Very good photo as usual. I’ll be very interested if you continue to post about your new mirrorless. It’s a 4/3rds correct? I’d love to hear your take on that sensor size versus full-frame and others like APS-C (my largest in my Canon DSLR). I’m nowhere as knowledgeable as you, but experience gives me fits: some of my best photos (especially bird photos) are with my XS-50 Canon with a tiny sensor! I’d be delighted to hear your thoughts on sensor size, image quality, and such.
Hi Alan. Well there are tradeoffs. A smaller sensor will probably be less good in low light, and diffraction issues mean that you can use a wider range of apertures. And then there’s DOF where it is swings and roundabouts (harder to get that shallow dof for portraits, easier to get the whole of that distant bird in focus at long focal lengths). I’m liking the camera a lot so far, and the viewfinder is amazing. There’s a fantastic article on the history of “full-frame” here:
Thank you Chris for that link–I not only appreciate the background story for the obsession with full-frame, but the skepticism that the obsession is really warranted.
The reason I really like my sx-50 (I transposed the letters in my post) is that DOF usually isn’t much of an issue with birding (for example). When the focus is so sharp that it gets the finest details of feathers–and that usually takes some luck whether using auto- or manual focus but as you say requires good light–the size of the sensor pushes into the background about why I’m using that camera.
{ 5 comments }
James Wimberley 12.09.18 at 6:18 pm
Very nice. “Bertram’s View of Bristol”? Though the sharp facets of the suburban houses are more Braque.
Donald Coffin 12.09.18 at 6:53 pm
Very nice.
Alan White 12.10.18 at 12:04 am
Very good photo as usual. I’ll be very interested if you continue to post about your new mirrorless. It’s a 4/3rds correct? I’d love to hear your take on that sensor size versus full-frame and others like APS-C (my largest in my Canon DSLR). I’m nowhere as knowledgeable as you, but experience gives me fits: some of my best photos (especially bird photos) are with my XS-50 Canon with a tiny sensor! I’d be delighted to hear your thoughts on sensor size, image quality, and such.
Chris Bertram 12.10.18 at 2:53 pm
Hi Alan. Well there are tradeoffs. A smaller sensor will probably be less good in low light, and diffraction issues mean that you can use a wider range of apertures. And then there’s DOF where it is swings and roundabouts (harder to get that shallow dof for portraits, easier to get the whole of that distant bird in focus at long focal lengths). I’m liking the camera a lot so far, and the viewfinder is amazing. There’s a fantastic article on the history of “full-frame” here:
https://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2018/10/the-remarkable-persistence-of-24×36.html
Alan White 12.11.18 at 12:16 am
Thank you Chris for that link–I not only appreciate the background story for the obsession with full-frame, but the skepticism that the obsession is really warranted.
The reason I really like my sx-50 (I transposed the letters in my post) is that DOF usually isn’t much of an issue with birding (for example). When the focus is so sharp that it gets the finest details of feathers–and that usually takes some luck whether using auto- or manual focus but as you say requires good light–the size of the sensor pushes into the background about why I’m using that camera.
Thanks again!
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