On Sat, Jun 20, 2009 at 11:44 PM, Ken Norton <ken@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> http://zone-10.com/cmsm/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=438&Itemid=1
> <http://zone-10.com/cmsm/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=438&Itemid=1>Finally.
> What a bit of creative writing this one was. Should be something in there
> to offend everybody.
Search on "who's" and change it to 'whose." (Wanted to get that in
before Chris B. beats me to it.)
I'm going to share my critique on-list because it's just one opinion
and if I'm off-base, I'd be happy to be contradicted for the good of
the corps.
I feel this piece should really be divided into several pieces with
more development of each part. The "This is the revolution" ending
sort of drops like a sudden curtain fall, and unless that's just an
example of exaggeration, it warrants more development of the various
sections. I think maybe a whole section on 4/3 coming of age and
maturing into a specific sort of sensor type, destined to explode in
the marketplace, is one piece unto itself.
Another would have to do with the whole viewfinder/LCD/EVF thing.
There in no revolution if the LCD-LV arrangement of m4/3 doesn't have
traction. I guess I wonder whether it can get its traction from the
disparate points of P&S cameras on the one hand and LV shooters on the
other. It seems to me the concept may succeed with the former but may
flounder if it is mainly dependent on the latter.
My experience with Speed Graphic is sketchy, so I had to look up
graflok back and figure out what you were getting at. I think you
should generalize that concept more and make that its own piece as
well.
Any possibility of your begging a loaner from Olympus so that you can
give a hand's on confirmation of many of your points?
No offensive elements, to me at least. The comment that Olympus's
sensors are subpar in dynamic range is generally what is reported, but
this seems to be based, where I have seen the opinion expressed, on
using third-party software to process RAW files. E3 RAW files respond
very differently in Studio as compared with Lightroom, for example,
but I am generally prepared to believe that DR is comparatively
limited as I tend to shoot to preserve highlights as much as possible,
and for some good reasons.
The sanctity of the FF sensor seems to me to be about making the body
fully compatible with legacy lenses. The same arguments FF users use
against 4/3 would be leveled against them by users of MF-sized
sensors. The "larger is better" argument goes on to infinity. If
there isn't a compelling reason to make a FF body to support OM lenses
(and it is clear that Olympus did not have any such reason), the
question is whether 4/3 is good enough. Akira Watenabe seems to have
implied that it is good enough at 12 MP (for something, but what?) but
not that it is equal to FF -- though he was speaking only in terms of
pixels and file sizes. On this point there seems to be room to make
the case that m4/3 is a very natural evolutionary development, but
does it live alongside the E-system or bury it? You could go deeper
into this and get everybody stirred up! For that matter, maybe the
cellphone shooters all migrate to m4/3 and all DSLR marques shrivel to
extremely expensive niche markets.
Using the clamshell P&S to lead in, rather than the Pen, is
interesting and more to the essence of the revolution, if that's what
it is, than Pen is -- for me at least. But again, maybe that's its
own piece: Why Pen is the wrong bit of the Olympus legacy to dredge
up for m4/3 ... But hey, is that camera actually an Infinity? It
just looks like a plain old Olympus Stylus Zoom to me.
So I basically see four substantive articles lying fallow here.
Joel W.
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