobsonphotography.com/blo ... ull-frame/

[melek]

I have thought about this, and maybe someday I'll think about a full-frame digital. I do find the idea attractive, mostly because I have a collection of film lenses that I'd like to use as intended.

I tend to disagree with his statement that people don't take you seriously unless you show up with a big camera. In part, this is true.

I don't think a pro should show up with a point and shoot, even if you're only doing some corporate "grip and grins.

But a lot is how you carry yourself, and maybe you might be OK with a CSC.

I notice that Olympus is pushing its OM-D series in a collaboration with Major League Baseball.

I do like the Micro Four-Thirds cameras, although I have only one camera and one body. If I were a pro shooting sport, I don't know if I would use a M4-3. Maybe, but probably not. It has to do with the speed of the viewfinder for me. No way are pros using Live View for most shooting. They might use it for studio shoots or for overhead shots if they have a tilting LCD.

In the next year, I'm planning to write something about how a pro shoots college or pro sports and talk a bit about equipment and what they carry as their primary and backup cameras.

I carried the gear a number of years ago for a Sports Illustrated photographer. He was one of four or five at the stadium.

At the end of the night, it was quicker for someone to drive all of the memory cards from Pittsburgh to New York than have someone sit up all night and transfer 3,200 photos. And this was about 2004 when file sizes were much smaller.

[Philip]

Thanks for posting this link, Benny.

I don't know very much about the *business* of taking other people's pictures, like at weddings. That business probably does have stresses like gaining the confidence of people who are really unsure of what will be a good buy for their thousands of dollars, and who grab on to little festishes of success like that the photographer uses the most expensive and "best" cameras the market offers. I have a friend who, when he was a fulltime real estate agent, bought a really big car because he said customers didn't respect agents who drive small cars; they needed, he said, to be confident the agent was successful. So I have no doubt the wedding market requires big cameras. But, after thirty or forty years of trying to take pictures I like, I have a strong sense that gear does not necessarily make a good picture. Many of my most favourite pictures (ones I took, that is) are in half-frame cameras, on expired film.

There is no one way to a "good picture." So I agree with the author. A full frame dslr is a good thing for lots of reasons. But other cameras are good for other reasons. She makes me want to buy an OMD to match the lenses I have that work on my E-P2. And I will continue taking small format pictures both on film and digitally.

[Bill Smith]

This is an interesting thread as I'm almost exclusively a film shooter save for my iPhone 5s. At some point I'm going to need a digital system and I'm on the fence between the OMD EM1 or EM5 or go into the world of Fuji's APSc mirror less cameras as the XE-2 is in the same ballpark price and if I had more cash-flow the X-T1.

As for full frame, wedding shooters love it for the simple reason of the super high ISO sensitivity, you can't fire off a speed light during the wedding ceremony proper so you have to jack the ISO up a lot to get a half decent image.

For my needs (landscape, portraiture, candid and streescape/architecture) unless someone dropped a Nikon DF into my lap, I think I would be happy with the above short list.

[Bennybee]

Interesting comments so far. Personally I think full frame DSLRs are unbeatable for sports photography. Via links and articles on M43rumors.com and Steve Huff's website I have seen a lot of websites from pro photographers in fashion, wedding and advertisement who are succesfully using OMD cameras. I have always been a Nikon film shooter and even skipped the AF era completely to end up buying an EM5 last year. It's a fantastic camera, more so in other peoples hands than in mine I must admit.
I also checked out the Nikon Df, which is a fine camera, with great image quality and perfect weight/size ratio. But to me it would have been even better if Nikon had gone mirrorless, something like the Fujifilm XT-1. Maybe the next one from Nikon? (a Dfm or Dfe?)
Outside Japan (or Asia), mirrorless is not (yet) a big hit, although it's a segment of the camera market that is incredibly alive. People wanting to upgrade from a digital compact camera always automatically look towards the entry level plastic fantastic DSLRs which are too big with mediocre big lenses, bobbing around on your belly and still with that antiquated shaving mirror inside... (but that's my personal feeling). Let's face it, Nikon and Canon keep trying to sell us the same boring blobs : D3000, D3100, D3200, D3300, and so on. Not much news there, except that the delete button changes places every six months.

[jamesmck]

buying an EM5 last year. It's a fantastic camera,.

I'll second this about the Olympus OMD EM5. I am very happy with mine. Image quality with the right lenses is remarkable.
--- James

[P C Headland]

And there's also Kirk Tuck who is now shooting largely micro 4/3rds, since it does the best video for the price (GH3), there are great lenses, and the quality for stills is more than sufficient. Size is an added bonus. He now has one format that suitably meets the needs of both stills and video.

No single format, or design form, will ever be good at everything. Everything is a compromise. With 'full frame', size, particularly lens size and weight is the main compromise. With the smaller formats, ultimate high ISO is. For CSC's tracking focus speed is, but even that is less clear cut than it used to be.

I don't understand the flap or lust over 'full frame', why some see it as the holy grail. A 24x36mm slab of silicon isn't any more magical than any other size. In the past, 'sensor' size was relevant because cameras had to be standardised to accept a specific film size. Now, as long as your lens covers the format, who cares?

Personally, I'm happy with micro 4/3rd's quality, love the size and lens quality. I don't need focus tracking, and I don't shoot black cats in coal cellars at midnight .

But, we're lucky that we now have a choice of formats and designs, so we can each pick what best meets our own needs, with few significant compromises on image quality.

[melek]

I'm hoping to shoot at some of runway shows at New York Fashion Week in the fall. I'm planning to bring my little Olympus Pen EPL-1, although I'm planning to pick up a second lens for it.

The image quality is pretty darn good, and it has good low-light sensitivity. I'm sure the pros will be there with either Canons or Nikons and a lot of gear. I plan to travel light. I might tote a big film SLR just for show.