kymarto Loc: Portland OR and Milan Italy

I may be wrong, but I disagree. Pros know their gear inside out: they don't need a sensor reading to know what they will get. They are on standby a lot, and an EVF eats batteries. There is also a small lag time reading off the sensor, which is not an advantage. Also, many people I know don't like the tiny body coupled with bigger lenses. And of course EVFs are no fun in contrast situations. Add to that the paucity of direct controls and you do not create an attractive package.

The only real advantages I see are a potentially higher frame rate, and sometimes better viewing in very dark conditions with top end high ISO cans like the A7s--and of course the fact that you can potentially design better fast normal and wide lenses.

To be honest, still cams might be on the way out. We have videocams that can do full rez progressive images at 100 fps. Soon all you will need to do is roll video and then just grab the frame you want ;)

Cdouthitt Loc: Traverse City, MI

Bingo...I've done that a few times already, but on a much smaller scale file with my em1.

wdross Loc: Castle Rock, Colorado

I agree that pros know their equipment very well. But if one thinks about that, they needed to learn the equipment when it went from film to digital and have had to do the same as the digital cameras progressed to today cameras. You are right in that at this time, the EVFs would require an extra battery or two to meet pro needs. But they will get better both in terms of power usage and imaging abilities. The lag between sensor and viewfinder is not really that much different than the mirror flipping up and down. And, in the near future, the mirror's ability to only flip up and down at 10 or 15 times a second will be a disadvantage compared to a mirrorless camera's 30 to 60 frames a second. And as the lenses get replaced by the smaller and lighter ones with equal abilities, the pairings will not seen so lopsided. And I have setup my EVF such that it is fairly easy to determine my contrast for my pictures. I thank this site for teaching me what "blinkies" are, which I formally used. But I have trained my eye to know the contrast level I am seeing in my EVF now. One can see the contrast levels in an EVF if they want to.

And as far as controls, even on my "old" E-M5 I am only two touches away from over 90% of all camera functions and 98% or 99% with one more touch. I can set two function buttons to automatically go to their presets instantly (I haven't even set them since the controls are easy to use). And two dials within fingers reach of the shutter button to alter manual, program, aperture, and shutter modes on the fly without letting go of the camera (don't even have to remove my eye from the EVF and I am left eyed). The only control that I have a problem with on the E-M5 is the video mode button - its too easy to accidentally turn on. Does anyone think that Canon, Nikon, Sony, Panasonic, and others are going to allow their products to be less convenient than Olympus?

And I fully agree with you about full resolution video cameras taking a lot of the future market, especially in the pro end market. A pro cannot miss shots and expect to remain competitive. Anything that might give one an edge over the competition will be used. And if getting that one "still" frame from that 60 or 100 fps will get them what they need, you can bet that they will do it.

n3eg Loc: West coast USA

I've been saying this since I did VGA frame grabs from camcorders in 1998 - this was how I got into digital photography. We'll need some big heatsinks on the sensors and processors though...

sirlensalot Loc: Arizona

Admitting I know very little about video, but I can't imagine the agony of sorting through shots at 100 fps to get one keeper for print, then moving into PP?
No disrespect intended, but I think we are a very long way from the demise of the DSLR.
I fully agree about the miniature bodies with full-size lenses. It has a comical look to it in my opinion. Have always found the weight an advantage to hold steady. Lighter bodies I think are the opposite. Using batteries faster opposes what DSLR manufacturers are producing these days (mirrored) often getting in excess of 1000 shots per charge. No advantage to having the life shortened by leaving the EVF on if that is your point.

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

This blogger admitted that he doesn't really understand how to operate the camera; I'm not sure whether this is a problem with Sony's instructions or with the blogger's understanding.

Frankly, I'll believe neither the claim nor the counter-claim until someone who actually knows what he is doing does similar tests. I'd be happy if someone who knows what s/he is doing stood by railroad tracks and took a burst of pictures of an on-coming train going at 40+ mph starting from when the train was a block away and ending when it reached him/her. A train is big enough that surely the camera would lock onto it, so we would at least eliminate that variable.

Having a useful and up-to-date viewfinder is important to me, but getting focus, especially of moving things, is issue #1 as far as I'm concerned

kymarto Loc: Portland OR and Milan Italy

We are not that far away from video do stills. Look at the line of Red cameras. They already have a camera with a sensor that is the DxO champ with a sensor rating of 101. Check out the Red Mysterium-x. That is still only 5K, but it has a tremendous DR and will shoot 120 fps at full rez, and is not much bigger than a DSLR. It's already marketed as a hybrid video/stills cam. And of course mirrorless...

Finding the right frame is easy. Just load a clip in s/w with a timeline and drag the cursor until you come to the one you want. You can also set the Red for any frame rate between 1-120 fps. This is available today, although the controls are, I understand, not well set up for stills. But the technology already exists.

Ultimately the mirror will go, no doubt, but we are not there yet.

countryman60951 Loc: Bourbonnais, Il

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: :lol:

lukan Loc: Chicago, IL

Enter the Panasonic GH4, with 4K video, and it won't bankrupt you. It's really an interesting piece of gear. ;)

kymarto Loc: Portland OR and Milan Italy

There will soon be other DSLRs with 4K, FF. Sony A7s will do it but only a feed to an external recorder.

CHOLLY Loc: THE FLORIDA PANHANDLE!

Sorry dude, but THAT steer won't breed.

I said that with EVFs, what you see is what you get and YOU responded by CLAIMING that OVFs gave more dynamic rage etc, to which I replied that the signal coming off the sensor in the EVF is much closer to the reality of what is being recorded than what comes out of the pentaprism/pentamirror.

THIS STATEMENT IS IRREFUTABLE, AND BOTH PRACTICALLY AND SCIENTIFICALLY TRUE AND CORRECT.

All the other stuff you have included is just fluff for the sake of argument.

ADDITIONALLY, the argument that OVFs are better because "all the pros use them" FAILS to consider that both mirror less AND EVF technology is NEW. And you can bet your paycheck that as time progresses, more and more "professionals" will adapt.

kymarto Loc: Portland OR and Milan Italy

Why are you so defensive? I said numerous times that both types have advantages and disadvantages. Are you the EVF police, here to outlaw OVFs because they are inferior to EVFs in some regards?

I use both. EVFs suck for quick action, having a refresh rate under 60 fps. EVFs suck for HDR high contrast situations. On the other hand I always use my EVF for critical focusing and I like it in dark interiors. In shooting video I am forced to use it and it is no issue. As to whether the signal from an EVF is a more accurate representation of the final image one gets from the sensor: that depends entirely on the quality of the EVF. A DSLR OVF (and I am not talking here about a direct optical viewfinder such as on a rangefinder camera) is an exact view through the lens. Do you think a 921k dot EVF is an accurate representation of a 36 Mpx image? Sorry, far from it. It is a rough approximation both in terms of resolution and dynamic range.

I said it before and I'll say it again: courses for horses. Both have strong and weak points. You can bet that if there was enough demand Nicanon would be making Crop or FF mirrorless, although I am sure they are watching the Sony A7 series sales closely.

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

This is an interesting view of the A6000.

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/sony-a6000/sony-a6000-shooters-report-part-ii.htm

sirlensalot Loc: Arizona

Gotta go with kymarto on this one. Great information. Your knowledge is appreciated.

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

The article I provided a link to basically says the same thing as I read it. Delay off the evf is noticeable, which means that we would need to learn new habits (I got my first camera in 1955. I got a Canon Elan in 1995, which was my first camera with a motor drive, and it has taken me 20 years to learn to depend on burst mode for moving/action situations; now I would need to learn to start burst mode a tad earlier and keep it going longer, since I'm not "wasting film", in order to be sure of getting the picture I want in focus)


I would think the place they would lose sales would be in crop sensor cameras because of lens issues - I'm guessing that the average crop sensor user would have to spend a lot less to re-create his lens arsenal, and full sensor users may not even be able to find equivalents right now. The biggest issue I would have right now with my crop-sensor camera would be getting the wide-angle (10mm-20mm Sigma) and telephoto (doubler added to a 18mm-270mm Tamron) that I have happily become accustomed to.