BillBingham2
Registered User
I suspect that AF and EVF speed will be the place where the upper end will see improvements over the next year.
I suspect that the DSLR market is full and the differences that the vast majority of consumers want to pay for are there.
Me, I thinking a Fuji X-M1 with a 18/2 and a CV Brightline on top will be my in my future. I know I will want something different for longer glass, but not sure what yet. My hope is that the FF DSLR market will begin it's price decrease as I have some older F glass.
I'm wondering from a power consumption perspective if a dedicated GPU would provide better EVF speed at less power than the main CPU.
B2 (;->
I suspect that the DSLR market is full and the differences that the vast majority of consumers want to pay for are there.
Me, I thinking a Fuji X-M1 with a 18/2 and a CV Brightline on top will be my in my future. I know I will want something different for longer glass, but not sure what yet. My hope is that the FF DSLR market will begin it's price decrease as I have some older F glass.
I'm wondering from a power consumption perspective if a dedicated GPU would provide better EVF speed at less power than the main CPU.
B2 (;->
Jamie Pillers
Skeptic
The Fuji X-T1 is better than the X-E2. More manual control (easier to set it up to emulate a manual film camera) and a much better viewfinder.
That's correct. We are also allowed to have an opinion about what is comfortable to use for our type of photography. Every single camera listed is capable of technically great photographic quality... but they each have shortcomings that may not fit the way each of us photographs. Additionally, each is different ergonomically. What is wrong with weighing your options and figuring out what works for you? I'm sure the "most accomplished and rigorous photographers living today" have done the same thing. If this did not matter, we'd all be using the same camera.
kkdanamatt
Well-known
That's a snarky remark.
I'm 72 years old. When I was 20, I used to focus Leicas faster and more accurately than almost anybody else. Now, I miss the mark about half the time. So I can only use my Leica M film cameras with wide-angles and zone focusing outdoors.
I shoot low-light indoor billiard tournaments for an international print magazine and some online websites. I need a silent or almost silent camera with a fast zoom lens for that purpose.
What do the cameras chosen by the "most accomplished and rigorous photographers" have anything to do with my personal requirements?
back alley
IMAGES
maybe i should look at the xt10 when it arrives...$899. locally
back alley
IMAGES
Ranchu
-
I had no idea evfs are still lagging, it's been 5 years or whatever they've been working on them. It's a basic demand.
f16sunshine
Moderator
They are and I think it will continue.
People also demand small lightweight cameras which means wimpy batteries and less robust ... Slower hardware.
I've been leaning back to my 5D for many uses.
Having a reflex finder is pretty damn sweet compared to evfs for some uses.
For other uses the evf cameras are great!
It's nice having choices.
Given another choice, personally I would be happy to carry a slightly larger/heavier camera if it improved overall lag dramatically.
Godfrey
somewhat colored
RF: CL, M4-2, M-P typ 240 bodies. Can use all my current M-mount and LTM mount lenses as well as Nikon mount lenses with an adapter.
SLR: Olympus E-1, Nikon F, Nikon F6. The Nikon lenses can be used on the Olympus.
Electronic TTL: Olympus E-M1, E-PL7. If you have the viewfinders configured correctly (and yes, there are many options), the E-M1 and E-PL7 with VF-4 are virtually indistinguishable from an optical viewfinder in normal use. Nikon and Leica M lenses can be used on the bodies with adapters, but the Nikon SLR lenses perform better than the Leica RF lenses. The E-1 lenses fit these bodies with an adapter and work perfectly.
Compact: Leica X typ 113. Fitted with optical or electronic viewfinder depending upon need. No other options. Perfect.
G
SLR: Olympus E-1, Nikon F, Nikon F6. The Nikon lenses can be used on the Olympus.
Electronic TTL: Olympus E-M1, E-PL7. If you have the viewfinders configured correctly (and yes, there are many options), the E-M1 and E-PL7 with VF-4 are virtually indistinguishable from an optical viewfinder in normal use. Nikon and Leica M lenses can be used on the bodies with adapters, but the Nikon SLR lenses perform better than the Leica RF lenses. The E-1 lenses fit these bodies with an adapter and work perfectly.
Compact: Leica X typ 113. Fitted with optical or electronic viewfinder depending upon need. No other options. Perfect.
G
mfunnell
Shaken, so blurred
There is, however, the old (quite old by EOS standards) EF 24mm/f2.8 which is compact, though not pancake sized, and takes a decent photo with the old original 5D:
...Mike
kxl
Social Documentary
Good enough for the gods of photography or an ass like you has nothing to do with my enjoyment of gear that I buy for my own use.....
Thardy
Mentor
zuiko85
Mentor
At least the OP can look at and handle several cameras. That option is closed to probably half of us. Unless you live in NY or 3 or 4 other major cities there is just nowhere to handle these cameras. You have to buy sight unseen based on reviews. I finally got a look at a OMD EM-5 after it has been out what, 3 years or so? Totally underwhelmed by the EFV, I guess that is what happens when you are used to a OM-1 viewfinder.
rscheffler
Well-known
I had a chance to use the Sony RX10 for a few weeks and thought I would hate it. Quite the opposite, and I'm a diehard DSLR guy (and Leica digital M). It's not going to give you the ultra high ISO performance of a larger sensor (it's 1") and it's a fixed 2.8 24-200 equivalent zoom, so no adapting lenses to it. But it's relatively small and near silent. I didn't shoot a lot of low light indoor stuff with it though, so not sure how it will compare at that. In the same line of thought is the Panasonic FZ1000, though the lens is a stop slower at the long end, but reaches to 400mm equivalent. Otherwise, for silent operation and interchangeable lens options, particularly legacy glass, I'd consider the a7S. I borrowed one for a couple weeks and of the a7 series cameras, liked it the most, though it's equally bad in terms of menu diving, small buttons and dials, etc. Its saving grace IMO was the silent fully electronic shutter. Worked well in most situations. It just doesn't handle fast motion well because it scans the sensor in this mode at about 1/30 second rather than capturing all pixels at the same moment. But I never ran into this problem in 'normal' use. It will work fine with your Nikon lenses, for the most part. Will also be OK with many rangefinder lenses, but my finding was like the other a7 cameras - there are some lenses where there is significant image smearing at the edges. One other drawback of the a7S is price. It's high relative to everything you've looked at and is one of the few Sony cameras that has not come down in price at all since introduction.
Isn't there now a silent electronic shutter function for one or some of the Fuji models after a recent firmware update? Maybe the XT1?
Another consideration is maybe the Samsung NX1, but it's not all that compact. Its sibling, the NX500 won't fit your requirements due to a lack of viewfinder. While it's not silent, from my brief trials compared to a number of CSCs, it's probably one of the most responsive and nearest DSLR performance. If you needed dead silent operation, you could 'simply' shoot 4K video with it and do frame grabs at 8MP resolution (I guess you could do the same with any other 4K capable camera, such as the GH4 or FZ1000). I've seen some frame grabs and they looked very good. Super high ISO performance is OK, but it seems to maybe lag some of the top APS-C and FF cameras by about a stop. A problem here again is price. Body and the 50-150/2.8 will set you back about $3000.
If you can live with 1fps shooting and somewhat older EVF tech, there's also the Ricoh GXR with M mount module. You'll have to find it used, but so far it's the only non-Leica M solution I've found that is decent with pretty much all M glass. The M module also has a silent electronic shutter mode.
randolph45
Well-known
back alley
IMAGES
Joe
You can't have the 40 back just yet
apparently it won't work on the 5d!
no worries though...i hope you are enjoying it.
i might get an xe2 and hope the firmware upgrade makes it the camera for me...or the xt10, even if it is ugly.
mfunnell
Shaken, so blurred
Just in case it's of some use to someone, here's a quick size comparison of the new EF-S 24mm/f2.8 pancake lens on an APS-C camera (should be roughly the same size as the 40mm for full-frame) with the older full-frame EF 24mm/f2.8 lens on a Canon original 5D:
...Mike
Armoured
Well-known
I also sympathize as I was in the same situation for a very long time. My previous forays into digital compacts (including systems) was very negative. Mostly I hated ones without viewfinders and found shutterlag unbearable.
Add to this that while I can afford a system, I really don't want to spend substantial money on a system that I'd end up hating. And most of them are still in price ranges (for a workable minimum kit) well above what I was willing to risk.
Anyway, two things recently pushed me to take the plunge: the size penalty of full-frame DSLRs was just getting too painful in context of lifestyle recently - meaning I just wasn't having fun taking Nikon kit except for things where it is needed - and finding one that was below my (vague internal) cost barrier.
I'd been aware for a while that the OM-D series had advanced to the point where I could probably live with it - particularly response time, it 'feels like a camera.' But prices (to the extent that I was following) also seemed high in case I hated it (I'd hated an early iteration of M4/3).
So what changed was that the EM-10 was introduced at an attractive price point, and with intro of EM-5mII, the original also fell in price. I settled on an EM-10 with kit lens for a bit over US$400. At that price point, losses if I get rid of it are okay.
Overall I'm very happy with it: pictures are good, it handles like a camera, and - key factor - small enough for me that it is a great take-with-me-whenever-I-want camera. It's fun and I take more pictures (whereas I just couldn't with Nikon fullframe kit).
Negatives of note are that the EVF - while acceptable - is far behind an optical viewfinder. I can live with the menus which others hate, although I'm not a fan. It's quiet enough for my purposes.
So my insights:
-EVFs do indeed lag in terms of where the rest of the technology is - but still manageable.
-You're quite right that they all have deficiencies or shortcomings. You can either wait until it gets 'good enough' or compromise - I waited for years but current OM-D is there for me.
-What's the main goal? For me it was size (at acceptable performance on other parameters).
-Price matters. I probably wouldn't have taken the plunge before a basic kit got below $500. The threshold is obviously personal and subjective. Now that I have it I admit I probably would have found OM-D line acceptable at, say, $700-$800, but I didn't know that then. ))
-I don't feel fully committed to m4/3 but confident enough that I'll get plenty of use out of the EM-10 to make it worthwhile. I will want a small, good fixed lens though.
-I am personally not at all ready to move fulltime to mirrorless and get rid of other kit. For me, I think that will take a few generations more - not in terms of image quality but other factors that have already been covered here. THis is subjective of course. BUT: I'm fine with that. My Fullframe kit is for other stuff, m4/3 for general and fun. But I must admit that the range of things for which the FF kit is essential - or trade-off for size not acceptable - is getting quite small. Realistically having both kits is not necessary (but that would hold for much of my herd of cameras, too).
-Side note on EM-5 vs EM-10: I'm glad I have the EM-10 as I find the wifi and a few other features useful - but probably would have been fine with the EM-5 as well. I don't think the difference between them is so enormous, although obviously some will want some features more than others - that's fine.
nongfuspring
Well-known
In my mind there's only one recommendation; the LX100
Good low light capabilities, zoom lens, leaf shutter. It's essentially a fixed lens M43 camera with an impressive 1.7-2.8 24-75mm equivalent lens. Good at low light, direct, sensible manual controls and an EVF.
IMO silent electronic shutters aren't up to scratch yet since they're only good on stationary subjects, so I think unless you're OK with some noise mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras perhaps aren't quite suited to your needs. EVF lag is overstated and as I have said in another thread a VF is used for framing with; not for panning around wildly camera to eye, EVFs also have distinct advantages over OVFs that are worth the (minor) tradeoff in my experience.
Whichever you end up choosing I'm afraid there will always be a learning curve with the menus. While it might seem illogical and annoying at first, you do get used to it, and much of the reason why every camera brand has at least a couple of different menu systems is that every line has a often dramatically different features. It only seems fair to try and meet it half way.
Good low light capabilities, zoom lens, leaf shutter. It's essentially a fixed lens M43 camera with an impressive 1.7-2.8 24-75mm equivalent lens. Good at low light, direct, sensible manual controls and an EVF.
IMO silent electronic shutters aren't up to scratch yet since they're only good on stationary subjects, so I think unless you're OK with some noise mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras perhaps aren't quite suited to your needs. EVF lag is overstated and as I have said in another thread a VF is used for framing with; not for panning around wildly camera to eye, EVFs also have distinct advantages over OVFs that are worth the (minor) tradeoff in my experience.
Whichever you end up choosing I'm afraid there will always be a learning curve with the menus. While it might seem illogical and annoying at first, you do get used to it, and much of the reason why every camera brand has at least a couple of different menu systems is that every line has a often dramatically different features. It only seems fair to try and meet it half way.
pvdhaar
Peter
There's only one aspect where I find CSCs are still lagging miles behinds DSLRs, and that's the time it takes them to power-up. Even the most basic DSLR is instantly on and ready to take a shot, while my NEX-6 takes anything between 2 to 6 seconds to wake up.. Reason for me to sometimes just pick up an old SLR or DSLR if think I need fast response times.. Also reason for me to just wait it out before upgrading from the NEX-6 to FF, heck, I'm considering not to upgrade the CSC at all and replace the DSLR for a FF instead..
By the way, the start-up time of the NEX depends on a number of factors:
1. SD card size --> 2Gb or less is faster, bigger is slower to start-up..
2. Lens --> manual zoom is faster, power zoom is slower to start-up..
3. Cold-start, warm-start --> Cold start up is faster, power-up immediately after power-off takes forever...
But why in the world does this have to be?? I doubt that these are a fundamentally unsolvable byproduct of the CSC design..
By the way, the start-up time of the NEX depends on a number of factors:
1. SD card size --> 2Gb or less is faster, bigger is slower to start-up..
2. Lens --> manual zoom is faster, power zoom is slower to start-up..
3. Cold-start, warm-start --> Cold start up is faster, power-up immediately after power-off takes forever...
But why in the world does this have to be?? I doubt that these are a fundamentally unsolvable byproduct of the CSC design..