[quote=R.G.]Olympus Pen E-P7 with Lumix 12-32mm (24-64 equiv). Small enough to go in a fleece pocket. M4/3 sensor, IBIS.

Like you my pocket camera is not a point and shoot but the Olympus Pen EP-5. Like yours it has interchangeable lenses, IBIS, an easy bracketing function and very pleasant colors. I tend to use it with a Panasonic 14-45 lens.
Here is a shot I made yesterday while on Tamiami Trail (Highway 41) at a popular tourist place. The zoom was set to 18mm, equivalent to 36mm with a so called full frame camera.

Nice images Cindy.

Sylvia, as usual beautiful images. I keep on saying you are the magician of the kit lens.

I thank you all for your kind comments and thank you for stopping by.

When I saw that video of the lady using what I believe it was a Panasonic camera, I posted my thoughts about using a simple camera for a majority of our photography. That simple camera in my case is the Olympus Pen EP-5 with an old Zuiko 17mm f2.8 or a Panasonic 50mm f1.7.
Remember when cameras came with a 50mm lens? Today the manufacturers sell their cameras with a kit lens and the kit lens happens to be a zoom

Remember when cameras only had interchangeable fixed focal length lenses? We were living then with mostly mechanical cameras, all manual and with hand held exposure meters. Remember when nobody wanted a zoom because of their poor optical quality? I am mentioning all this because it is history but that was the time of basic photography when one needed to know what was doing to be a photographer. Cameras were popular then only with professionals and advanced amateur photographers, they were too complicated for those starting in photography.

The majority of the street photography done at the time was using a 50mm lens and usually a Leica rangefinder camera. A Gossen or a Weston Master exposure meter were our best friends when it came to taking an exposure. Pentax introduced a spot exposure meter that became very popular especially with photographers like Ansel Adams whose majority of his work was black and white. All history.

Now we have digital and excellent zooms along Photoshop. I see more photographers with zooms than those using a single focal length lens. I still keep a 1963 Nikon F that I bought while studying in Spain. That camera came with a 50mm f1.4 lens and I used it almost exclusively because I did not have the money to buy Nikon lenses at the time. I had a Konica camera before that but the Nikon impressed me with the quality of its images.

The exercise of using a single focal length is a practice I do often. The street scene in Puerto Rico that I posted yesterday was made with the 50mm Nikon lens. If anyone here wants to really enjoy this journey try a single focal length with a hand held meter and if the lens is like mine, a manual lens which apertures need to be set by the operator then the experience is much better. It teaches discipline.

Thank you for your comments. I am hoping to be back in Puerto Rico soon and this time I will tour the island visiting the countryside which I know is also beautiful...and less expensive than in the tourist Old San Juan area.

Bill, I surely enjoyed the video and I thank you for this thread. I could not agree more with her and with you and in many occasions I have reiterated that nobody needs high quality gear to make good images. Everything I own is old, I still keep Nikon lenses from the 60's and 70's and I use them regularly.
I believe that it is the photographer not the camera. Yes, technology impresses anyone and we can do with modern digital cameras what we never thought we could do years ago. Do that means periodic updates? My answer continues to be no.

I bought an Olympus Pen digital around 2002. I sold that camera and bought a refurb Pen EP-5 which I keep on using. I have beautiful enlargements made from its images. Most recently I bought the Olympus EM-5 Mk III ONLY because I wanted to shoot wildlife with Olympus gear. I would say that the quality of images made with my old Pen EP-5 is not that different compared to the new camera. The Em-5 Mk III has 20 Mp. while the Pen has only 17.

Now when I use my Nikons I find them very heavy and troublesome to spend a whole day using them. Any of my Olympus cameras can be carried in a pocket or in a small bag with two lenses and spend the whole day out there photographing without feeling tired at the end of the day.
As she said, we need sophisticated cameras and lenses for certain jobs only, the rest can be taken care of with simple cameras, no matter how old they are.

This was a visit I made to Puerto Rico, a few years ago in October. What a beautiful country considered as an associate state to the United States. Although the original language of this Caribbean island is Spanish for those who only speak English no problem, English is the second language and it is spoken practically everywhere.

I stayed in the Old San Juan district and for those of you not aware of it San Juan is the capital. The old Spanish architecture is so beautiful that I spent a whole morning photographing it. Houses with beautiful, brilliant colors that called my attention. It is perfectly safe to roam around at night in Old San Juan, I could see the police presence there since it is a touristic area. The people are very friendly and always willing to help, some of them stopped me and thank me for visiting Puerto Rico and that was really nice. Plenty of places to stay and plenty of excellent restaurants and food.

I was using for many of the images my Nikon D610 and the 28-105 f3.5-4.5 AF-D lens. The first image was shot with an old Nikon 50mm f1.4. For some of the images but specially at night, I used a tripod. As I said, I visited in October when it begins to get cold there. Prices are still reasonable in October but they get really expensive during December-February. In summer it is hot and humid as expected in the Caribbean islands.

No.1 is a typical street in Old San Juan.
No.2 is the San Felipe del Morro Castle that was built in 1539.
No.3 is the Rogativa, a prayer when British troops occupied San Juan. The troops left peacefully when Puerto Rican women went to the streets with torches. The statue is located in Plaza de la Rogativa.
No.4 is a sunset by the bay.
No. 5 is a typical Old San Juan street at night.

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I have watched it previously in YouTube. The design of a lens goes to optical engineers and computers the rest, as you saw is mostly done with machines till the final assembly. The video does not show the different types of glass that are used in the manufacturing process of a lens. LD and rare earths glass are used extensively today by all manufacturers. The same technology is shared by all independent companies. Quality control and precision manufacturing is what separates the good from the mediocre lens. Even in cheap kit lenses you can find good optics today.

Paul wrote: "At 45MP, just crop. After that, the best images will come from the best (longest) lenses and the best shooting technique."

I could not say it better. You have plenty of megapixels so cropping should be no issue. There is something in photography called composition, learn to use it effectively in your photography.
There is a tendency to "fill the frame" with the animal or bird in wildlife photography and I have also been guilty of that as a learning wildlife photographer that I am. It is important to show the viewer the habitat where the animal or bird lives and many times we take close-up of the animal and entirely forget this principle.

Always follow your guts when shooting wildlife and use composition for a more pleaseant visual design.

Hi Michael, yes the Miami Zoo is a beautiful place to spend the day and look at many exotic animals and birds. I thank you for your comments.
To all others, I do appreciate your kindness stopping by and taking a look at my images. I know they are not firs quality, I have said repeatedly that I am learning wildlife photography...and this new to me camera.

We have a great and friendly community, let's keep it like this.

Thank you all for the nice comments. I am still learning.

That bracelet has a lot of history built-in.

I am not what you could call a wildlife photographer. My photographic efforts went to portraits that I rarely practice now and landscape photography which is what I really enjoy doing.
During my previous visit to the Miami Metro Zoo I made a newbie mistake, I took with me my new Olympus EM-5 Mk III without being familiar with its AF. A majority of the images I made that day were pretty soft as to be expected.

Auto ISO and Auto WB are new features to me, they worked as expected although I set my shutter speed too high in shutter priority resulting in the camera selecting apertures too close to wide open.
This is not precisely a bad move but it was for me not used to that shooting mode. I am in aperture priority most of the time.

I find the AF of my new Olympus kind of complicated compared to the AF of my Nikon bodies. It has taken me several days learning its many features which I do no master yet. The Olympus EM-5 Mk III is an excellent little camera that can easily be carried with a couple of lenses in a small bag without issues. It is a traveling photographer’s dream. I did not feel tired at the end of the day using it.

I took two lenses with me, the old 17mm f2.8 and the new 75-300 f4.8-6.7. Why Olympus selected such weird apertures for this tele zoom is beyond my understanding. With a full frame camera, a term improperly reserved for sensors the size of a 35mm negative, the lens behaves like a 150-600mm lens. The micro fourths thirds uses the whole sensor by default, isn’t that full frame? The same goes with APS sensors. It is not my intention to start arguments in favor or against those "cropped" sensors.

I still need practice to fully realize how the AF of this camera performs. During editing I had many keepers but many images were soft or out of focus. I am showing here some samples of what I did. If anyone here is using this camera I am open to suggestions regarding the settings and techniques that have best worked for you when using its AF for wildlife or birds in flight. I still have a lot to learn about wildlife and birds in flight.

Finally, it was a hot and humid day that made me stop often under the shade and drink plenty of water. I guess the animals were not that comfortable either because many of them were hiding. If visiting Miami and you expect to shoot at the Zoo I would say January and February would be your best months to visit. I hope you enjoy the images.

No.1 and 2 are images of the flamingos by the entrance of the Zoo. Very difficult birds to photographs because they are in a continuous move.
No. 3 is a snowy egret, I did not see any in the Everglades during my visit.
No. 4 is a Sumatra tiger. It is not an actual wildlife image but she prefers the shadows in a hot day. She never came out to be photograph. I did not see her little pub either. No. 5 is a portrait of an elephant having lunch.
No. 6. I could not identify this bird. I amputated part of the left leg, a no-no. No. 7 is a sign inside the Zoo, I guess welcoming new visitors.
The last one is a female lion resting in the shade. She went to sleep after I made the image, what is called to be at the right time in the right place.

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Well, your chasing clouds paid off with this beautiful shot.