Ray Sachs
Legend
- Location
- Not too far from Philly
- Name
- you should be able to figure it out...
With the recent introduction of the Pentax Q and now the announcement of the Nikon mirrorless camera, I'm starting to wonder at which point we've blasted through the point of diminishing returns...
I was drawn to m43 primarily because the cameras and lenses were notably smaller than DSLR, the IQ was good enough (and would get better), and I knew I didn't want to carry a big heavy DSLR setup around. When the Nex came around, I was interested, gave it a try, but ultimately concluded (upon seeing the more recent lens roadmap) that the size of the lenses that Sony was developing was still bigger than I wanted to deal with in a compact camera system. So I see the benefit of downsizing from APS sensors to m43 sensors if the lenses can be made notably more compact.
But, even in the m43 world, both Panasonic and Olympus have shown they're capable of making fully functional cameras in sizes that are frankly too small for me to be comfortable holding for long. I settled on the EPL3 from the recent batch of camera bodies (primarily because of its flip screen), but its smaller than I'd ideally like. As are the EMP1 and GF3). To me, the most comfortable cameras to shoot with for an extended period of time are more around the size of the EP3 (and 1 and 2 before), the GF1, the X100, etc. Small enough to be light and inconspicuous but large enough to hold and grip and make adjustments easily on the fly. The Ricoh GRD3 also works for me in this sense, but its an aberration - an amazing combination of interface and ergonomics that makes a very small camera feel incredibly comfortable to use for an extended period. I've had a Canon S90 and a slightly larger Panasonic LX5 and these are both great little cameras, but they were really both too small for my taste, with various ergonomic compromises resulting.
So, what is the benefit of these new even SMALLER ILC systems? I'm sure that as sensor technology continues to improve, these too will achieve results that are at least good enough and maybe better than that (although I question the Q with the tiniest sensor used in the cheapest P&S). But at what point is not much gained by going smaller? I know the lenses for the new systems will be even smaller than the m43 lenses, but with the exception of a couple of the telephoto zooms, the m43 lenses feel incredibly in-scale and small for these basically small cameras.
Is there a point where it no longer makes sense to try to make a fairly high quality camera system smaller? For me, I think we're there, but obviously a successful camera maker like Nikon doesn't lauch its own smaller sensor and build a system around it on a whim. They obviously have something in mind here. But I'm having trouble seeing the benefit, even if its incredibly well implemented...
What do others think?
-Ray
I was drawn to m43 primarily because the cameras and lenses were notably smaller than DSLR, the IQ was good enough (and would get better), and I knew I didn't want to carry a big heavy DSLR setup around. When the Nex came around, I was interested, gave it a try, but ultimately concluded (upon seeing the more recent lens roadmap) that the size of the lenses that Sony was developing was still bigger than I wanted to deal with in a compact camera system. So I see the benefit of downsizing from APS sensors to m43 sensors if the lenses can be made notably more compact.
But, even in the m43 world, both Panasonic and Olympus have shown they're capable of making fully functional cameras in sizes that are frankly too small for me to be comfortable holding for long. I settled on the EPL3 from the recent batch of camera bodies (primarily because of its flip screen), but its smaller than I'd ideally like. As are the EMP1 and GF3). To me, the most comfortable cameras to shoot with for an extended period of time are more around the size of the EP3 (and 1 and 2 before), the GF1, the X100, etc. Small enough to be light and inconspicuous but large enough to hold and grip and make adjustments easily on the fly. The Ricoh GRD3 also works for me in this sense, but its an aberration - an amazing combination of interface and ergonomics that makes a very small camera feel incredibly comfortable to use for an extended period. I've had a Canon S90 and a slightly larger Panasonic LX5 and these are both great little cameras, but they were really both too small for my taste, with various ergonomic compromises resulting.
So, what is the benefit of these new even SMALLER ILC systems? I'm sure that as sensor technology continues to improve, these too will achieve results that are at least good enough and maybe better than that (although I question the Q with the tiniest sensor used in the cheapest P&S). But at what point is not much gained by going smaller? I know the lenses for the new systems will be even smaller than the m43 lenses, but with the exception of a couple of the telephoto zooms, the m43 lenses feel incredibly in-scale and small for these basically small cameras.
Is there a point where it no longer makes sense to try to make a fairly high quality camera system smaller? For me, I think we're there, but obviously a successful camera maker like Nikon doesn't lauch its own smaller sensor and build a system around it on a whim. They obviously have something in mind here. But I'm having trouble seeing the benefit, even if its incredibly well implemented...
What do others think?
-Ray