Relative Size is a Priority of Choice

Olympus OM-D E-M1 with Sigma 50-500mm Four Thirds lens next to the Sony A7 with 35mm f/2.8 Samyang pancake lens

People who have not gravitated to the Micro Four Thirds or Mirrorless ecosystems often take the example of a large MFT body and large MFT lens to demonstrate that the smaller sensor of the MFT system is pointless when the large MFT combo can be / is larger than a smaller-by-design full frame system. I realised that indeed, I do have the requisite gear to demonstrate this aberration and made this photo, impromptu.

The trouble with big trouble with waving big hands and making statements that seem obvious like that is, the truth is often other than obvious.

This specific Micro Four Thirds gear

The E-M1 and Bigma combo looks monstrous. It is. And not the most comfortable or effective for Birds In Flight - in fact it's far from optimum in most use cases. The E-M1 is not the smallest MFT body - it's made weather resistant, tougher, with a big hand grip to offer ergonomic comfort when mounted with larger MFT Pro Level Zooms. It and subsequent flagship Pro Level Bodies is packed with mechanical and electronic features - fast frame rates, sophisticated autofocus systems, the most effective in-body stabilisation and so on. So, it is not a good demonstration of a small light body for travel and street photography.

The Sigma 50-500 zoom is a huge zoom from the era of Four Thirds E-System DSLRs when the E-3 body was not particularly small and lenses for it were not well optimised for super small size. Lenses in those days were not much smaller than the competing APS-C or Full Frame DSLR lenses. In fact, it is likely that this Bigma is not specifically designed for a Four Thirds sensor and could be an APS-C (or full frame) model grafted onto a Four Thirds lens mount.

I bought the Bigma for old times sake - to play with a now discounted lens that I had heard so much about from the old days.

This specific full frame example

On the other hand, the Sony A7 (original version) was specifically made as small as possible for a full frame model. Sony chose lens mount called the E-Mount, originally first shown on the Sony NEX APS-C models. New competitors in the full frame mirrorless market are pointing out in a mischievous manner that their lens mounts, designed fresh, come with larger orifices to potentially enable f/0.65 lenses.

In this initial A7 model, Sony could not figure out how to include in-body image stabilisation into the system nor silence the strident sound and of the full frame shutter.  In this and in subsequent models, the hand grip is particularly truncated in contrast to the Nikon or Canon DSLR grips. There is no AF joystick, the buttons are not backlit for night work like the DSLRs.

The Samyang 35mm lens is particularly compact. It is only f/2.8, the autofocus is slightly noisy and the bokeh is not the smoothest.  I chose to buy it because I wanted something small, light and less expensive.

"Real serious" lenses that full frame owners (for example, those owners of the Nikon D850 and Canon 1D / 5D) prefer are typically 1.4 (at least), have a substantial number of glass elements to correct for all sorts of aberrations, ensure smooth bokeh, ensure 48 megapixel resolution and sharpness. Such no limits lenses are in no way small, light or inexpensive.

Meaning

Although the MFT sensor is a smaller cropped sensor, you don't have to design or choose gear that is small. Conversely, although the full frame sensor is larger and gear tends to be larger, you can opt to sacrifice design targets to make specific gear smaller.

Food for thought

Memories of Dad

I’m here in Malaysia, where it all began so many years ago. And where I last saw Dad before his last rush to hospital. We’ve visited his resting place in Nilai a few times and it is peaceful there but that’s not what I preserve in my heart and my mind.
We used to go to Pudu wet market, we did.

Mum used to do all the heavy lifting – trudge into the wet places to buy chicken, eggs, meat and so on. The women of the household still do that. They used to wear local clogs and later on plastic washable sandals and they still do that.

Dad and I would wait in the cleaner areas and indulge in his passion for fruit – he was the gatherer of the fruits. I went to the place where we bought bananas and they still sell bananas there, but I don’t know the people, old or new.

It’s a darker corridor and there are side entrances

There were lots of things inside the dim market but as Mum did all the main shopping, I didn’t see the veil lifted. Shallots, spices and eggs.
There would be fish.
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And meatier stuff – curiosities like Pigs Ears.

If we stepped outside, we’d see all kinds of stuff on sale. Just because it’s a wet market doesn’t mean you only sell bloody meat or things that make you go Eeeuuww.

Flowers in garlands

As we walked back to the fringe, we would pass this Taoist worship ornaments shop

The shops by the road that sell fish are still there

Then Mum would still not have turned up. We would wait some more and see peddlars with fake Rolex watches (Dad always wanted a real one but settled for two Tissot in his life, he was realistic – his had a family to feed and two sons to send oversas to Uni on government officer salary). He would reward my patience with two types of Chinese pancakes – the thick and the thin types.
And sometimes, sometimes, I would catch a glimpse of something potentially scary and intriguing. The slaughter of a big lizard, turtle – often in a manner that might bring the RSPCA. Those days are gone of course, all you can see are frogs

The market is still full of wide eyed kids

and their Dad

And people who take might have the advantage of wide eyed adults

And that, is what memories of Dad and our time together is.

Thanks Robin Wong, Luke Ding, Yeow Chin Liang and all the gang for hosting the walk. And a hello to Mithun

12MP is enough (or was that 640k?)

del.icio.us Tags: Olympus,DSLR,FourThirds

Image via Wikipedia

The forums at DPR are going a bit ga-ga over the CNET PMA interview with Akira Watanabe, manager of the SLR planning department. He said - "We have no intention to compete in the megapixel wars for E-System".

It is quite common in conversations with self appointed gurus, to moan about how the small sensors in cameras keep being pushed into higher Megapixels whenever a new model is released. These people say that manufacturers of cameras should voluntarily step back from the Megapixel race. And now, when one manufacturer says so, the same people or other doomsayers step forward and say that staying at a plateau of 12MP for the Four Thirds sensor signifies the beginning of the end.

What people choose to skip, is the following remark by Watanabe-san - “Instead, Olympus will focus on other characteristics such as dynamic range, color reproduction, and a better ISO range for low-light shooting”.

It is also well espoused by reviewers and by the anti-Four Thirds opinionists, that the weak points in the Four Thirds cameras is about a stop of dynamic range and earlier onset of digital image noise (graniness). So Watanabe-san is simply stating that the company does recognise the challenges in this sensor size and they want to improve the performance of these aspects on a higher priority.

Certainly, if Panasonic (or less likely, Kodak) comes to the table and brings an even denser Megapixel sensor, it would not be logical to sweep such a gift into the rubbish bin.

Much is also made of Watanabe-san’s statement: "We don't think 20 megapixels is necessary for everybody. If a customer wants more than 20 megapixels, he should go to the full-frame models”.

Again, nothing surprising in that. Lots of people don’t need the 20MP. Look at the long sales life and service life of the redoubtable Nikon D40 – a 6MP camera. And routinely still recommended as a useful camera – with punchy colours, low image noise. Many people, including myself, seldom print now (again there are aged, veteran photographers who frown on this and insist that the object of photography IS PRINTING) – and certainly web images or screen images, as a output result, uses less than 2MP.

So, why the angst? Why the neurotic chest thumping? It’s because someone practical and pragmatic stood up and announced that there is a finite limit to real sensors and real optics and the Four Thirds design as at the time of the interview.

Will there be electronic and optical improvements? Sure. By how much and how soon?

Should aspiring pros and pro-like fans abandon Four Thirds as of now so that they can fill their bag with CaNikZeiss lenses? Maybe. If you must have the huge Megapixel, the wafer thin DOF, the super creamy bokeh that an 85mm f/1.2 lens will deliver, the ISO 2500 without digital image noise, then they should have left the station like, oh, a year ago.

For the rest of us, the practical niceties of the Four Thirds system daily proves it’s worth. And when the time comes, when the legendary 24x36mm “full frame” sensor DSLR sells at today’s entry level price, we’ll take our options then. Until then, Carpe Diem – don’t burden yourself with the perceived loss of assets that aren’t.

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Manual Focus Me

Image via Wikipedia I just bought a second hand Tokina f/3.5 200mm Minolta MD mount lens. It does have a little fungus on the lens rim, but the weight feel, the smoothness of the focussing action is simply classy. The lens barrel is all metal, Made In Japan - in an era when they were. I quite like my fibreglass bodied modern Zuiko Digital kit lenses that came with the Olympus E-510 - they're light, quick working (in bright light) and small. But they don't feel at all like these classic old lenses.

I'll find some time to shoot in the weekend, maybe. And try the old, hand me down, Vivitar Series 1, 70-210mm f/3.5 manual focus zoom as well. That's even fungusier.

Stay tuned.

The Four Thirds and Micro Four Thirds Standards

Olympus and Panasonic have just announced the Micro Four Thirds Standard. It's obvious that this is a significant milestone in the evolution of the digital camera. To the extent that Phil Askey penned a short commentary when reporting the announcement.

What's so significant?

1. Commercially, the Four Thirds Standard and the Micro Four Thirds Standard had to come from companies that did not have a strong vested interest in keeping pre-digital legacy lens mounts, lens catalogues.
2. Although it is not clear to me whether the Four Thirds and Micro Four Thirds Standard is truly Open Standard (as in Intellectual Property, free availability of engineering specs), these "Standards" are purposely declared to be available so that other companies do not have to reverse engineer the electronic and mechanical interfaces. I don't know what it costs financially to gain a ticket to these Open Standards for a would be manufacturer, but it is, shall we say, not specifically a closed door.

The significance is that there is a possibility that Kodak + Panasonic supply a sensor, Olympus and Panasonic (maybe others will join) that supply more than one body, Olympus, Panasonic, Leica, Sigma, maybe Schneider Kreuznach can supply Four Thirds and Micro Four Thirds lenses.

If any other brand can supply just one thing - either a sensor or a body or a lens, the empire and diversity of parts to mix and match will grow. If nobody wants to join the club, then this is just another proprietary, locked in, dead end idea.

3. The aim of the Four Thirds Standard is to make a smaller DSLR body and lens for the same telephoto magnification. The aim of the Micro Four Thirds Standard is to make a camera smaller than a DSLR and grow up the bridge prosumer camera to a larger sensor. This means you have one sensor size and in the long term, two lens systems, the longer one being useable on the shorter one.
4. It is difficult to do this in the shoes of the Big Two - Canon and Nikon - they are committed to
   1. the 24x36mm sensor size (requiring true full frame lenses)
   2. the APS-C sensor size (another lens system)
   3. if they want to independently create a Micro Four Thirds competitor, they have to come out with a short flange lens mount. (yet another lens system)

That's three lens systems they have to support and grow. If they decide to mount their full frame lenses on the APS-C sensor body, they don't enjoy any reduction in package bulk or size.

1. The Micro Four Thirds Standard can use :
   1. "legacy" Four Thirds Lenses that already exist, in autofocus and body image stabiliser mode. Thus scarcity of lenses is not as much an issue. True, the compactness of the Micro Four Thirds camera body with a Four Thirds lens would not be pretty, but you have a lens that may auto-focus, image stabilise and with no crop factor or magnification change.
   2. legacy manual focus lenses for various brands - Minolta, Nikon, Olympus, Pentax K, M42 - already exist for the Four Thirds bodies, then the Micro Four Thirds Standard will also fit those with the relevant adaptors.
   3. with enough reverse engineering, will and skill, current competitor autofocus lens systems in autofocus mode - since the flange distance will be shorter than any DSLR lens mount.
2. The purchasing public has long asked for an EVIL (Electronic Viewfinder, Interchangeable Lens) alternative to the DSLR (Digital Single Lens Reflex) with an OVF (Optical View Finder). There have been some prototypes and navel gazes but at the end of the day, the following cause some concern:
   1. How do you establish a commercially viable line of new lenses for the system?
   2. Who will expend resources and costs on initiating the proprietary lens system?
   3. At the end of the day, what is the ROI (Return of Investment) on such a venture, given that traditionally camera companies "own" the mount and thus other companies will be reluctant to support it.
   4. How will the pricing and price categorisation be viable given that that EVIL has to compete against the so called Bridge Prosumer Cameras and the entry level DSLRs - a very "hot" price level with lower volume sales than the USD 100 compact.
3. The camera body makers can choose to:
   1. make expensive Micro Four Thirds bodies
   2. make cheaper Micro Four Thirds bodies
   3. make bulky Micro Four Thirds bodies
   4. make more compact Micro Four Thirds bodies
   5. incorporate optical rangefinder mechanisms
   6. incorporate Electronic Viewfinder in addition to an LCD screen
   7. simply just have only an LCD or OLED screen.

Not every Micro Four Thirds Body and not every Micro Four Thirds Lens has to be tiny. This is a Standard / System. You can Mix and Match! Build them good, let them come.

del.icio.us Tags: Four Thirds,Olympus,Panasonic,DSLR,EVIL,LCD,Photography,Sensor Size