camera question for you photography buffs.

[SeldomSeen]

I have a question for you camera guys. As I've been outfitting my new grandby shell the last couple weeks, I'm planning on including a camera in my kit. I'm looking to buy my first serious camera. My photography experience has been limited to point and shoot since taking a photography class in high school in the nineties with an old canon slr.

Through my research, I think I'm leaning toward a mirrorless setup to reduce the bulk of carrying a full size dslr with the larger lenses. I was leaning toward the new sony a7 since it has a full frame sensor, but after reading extensive reviews, think it might feel more methodical than I'm looking for. The olympus o-md e-m1 gets amazing reviews, and seems to be pretty user friendly.

I want to use the camera to chronicle our trips, taking print quality landscapes, quick action shots of the dogs, wildlife shots, etc.

Here come the questions:

1) Have I gotten wrapped up in the blogs and reviews? Will the olympus be over my head and way too much for me? Will I see enough of a difference between this kit and say a sony nex6 to justify the price gap? When buying kit for various hobbies, etc, I'm usually about buying the right gear the first time instead of going the cheaper route and then upgrading in a year or two when I outgrow the starter stuff.

2) Assuming I buy the oly, should I go with prime lenses in 25 and 45, or get the 12-40pro zoom and then kit out some primes as I get more of a feel for what I'm after? The price would be equivalent to start with.

Thanks for your help guys.

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

Seldom, my recommendation is if you're wanting high quality large prints, that you reconsider full frame. The larger sensor and larger size pixels give much better results than aps c and m4/3s sensors. Typically, you have a much better lens selection as well. Nikon, Canon and Sony all make excellent gear. The pro quality lenses are much better than kit lenses. The holy trinity zooms (14-24, 24-70, 70-200 , all f2.8 lenses) are excellent, with very little distortion and diffraction. For action, look for a body that gives you a high frame burst rate.

Since I am spending your money for you, I recommend that you invest in a high quality tripod and ball head. A good article on tripods is by Thom Hogan . You will need a couple of good filters, too. A circular polarizing filter is a must, and I recommend a few neutral density and graduated neutral density filters as well. I normally do research on the internet, then purchase locally (ProPhoto Supply in Portland), but with filters, I find that I can get a better selection from The Filter Connection.

To deal with weight when you're walking, consider something like a Cotton Carrier. It's a chest carrier that allows you to be hands free on the trail.

Edit: good gear doesn't necessarily equate to good images. Solid technique and editing skills are just as important. There are great tutorials for all of those topics. Some can be found for free on the internet, some have a fee, but it's a way to jumpstart your skillset. Another good source of information is Flickr (shameless link to my photostream). They have interest groups that are centered around a camera make/model, lenses, and topic (e.g. Software, Landscape, Wildlife, People). You occasionally will encounter a butthead on Flickr, but usually there are lots of skilled and helpful photographers that are willing to answer your questions.

I totally agree with Lighthawk's post.

 

[Lighthawk]

^What Sagebrush said^

----------------------------

SeldomSeen. I am a photog buff, but don't have any experience with mirrorless cameras. They offer a much smaller form factor and I've read that they can produce some very high quality images. I'm not familiar with the models you are looking at, but be sure you can shoot RAW images on the largest size sensor, not just how many megapixels (which can just be packed onto a small sensor, but at significant loss of quality.) Well exposed jpegs are alright, but you are letting the camera do a whole lot of decisions on processing the image that I prefer to control when I process the image. In truth the work flow is more than the camera/lens, it also includes your software/hardware you use to process and organize you images.

You can never get too wrapped up in blogs and forums IMHO
You can read reviews and other user feedback at http://www.dpreview.com/
I like the discussion forums and buy/sell forum at http://www.fredmiranda.com/
I also like to read user reviews at http://www.bhphotovideo.com/, which is a good place to buy new gear, with a great return policy.

Part of the fun, at least for me, is to obsess a little over the pros and cons, but ultimately you will have to pull the trigger and purchase. One thing I've found as I've upgraded or outgrown my gear is that there is a good secondary market for selling and even carefully buying used gear.

Primes vs. zooms A good versatile zoom can be helpful, so long as it's not too slow. Get at least f4 or faster (f2.8 is twice as bright). For true low light performance and/or using narrow depth of field, a fast prime (f2) can be a just the ticket.
If you are trying for quick snaps of the dogs you will want a lens that has quick focus technology, which each mfg. tends to name differently. Same goes for image stabilization, which will help you hand hold to slow shutter speeds like 1/15 sec, but will not freeze action. I you want to do wildlife photography, you will want 300mm or longer focal lengths.

 

[billharr]

One more thing to think about. On another forum I am on someone suggested to see what your good friends use Nikon, Canon, etc. Buy the same if you can borrow a lens. The really good lens are big $$$.

My daughter shots professionally. You will also need to get a program like photoshop and invest time in learning it.

 

[Riverrunner]

Good advice from the pro's above! Everything they said has proven to be true at least for me.

FWIW - I was in the same place about 4 years ago. I went the DSLR route but not full frame as I'm just a "wannabe" and I'm happy with what I get out of them for now. The bulk of DSLR can be a pain but you just need to get a good pack to haul your gear around. For me there was a rather steep learning curve since I really didn't know what I was doing...probably still don't. I started out with kit lenses and have since move up a little in lens quality although I don't have the budget for f2.8's right now so I'm stuck at f4. Most of my photo's are outside so it works ok and the f4 are a lot lighter to carry. All of my bodies and lenses are used or refurbished. As mentioned a good tripod is a good investment and is something I'm learning to work with the last few months.

One thing I'll mention is JPEG vs RAW. This was something I had no idea about until after I got my DSLR. It wasn't until I started shooting in RAW that I started to get the quality of photo's I was looking for. Of course that meant I needed some software as I quickly out grew the standard Canon software. I now do my "developing" in Lightroom.

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

To follow up on Riverrunner's comment on Lightroom. Adobe, the creator of Lightroom, is the market leader in photo editing. The three main applications that they produce are Lightroom, Photoshop, and Photoshop Elements. I use Photoshop CS 6 (Creative Suite), but it is probably overkill for what I do. Elements or Lightroom would be sufficient for most of my work, and they are much more affordable. I had an early version of Elements, and from what I can see, you can do just about everything you do in a Creative Suite, in Elements. It's just done differently.

Adobe has recently changed their business model for Photoshop. It is now called Photoshop CC (Creative Cloud), and is done via the internet cloud. You can no longer buy the latest versions of Photoshop, you need to pay a monthly fee for it. I will probably stay with CS 6 until I can no longer get support for new camera models, then will either move to Lightroom or Elements, which you can still purchase and have on your computer.

If you shoot other than JPG or TIFF (and I recommend you not shoot JPG or TIFF, but rather shoot RAW), Adobe has to create software that takes the RAW proprietary format and converts it into a form that their software can work with. They bundle all of the camera formats up in a package called Adobe Camera Raw or ACR. After a period of time, they cease to update the version of ACR that older versions of Photoshop need, so the newer cameras are not supported unless you shoot in a generic format like JPG or TIFF. There are third party converters that will take your proprietary format to a common format that Photoshop understands, but I have not used them.

So, after all that rambling... My two cents worth is to use Lightroom and/or Elements. Both are relatively inexpensive. Both have a learning curve.

 

[SeldomSeen]

Thanks for the quick feedback. I really appreciate it. It looks like I've been lurking on the right photography sites since I'm familiar with all the ones you guys listed. I initially had my heart set on fullframe, but the sony a7 is the only realistically priced mirrorless fullframe (can't even afford to look at the leica). Here are the two reviews that got me leaning toward the e-m1. I know it's one guy's opinion, but I found it shared a bit on otger sites too. You guys know how internet reviews are though: read enough and you'll get so turned around you can't see straight.

http://www.stevehuffphoto.com/2013/10/12/the-olympus-om-d-e-m1-full-review-the-most-versatile-mirrorless-camera-ever/

http://www.stevehuffphoto.com/2013/11/29/the-sony-a7-and-a7r-camera-review-by-steve-huff/

The camera is a body only, so no kit lenses. The zoom lense I'm looking at is f/2.8. The primes are 1.4 and 1.8. I think I'll do the zoom and branch out from there.

I have lightroom and photoshop, so shooting raw and editing are options I'll learn to utelize. I'll research the filters because I'm completely ignorant concerning their use.

Thanks again for your help.

 

[pvstoy]

Another web page for more opinions.
http://www.naturescapes.net/forums/viewforum.php?f=57

Some post that mentions mirror-less
http://www.naturescapes.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=240249

http://www.naturescapes.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=237827

http://www.naturescapes.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=240177

 

[Riverrunner]

From the Canon software I went to Elements but found the workflow slow and cumbersome. Lightroom is much better and saves time I think. Once in a while I'll bring a photo into Elements to do some tweaking that I can't do in LR...but that is rare. My problem is I don't really know how to use Elements and have figured out enough in LR to do what I need to do. I know both can do a lot more than I'm capable of.

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

Remember that a 4/3s sensor gives a cropping factor of 2. That means your 12-40 zoom will give you roughly the same image circle as a 24-70 does on a full frame camera. It is a very good range for a walking around lens, but you may want to go to something wider for landscape, say something in the 8mm range.

I use my Nikkor 24-70/2.8 as my walking around lens, then use a Tokina 16-28/2.8 for my ultra-wide.

More on Lightroom... I am not sure that it allows you to use, or easily use(?), layers. My typical images use 3 to 5 layers, and on some up to 10 or 12. Maybe a Lightroom user could comment more on that.

 

[pvstoy]

More on Lightroom... I am not sure that it allows you to use, or easily use(?), layers. My typical images use 3 to 5 layers, and on some up to 10 or 12. Maybe a Lightroom user could comment more on that.

Lightroom no layers........

 

[SeldomSeen]

Well, I pulled the trigger on the e-m1 and the 12-40 f2.8 lens. I also picked up a uv filter, circular polarized filter, and a neutral density filter (I'll get more once I have a chance to play around with this one and actually start to learn a little of what I'm doing). They threw in a tripod, bag, sd card and filter case as well. Thanks again for the info gentlemen.

 

[Accrete]

Good comments and suggests, i enjoyed the read.

For any who may wish to dabble in a nice photo/graphic program that is well respected and free/open-source, you might download GIMP... available at _this link_.

I got turned onto GIMP some years ago when i was doodling in what are called PanoPlanets or LittlePlanets like this shot of Haystack Rock at Cannon Beach (<an original non edited version) down the road from my home on the oregon coast...