Stunted progress in photography, the future of cameras, and how we treat digital cameras like film cameras

[Jochen_S]

<p>With a lot of respect:<br>

I think treating the digital side like film is something I appreciate a lot in a camera build. - I used to work with prosumer 1.3 to 3.3MP cameras and the handling felt annoying to me. I did not buy anything digital myself until 6MP DSLRs became available. <br>

During the 80s I did a few (for me too expensive and way too hard to handle) rolls in grandpa's Minox C with a fixed <em>zone focusable</em> 15mm f3.5 standard lens. - I'd appreciate it a lot to have something similar in the digital point and wait cameras that made their way to me instead of a more or less blind contrast AF, that makes these cameras too unresponsive for my taste. <br>

I am not understanding what changed between the 1920s / 30s and now. My Voigtländer Brillant or Bergheil had wonderful light constructions shading their ground glass or huge brillant finder against the sun. - Why are similar things not at least optional parts of modern rear screen aimed cameras? I'd be happy as a clam if I could use something like my modern collapsible Mamiya C33O WLF on a EVF-less MILC.<br>

Upon the future of the professional or serious amateur non-sytem camera: Yes, I see it too! - Juggling a pair of zooms on one SLR always was an amateur thing... Any somewhat established journalist I saw here had a 2nd body for the 2nd zoom. Early digital taught the lesson about sensor dust and makes lens changes even less desirable than they used to be. Not to mention the issues arising from an interface between camera and lens. - No matter what we are transmitting through it which way; we are apparently jumping through surplus mechanical hoops. Be it an RF coupling pretending that whatever we mount is a a 50mm lens, be it mechanics to couple screwdriver AF, be it just a bunch of contacts between lens and body that don't work entirely well and reliably...<br>

I think we are <em>close to</em> a point in digital development where leapfrogging cameras and lenses might be less important. I can at least imagine that something like Leica Q or the Sigma fixed primes series might become able to attract customers. FTR: The current Sigmas don't look great to me. - Reasonable cameras with decent fixed lenses would be something I'd look at. At a going rate of let's say 300 Euro per APS C camera part and money saved by not making an imagined lens interchangeable at all. <br>

My personal crystal ball is foggy about the future of smaller sensors. - I don't always appreciate the lack of DOF arising from APS - FF usage. While happy-snapping social events indoors, I wouldn't mind an DOF multiplicator of 3 or 4, especially if it was granted by a pre-zone focused <em>true</em> P&S camera performing as well in low light than my current elderly gear. <br>

I even dare to believe that a lot of "love" for selective focus / shallow DOF arose from technical limitations like slow film & sensors + blind AF shouting for fast lenses and available darkness demanding their wide open usage. <br>

I honestly haven't taken a closer look at the Sony mentioned by Karim. A quick glimpse caught it seems outperformed by Nikon 1's AF, so I guess it isn't really "there" yet? - Pondering an AW1 purchase I looked at Nikon 1 samples and wasn't convinced by the IQ. What I downloaded didn't look that great on a 4K screen, but it takes less pixels to make the news...</p>

[ilkka_nissila]

If you accept similar noise, you can match small sensor DOF using a larger sensor simply by stopping down and

increasing ISO correspondingly. What the larger sensors give is a choice between deep and shallow DOF.

 

Originally many fast lenses were fairly poor quality wide open and the widest apertures were used mostly only as a last

resort in low light. They did assist in manual focusing. Eventually the optics and autofocus improved to the point where

wide open shooting can be used without much image quality penalty (on the contrary you can use lower ISO so you get

nicer tonality and colour). I use the whole range of apertures as needed, but f/1.4 to f/4 is my favorite for photographing

people in uncontrolled, visually complex locations. I love the way blur encodes the third dimension (depth) in two-

dimensional picture. And so a lot of the time I shoot wide open. For landscape, macro etc. I stop my lenses down and go

for the best image quality including near-to-far sharpness. Also in the studio I use f/5.6 to f/11. With a homogeneous

background, there is little benefit from using a wide aperture.

 

The increased sensitivity and reduced noise of modern sensors allows us to shoot in lower available light than before,

recording indoor events without flash and, for example, rich displays of aurora borealis with fine detail recorded instead of

the weak, blurry shadows possible with film. But these things still require fast lenses for best results.

 

I appreciate having these choices. I also appreciate that other people can make different choices, for example, in favour

of portability.