Rongnongno Loc: FL

Well, yes it is.

I was reading a post a couple of days ago and it kept bothering me.

The statement made was: Before we were told that it was more important to get good glass than a good camera. I agreed but at the same time I was ambivalent. Finally I understood my reservation for today's camera.

If before the lens was the prime element in a camera now this not the case, even if you STILL NEED good glass. Why? If you recall we had a choice of film that in turn determined the quality of the final product depending on need and purpose.

The film choice in camera has been removed from us and we are stuck with a sensor that has set physical limitations. The size and concentration of the pixels is so different from one camera to the other that the camera sensor is now a determining factor.

If a glass is still important it is not as important as you have to match sensor capabilities with the lens quality. It makes very little sense to invest in a good glass if the sensor is crappy unless you are planning a major upgrade to a mega-pixel camera.

We have to recognize that few of us want the best sensor resolution and we still want more. I am stuck with a Nikon D800e so I am waiting for the next major upgrade, not the intermediary commercial D810. Had I had canon system I would have purchased their 50MB camera.

To go back to the lenses. Since I use manual focus and do not give a damn about autofocus I am in the process to revert to much cheaper older lenses that are way better than our current crop of offering. They were built like tanks, had a DOF guide, are just as bright and... Well the circle of diffusion used over the sensor was larger than what we have now. Yes, they are not aspherical and frankly I find this a plus.

So, “Yes, it is the camera”.

Paul J. Svetlik Loc: Colorado

A good point and well stated. I have to agree!
Although I tend to come from the other end - the size of a nice quality print - about 24"x 36" max.
Also for the convenience: A light camera with a fixed, decent range zoom, making manageable size files for a computer and emailing.
I suspect, that might be a future of photography.
We'll see.

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

That is definitely a good point, but others seem to think that their are other considerations such as the resolving power of the lens especially for dense sensors such as the 50MP Canon or high resolution Micro 4/3 sensors.

Other considerations may not be relevant to your particular usage style, but they do seem to be for many situations such as low light usage or fast moving subjects.

Each of us will have different priorities, but it seems that in most cases it is a good pairing of camera and lenses that makes the most sense, just like food and wine...

Another consideration is that the pace of camera body development is much faster than lens development, so purchasing lenses with future upgrades in mind seems to make sense for long term investment.

I have both manual focus and auto focus lenses, and both types serve different purposes. It seems very hard to have simple answers that fits a large sector of the population without removing the constraint of budgets...

John_F Loc: Minneapolis, MN

Just as there was a lens/film relationship, there is a lens/sensor relationship. Film had a resolution limit based on halide grain size and a lens had only provide a matching resolution (think abberations for example). So a lens for a digital need only provide a resolution that matches that of the sensor. Any greater lens resolution would not be noticeable. In digital all lies in the sensor design. If you think of sensor dimensional size and number of pixels, is resolution properly thought to be sensor area/#pixels square root of?

Quixdraw Loc: x

Though I have not done any kind of technical analysis, my observation is that my old Nikon AI fixed FL lenses produce sharper results than my modern Nikon lenses, on both the DF and D750. Having said that, I don't own any current Nikon lenses from their top of the line / pro group. Certainly most of my old lenses are faster, and the DOF guides are very useful. Yes a camera with a good sensor, but still, it does come back to good glass as well, since that glass transmits the light / image to the sensor.

Morning Star Loc: West coast, North of the 49th N.

I'd go a step further and say that it is a combination of camera, glass and photographer. And in the end the photographer is mighty important because he/she needs to know what qualities the camera and glass have in order to take the best quality photos.
As you say, you're going back to some older lenses because of their quality - and that's because you know what you're doing, what discipline to apply to that camera-lens combination to get the absolute best!

My Dad had a gift of knowing what settings to use on his cameras to get the best possible results. For many years I took snapshots because I never saw Dad fiddle with the settings. It wasn't till my brother told me that Dad didn't have to, because he had that gift of seeing the finished image before he pressed the shutter button. I certainly don't have that gift, and it wasn't till after my brother told me about that, that I started to pay more attention to settings and lens/camera combo. I achieved huge improvements in a relatively short time, but I'm still learning today.
So my glass/camera combination are definitely very important but my brain/finger combination is equally important.
The big difference for me, that "back then" I was frustrated with how many poor pictures I got, only kept a bunch because they were pics of the children. Today, I enjoy making photos and am making an effort to learn from the bad ones....

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

These are good points. Ron is a bit of a "special case", and the points he makes are in this instance are primarily related to his own usage style, specifically that he uses manual focus and doesn't give a damn about auto focus.

Another detail to consider is that manual focus lenses were designed to be focused manually and are geared rather differently in comparison to auto focus lenses that are not designed for manual focusing and some can be rather tricky in that situation.

I have some Canon FL / FDn manual focus lenses modified to be used with EOS cameras which perform very well, but I learned with manual focus systems so it is second nature to me. That said, I nly get them out when I know that I want to use them, my standard grab bag contains all auto focus lenses with the exception of the Samyang fisheye.

Acountry330 Loc: Dothan,Ala USA

Sounds like you have your mind made up that old glass is better than new. So why do they make new and improved glass; just to get you to spend your hard earned money on new stuff. Just maybe the new stuff is as good or better than the old! Happy shooting. Some of us need auto focus.

tdekany Loc: Oregon

Are you saying that better equipment ables one to take more artistic pictures? Because I see a lot junk produced by superior equipment. And see beauty with lower end cameras/lenses.

You can give me the best of the best to use and my pictures will still be nothing more than snap shots. So how do you explain that?

gmb3 Loc: Coastal CenCal

Not really. A poor lens will yield poor photographs regardless of the sensor or photographers skill. A poor sensor will do likewise.

What do lots o' pixels gain one?

1 - More cost

2 - More complexity

3 - More power used

4 - Poorer low light sensitivity

5 - Ahh, more resolution. OK, we are blowing the pictures up billboard size, yes? How many pixels are required to do that? Oh, how far away from the billboard is one standing? That makes a difference. But are resolution and sharpness dependent on one another? And the distance of the viewer?

Check out K Rockwell's page.
http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/mpmyth.htm

19104 Loc: Philadelphia

This can open a never ending debate. Car people argue over which is better, stereo people argue over which one is better, even carpenters will argue over which hammer is better. I use to work in a camera store that dealt with mostly used equipment, and I got to shot with a lot of that stuff. I learned a very important lesson, and that is the best camera is the one you got in your hand.

I personally converted over to digital and autofocus about 2 years ago. I am satisfied with the work I was able to do with film and manual focus and now with digital and autofocus. There have been some situations where I feel that I got more usable images with Autofocus than I might have with manual focus.

So I say buy what you want, shot what you want, and don't fret over what someone else has in there kit. And take pictures because you love to take pictures. Like an old friend of mine used to say what I eat wont make you fat.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

That guy is very low in my list of resources. I mean I do not even bother reading his prose. Too many opinions stated as facts.

This thread is not about mega pixels but lenses / camera pairing and how the sensor size and precision modifies the whole 'get the best glass' concept.

We are at a point where we really need to learn more before making any purchase, lens or camera.

The best glass is often wasted on a poorly performing camera.

As to MP race? Everyone has an opinion so I don't care to give one for or against it. I have a use for it, you do not. Leave it at that will you?

JD750 Loc: SoCal

I agree.

I assume we are talking here about technical image quality, not artistic acuity. While artistic ability is very important, I am not including it in my comments below, because I want to focus on the technical aspects of image quality.

What part of technical image quality does the body play in digital photography?

I have given this subject some thought and I started a thread here a while ago and there was a lot of good discussion.

In the film days there were basically 4 elements; the lens, the film, the film processing and the body. Assigning a percentage to each element, the body would get almost 0% for technical IQ contribution. The body did not contribute significantly to image quality, but it might make a difference in getting a shot, or not.

With digital photography we have basically 3 elements. The lens, the body, and the post processing. The sensor replaces the film and the sensor is an integral part of the body. You can't easily modify or change the sensor.

So whatever % of image quality you might have assigned to the body and the film in the old days, is now assigned to the camera body.

Thus, in digital photography, the body is a much bigger contributor to IQ than it was in the film days.

Jim Bob

Buried deep within your rambling epistle is a point to be made. However, it is never just the camera. It is always a combination of factors.

martinfisherphoto Loc: Lake Placid Florida

This statement assumes that you or whoever else picks up the Best of the best will take some sort of a good photo. In fact it sounds like another excuse for poor quality photography.. My lens or sensor is not good enough or compatible with each other. Please, look at all of the great photos made before us. And if it's the digital cameras fault then good back to film. It's more about the photographer than any piece of equipment. Take credit for your work, good or bad, stop blaming the stove.......