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 p.4 #18 · p.4 #18 · Does a "no frills" travel camera exist, Canon or otherwise? | |
melcat wrote:
I disagree with this claim. Although the smaller sensor may have enough pixels, it will have a smaller dynamic range, and this will be visible even on recent iPhones, which have very nice screens with a good black point (and a wide gamut too).
As it happens, in the last week I’ve been reprocessing a lot of my images from ten years ago, with photos from the Canon 5D, 1D Mk III and 1Ds Mk III, and the Sony RX10 mixed in together, and the ones from the RX10 leap out as looking “flat”. (The RX10 is the “1-inch” sensor camera I referred to in an earlier post.) It’s long enough ago that I don’t immediately remember what was taken with what camera, so a decent test, All the other cameras are clustered together with similar quality.
Maybe you wouldn’t notice if you haven’t adapted your shooting style from the days of Velvia, and carefully control the scene dynamic range by choosing your time of day and using graduated filters. And maybe you universally process for a low-contrast look anyway if your end product is print.
One might blame the zoom lens on the RX10, despite “Zeiss” being written on the side, but I’ve often seen similar but less extreme “flatness” in micro 4/3 images shot by others, which suggests it is indeed sensor size. That’s consistent with the physics and widely-held and often-stated beliefs among phootgraphers. ...Show more →
Think about how that smaller dynamic range plays out. It isn’t that you can’t see things at the dark end of the range, it is that noise becomes a problem sooner. And when you display your images on social media and in email as jpg images you are not getting that full range anyway – that file format has less dynamic range than the raw files from your camera.
And, to take advantage of that extra large dynamic range you’ll need to post process that raw file extensively to bring those shadows back up. Basically those very large DR capabilities don’t map to SOOC images — they preserve image data that you can manipulate in post.
So, back to my primary point, it comes down to how the photographer is going to photograph and what they will do with the images. If someone is doing extensive full-on post processing from raw files, then the higher end camera might make a difference. If one is going to shoot handheld and pump out unprocessed or minimally processed jpgs of their vacation photographs for sharing on the web and in emai on computer monitors, you’ll never see the potential of those higher quality images.
And, again, my main point was that “best IQ” is not the primary requirement for the sort of thing our OP is after. Good IQ is, and there are lots of cameras that will provide that.
I use a high MP FF body for my tripod based work that is intended to be printable at largest sizes on my P9000. But when I travel I leaves, in nearly every case I leave that system behind and take a smaller APS-C system that produces excellent image quality, including reliable 20” x 30” prints and licensable images.
Is it the “best IQ” system. Indeed, it is not. Does it produce excellent IQ? Yes, it does.
BTW, I’ve had prints in shows alongside work done on a range of systems, from BW film to to MFT to APS-C to full frame to MF digital. I’m 100% certain that even with very close inspection almost no one could correctly identify the source of the images. I’ve been fooled myself, including one memorable example where I was impressed to find that the print came from MFT.
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