Who needs a DSLR?

<p>I mean really, just how many people need a DSLR. Are they the "Emperor's New Clothes" of the digital age? Lenses costing $2000+? Cameras at $3000+. Tripods! Who are they kidding...</p>

<p>See <a href="http://the-mpas.com/mobile-photo-awards-exhibit-at-arthaus/">http://the-mpas.com/mobile-photo-awards-exhibit-at-arthaus/</a></p>

<p>My kids use their smartphones for photos. They take great shots of their friends and such and put them up on facebook right off. The system works very well I guess. My hobby is film so I just do that. It's been a lifetime thing for me. I just use my cell for making phone calls and to text the kids. They prefer texting so that is how it goes around here. Sometimes I text my wife but I prefer just talking.</p>

<p><<<<em>Who needs a DSLR?</em>>>></p>

<p>I suppose that would be people who want to shoot with one.</p>

<p>Some would ask, "Who needs a cell phone?" It would be just as obvious a question.</p>

<p>Do whatever you want. Oh, and live and let live.</p>

<p>Terrific stuff in there, very imaginative.</p>

<p>Other than for specific genres - sports, wildlife, maybe one or two others - the SLR paradigm isn't essential to most types of photography, and barely relevant - even a hindrance - to other types. I've hardly used my dSLR for the past year and am keeping it only because it's not worth selling. Therefore, in my opinion, that makes me an expert... in my opinions.</p>

<p>I, for one, welcome our new mirrorless overlords.</p>

<p>We're being fooled again. The Mobile Photography Awards is more a Photoshop contest. The two or three exceptions deserve to win for their superb composition. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>Who needs a DSLR?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Not me.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Some would ask, "Who needs a cell phone?" It would be just as obvious a question.</p>

</blockquote>

<p> <br>

Again, not me.<br>

<em> </em><br>

Be careful not to confuse <em>need</em> with <em>want.</em></p>

<p>From the "About" section of that site:</p>

<blockquote>

<p><em>"We are more interested in <strong>why</strong> pictures are made than in how they are made."</em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>Uh...Pretentious stylization by iPhone?</p>

<p>No...I don't think you really want to know why.</p>

<p>I don't think anyone's being fooled. It's obvious most of those photos are heavily edited and some are barely even photographs. And I'd be surprised if a print the waterfall photo could hold its own against a print from a 10mp dSLR, let alone from a large format negative, if only because the tradition of large format landscape photography set the bar very high for viewer expectations.</p>

<p>But most of the examples that appear to be more or less "straight" photos would likely fare as well in large prints whether taken with a cell phone camera, Minox, Instamatic, Digital Harinezumi, Nikon D3X, Lomo, Holga or Hasselblad. Some types of photos have that indefinable something that defies considerations about grain, sharpness, distortion or any of the dozen other factors usually cited as advantages in favor of SLRs, larger format recording media or Gear X over Gear Y.</p>

There's some truly beautiful work there. I don't care with what it was captured, or how much post-processing was involved.

<p>Lex, I think the "je ne sais quoi" you refer to has more to do with certain types of gear more suited to facilitating certain techniques than any intrinsic value of the gear itself. </p>

<p>Blurry shots for example is more an inherent quality of phonecams than DSLRs under many circumstances, so you'd have to rely on technique with a DSLR to achieve the same effect as what comes naturally out of a phonecam. </p>

<p>On the other hand, because of its limitations, phonecams will never be the choice tool for work requiring qualities only found in DSLRs - product, advertising, commercial, fashion, architectural, food. </p>

<p>My remark about being fooled refers more to the so called "Mobile Photography" rage and the bandwagon to legitimize it when it's no different from Minox, Polaroid, or any cheap camera for that matter. The difference is, many in the public believe there's "magic" with phonecams that somehow elevates it to a different class. </p>

<p>In the end, for those in the know, it's all about commerce. </p>

<p>"need or want", I don't care about this philosophical question</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>just how many people need a DSLR. Are they the "Emperor's New Clothes" of the digital age? Lenses costing $2000+? Cameras at $3000+</p>

</blockquote>

<p>This statement makes it seems that DSLRs are very expensive. Many of my DSLRs and lenses are very cheap. I got a Canon 30D with 5 lenses for under $200 (that was the truth, and I will not tell you how I got them). Is it as good as your "state-of-the-art" DSLRs and lenses? I don't think so, and that's why yours are more expensive. I wouldn't complain if the manufacturers did make some thing expensive for my cameras. I do complain if they don't make any good stuff for my cameras</p>

<p>It's too bad that Emil Schildt has pruned his portfolio. He has some of the most amazing work I've ever seen on p.net. <br /> <a href="../photodb/folder?folder_id=224043">http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=224043</a></p>

<p>It's also unfortunate that his style of work can now be replicated with a cellphone and a few clicks.</p>

<p>I think Emil still maintains his website. His "kill your darlings" style of physically altering the emulsions of negatives and prints can't quite be displaced by digital techniques. While the look may be the same, there will always be collectors and aficionados who value the process as much as the results, just as there will always be a market for original watercolors even when giclees and other reproductions are virtually indistinguishable from the originals.</p>

<p>Agreed, Lex, and by "unfortunate", I meant the average viewer's appreciation of Emil's work might be diminished by the ease in which the style can be rather easily replicated. </p>

<p>The images are good but I bristle at any labeling of photography. There is no "DSLR" photography, no mobile, iPhone, large format, point and shoot, color, B&W, film or digital photography. There is only photography. Photography is about making images, it's about life and the art spirit, it's not about tools or processes.</p>

<p>Photographers select their tools and process for many reasons. It's a long list and, yes, cost is one of them. So is convenience, size, flexibility, ease of use and suitability to the task. It is only equipment or process focused groups that delight in touting their work as "XYZ Photography". As in many art forms, there seems to be a desire to separate ones self from "the crowd". "See how clever and unique my tools and approach are" Were special!</p>

<p>Not really. Just the evolution of the tools. The human condition, the art spirit and the foundations of "writing with light" remain.</p>

<p>Amazing work!<br>

The same question could have been asked when the SLR, knocked the rangefinder off it's throne in the 1960's. The answer then was that few really needed the "advantages" of the SLR. But everyone ran out and traded in their RFs for SLRs.</p>

<p>It's all marketing. They create a need, and we respond to it. The truth is always that photography is in the mind and eye, not the hands.</p>

<p>Bob, it's popular these days to say that tools don't matter. However, to me they do. My tool of choice for most of what I do is a DSLR, mostly because it offers me the versatility I need. Could I take good photos with a cell phone? Sure, sometimes. However, I prefer a camera system that can handle "most" challenges, not merely "some" challenges. When I look through my portfolio, I find that at least half, and maybe as many as 2/3 of my photos could not have even been attempted with a cell phone.</p>

<p>These days I take my DSLR when I am going on a photographic trip and my P&S when I don't want to load up too much but think there might be something worth shooting. But I always have my phone with me.</p>

<p>But to compare cameras with other kinds of product, many people like to own a car that is more expensive, more powerful, more luxurious than they need to get from A to B. They buy it because it makes life more comfortable, provides a more rewarding experience and perhaps has a bit more street cred than a basic vehicle. So while mercedes and BMWs and Range Rovers sell well on quality, style, engineering and status I think the same will apply to cameras.</p>

<p>Oh, and some people drive taxis for a living and the Merc does that role too in many parts of the world.</p>

<p>Not sure why a DLSR with attachments should be expensive. There are many options for everyone's budgets and needs. The problem is defining one's "need". If that "need" includes having the coolest, newest, most-talked about camera with all of the trimmings, then I would imagine that could become expensive. If the "need" is driven by an interest in experimenting in photography and letting one's shooting interests determine equipment purchases, then there is no need to spend lots of money. Over the years I have keep the same (D)SLR and have bought lenses as defined by my shooting interests at the time (including refurbished lenses). I have gradually acquired things like tripods etc over time too.<br>

If you are not sure if you need a DSLR, then I would guess that the answer to that question is no. </p>

<p>Who needs a DSLR ? Not me I use one of these... </p><div></div>

<p>Steve Levine hit the nail on the head. No one ever "needed" any type of SLR film, or digital, they <strong>wanted</strong> one. Who in this world hasn't salivated over the newer shinier toy?</p>

<p><<<<em>Who in this world hasn't salivated over the newer shinier toy?</em>>>></p>

<p>Me. </p>

<p>But, then again, I was even an odd kid. Used to frustrate my grandpa when he brought his 5 grandchildren to the toy store and my brother and cousins went for the latest unnecessary toys and I'd ask for gum. Bazooka and a little comic was a treat for me.</p>

<p>I really don't want the latest shiniest camera and don't follow camera gear enough to even know what the latest shiniest is. When my camera stops giving me what I want, I ask around for advice on what to get, do a little reading and research myself, try out a few things, and make a purchase. I've only done that a couple of times in the last 10 years.</p>

<p>I haven't bought an iPhone because I don't want to shell out the extra bucks each month for a data plan and without a data plan my free AT&T phone suits me fine. </p>

<p>As for kidding, Bob, Apple is kidding as many people as Canon or Nikon, probably more.</p>

<p>People have different needs at different times, as we all know. For me, the tools of photography boils down to a primary and secondary reaction. When I get an idea (vision), the tool I choose seems important at the time, but later when I look at the image, I realize it was secondary. If you shoot with one camera or one style, this process becomes second nature on it's own......</p>

<p>When I need speed, I grab my lighter digital camera. Although I love the look of film more, the digital offers speed in both the pre and post processing that I haven't been able to achieve with film....:-(</p>

<p>It doesn't have to be expensive ( the digital experience), but that too is relative to one's resources (MONEY)... If you can buy the best, hats off to ya, but you don't need the most expensive to do creative, self satisfying work.....</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I hear that these new portable phones are pretty much on par with 8x10 velvia scanned on a tango. Tripods are just for old people. </p>

>>> Who needs a DSLR?<P>

 

A <a href= "http://www.flickr.com/photos/sionfullana/">photo friend in NYC</a> doesn't. All cellphone

captured...