I reject reality!

We applaud Artists whose vision escapes reality and allows them to re-create on canvas what they see in their mind's eye, so why should we limit our photography to accurate reproductions of reality. Do you remember sitting on the shores of Lake Michigan watching a sunset with that favorite girl when you were a teenager? Carefully consider that image in your mind - were those grey clouds with a tinge of red orange and blue above a lake of grey-blue water, or do those colors burn with the flames of your romance and your thoughts of that night.

When we do a still life of a bowl of fruit, will we settle for that weak orange color of a Valencia orange, the thin red and green color of an apple, or do we saturate those images to increase the saliva flows and the desire to reach into that photograph and grab that fruit.

Study the B&W photographs of the depression and dust bowl eras, study how the photographers added noise and contrast to their images to convey the ultimate hardship of these people's condition. Should we not use saturation the same way.

My goal is never to reproduce reality, but to induce emotions, and saturation is but one tool available to produce that image.

It all depends on the situation. Smart phones have small sensors, but they have prodigious computing power, which allows them to compute their way out of a lot of issues. Of course, some of this computing may nibble away at sharpness, but sharpness is not the only criterion by which photographs should be judged. My smart phone must have built-in HDR, for example, because it does the best job by far of quickly handling pictures that include glaring light that would confuse any other camera I own.

There is an article in the latest issue of Model Railroader detailing how to use a cell phone to produce publication-quality photographs. In model railroading, the two biggest problems are close focus and depth of field. The results published in the magazine are pretty stunning. Two key subjects addressed were camera support and focus stacking. Kmqw9v--I've been living in denial also, but the examples accompanying the article are pretty impressive.

Just as a side note...serious model railroaders as a group are probably the only folks who are worse nitpickers than this group.

Here’s my take on it. A camera is a camera is a camera—has a lens, sensor and image processor. They come in different packages with different controls. Or few or no controls. In the end, they all produce a picture. The only question is what is a “real” camera? My answer to that is, they are all real cameras. A cellphone camera, in my opinion, is a throwback to those early era pocket digital cameras that had very few controls, and were all fully automatic, yet took decent images. There are different kinds of digital cameras for different purposes, and how one regards any camera depends on that person’s intended purpose. For the advanced photographer, a cellphone camera isn’t going to cut it, but for the person who just wants to capture a moment or a scene, I think a cellphone camera works well. That doesn’t make him or her a lesser person no more than does someone with a D850 make them superior. The camera doen’t make the photographer, the person does, as is often stated here. Of course there are many who simply can’t afford a big DSLR or high end mirrorless or bridge camera, but nearly everyone has a cellphone, and for many, that works just fine for a camera.

The problem with consulting a dealer such as KEH is that it will give you unrealistic expectations... Their prices are higher than what a private party can typically charge for an item because the dealer has already serviced the camera (either themselves in the case of KEH... or sent out to a repairer, in the case of smaller dealers), insured it's in good working order and warrants it for some period of time. In other words, they are able to charge a premium because buying from them is much less risky than buying from a private party.

If thinking of selling the item to KEH, they will only be able to offer a "wholesale" value for it... usually 33% to 50% less than they eventually will offer to sell it for. That's to cover all their cost of operation, plus some profit margin.

A more accurate way would be to search on eBay and use the "sold" filter to see what similar products have sold for recently, in many cases sold private parties. Takes a bit of work, but gives a much more realistic idea of value. There are lots of Mamiya C330 sold on eBay. Many with 80mm Sekor lens set. (Not may Makita e300s, though )

If sold on eBay, I would describe that camera as "like new in original box"... definitely NOT "never used" (unless you were the original buyer and you're absolutely certain it was never used by yourself or anyone else, before or after you bought it).