elliott937 Loc: St. Louis

Aside from a light camera, and aside from it being a "new" thing, why are photographers dropping their DSLR and switching to Mirrorless?

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Beats me...
(I've no problem with a DSLR.)

elliott937 Loc: St. Louis

Then that makes two of us, curious to see what Mirrorless fans say.

Quixdraw Loc: x

I have and prefer DSLR. I also have a good but obsolete mirrorless kit. I bought it originally in order to use film era Leica and Nikon lenses and it does that as well via adapters. It is small, light, and most of all, comparatively cheap, but still takes very good photos. I like to take it when I don't plan to take pictures, or when I may leave it in the car, or be in a situation where the camera might be damaged or lost. A nice addition to a more expensive system.

rocar7 Loc: Alton, England

There are several advantages. Mirrorless cameras are smaller and lighter, more discreet, so are better for street photography, and especially good for travel, or just general carrying around. A camera like the Sony a6000 range has an APS-C sensor, so takes just as good photos as most DSLRs, and better than some, because of the type of sensor. And there are full frame Mirrorless cameras too. They don't look as "professional" as DSLRs, so are less likely to be targeted by thieves. You can download all sorts of programs, so that something like time-lapse is a doddle, just set up the camera, press the button and leave it. The camera does everything, and gives you a video. Adapters are cheap, as they are basically spacers (the Mirrorless camera is much narrower front to back), so it is easy to use your existing Nikon or Canon lenses or older film camera lenses.

Disadvantages? Well the EVF is not as good as the viewfinder on a DSLR (though live view is probably easier to use); the range of available lenses is still quite small, though growing all the time; lenses used on adapters are slow to auto focus, if they do it at all.

And so on... I've got both types, and find myself using the Mirrorless more and more.

tomgeyer Loc: New York City

I'm 70 and terminally lazy, so anything that saves weight and bulk is welcome. Also helps with sneaky street photography. Though it must be said that a lighter camera body doesn't help all that much if you still want a long lens with a big aperture and lots of light-gathering. No way to shrink one of those. I really like my Sony a7rii.

John_F Loc: Minneapolis, MN

OP's original premise seemed to imply the DSLR -> mirrorless is widescale. I would think 'switchovers' are more complicated than many might think. There are technical reasons and personal reasons and money reasons. As far as technical reasons are concerned, I do not see mirrorless being able to do something that DSLRs can not.

sloscheider Loc: Minnesota

What would you think if a camera came along that was mechanically a simpler design so potentially more reliable, offered all the controls, bells and whistles your existing DSLR had, all the image quality and sometimes better performance... would you switch? That's mirrorless with the exception that, as far as I know, still doesn't match a DSLR at focus speed.

Siennarose46 Loc: Pacific NW

Agree with rocor7 - I love my A6000 - but I chose it strictly because I wanted to travel light. The AF is super fast for action photography. Keep in mind I am totally an amateur out there having fun and not lugging around heavy equipment.

Bob baird

I do a lot of photography at church events, often of guest speakers. The DSLR mirror slap is annoying to listeners. I intend to get a minimal mirrorless outfit only for that reason. Otherwise, I prefer my DSLRs.

Peterff Loc: O'er The Hills and Far Away, in Themyscira.

Once I was able to buy "a proper camera" as a teenager I did, a Russian Zenit E. Manual everything and built like WW1 tank. Then I went on with SLRs - Canon - with the AE-1 and then the T90 - also known as 'The Tank' - and arguably the most sophisticated of Canon's manual focus SLRs. The revolutionary design of the T90 became the design concept for so many of today's DSLRs' look and feel. I like the heft and balance of this type of camera, especially with a battery grip. Oh, and by the way, to me this has nothing to do with brand. I chose and stayed with Canon for my own reasons, but Nikon, Pentax, Sony etc. all make excellent camera systems.

I haven't yet seen a mirrorless camera that I would want, but I suspect that day may come. Possibly the Canon EOS M5, but we don't yet know how good that will be (or not)!

What I like about mirrorless designs is definitely not the form factor, but the functionality. Much of that functionality is available on my humble Canon T3i with the Magic Lantern run-time software. It is a totally unsupported open source project and only works on a limited number of cameras but is a really nice fusion of the two camera types.

My personal opinion is that I would like to see a mirrorless camera that combines the handling of a DSLR with the functions of mirrorless cameras. I haven't seen one yet that 'floats my boat', but I suspect that they will eventually come to market. Whether the Canon M5 delivers that remains to be seen. So far Canon mirrorless cameras have been substantially sub-par.

Given the reasons I make my personal choices, if I were a Nikon guy I would find the Df a desirable camera. Had I followed the Pentax route in my early days I would probably still be using Pentax.

It is a very complicated scenario and one that is in the middle of a transformation, so for myself I can see no reason to go mirrorless at this point in time. For me, it is a usability and system issue. Any deficiencies that Canon products may currently have give me no reason to switch to another system and I don't expect to find any in the next five years. Probably the opposite as Canon improves its sensor technology and finally delivers a decent mirrorless camera, which may be as early as next month or could be much longer, if ever.

bobmcculloch Loc: NYC, NY

Canon's new M5 is only 5 oz lighter than my T4i, 4oz lighter than T6i, not significant IMHO, Bob.

LFingar Loc: Claverack, NY

The only reason I can think of is that different people have different needs and different preferences. Kinda like the difference between buying a full size pickup or a midsize one. As far as the actual advantages of a mirrorless, I have no idea. I've never even held one. They just don't interest me.

SharpShooter Loc: NorCal

And you have been told this by how many listeners?
Do they actually complain, or is this just your assumption?
Just so you know, crop dslr's are much quieter than FF, and many cameras have a, "quiet" mode.
And in live view, a dslr IS a mirror-less camera!
SS

BebuLamar

Mirrorless promises an important thing. You see the final image before you take it. I don't know how close it comes to that.