Jan 5, 2020
In this rather eclectic show I open the mail bag once again, talk about my new initiatives for 2020, discuss photography goals and I’ve got two pieces of recommended gear for you.
Links Mentioned in today’s show:
Join me in the Palouse for a Shoot-n-Print Workshop. May 24–25 and June 15–16. https://latitudephotographyschool.com/workshops/palouse-shoot-n-print-workshop/
Use this link AND the code "latitude15" the next time you need to rent gear. I'll get a small percentage and you'll get 15% off.
Lensrentals.com affiliate link: https://www.gopjn.com/t/SENJRktJT01DR09OS0lLQ0dLT0tGTg
Need to carry your gear in style? Treat yourself to a ThinkTank Photo bag with this link and get a free gift at checkout: http://bit.ly/2IMRhOT
Sign up to be the first notified when the new Latitude Photography School is available and open for business: https://latitudephotographyschool.com
Today I’m talking about:
Question: Renos wrote in recently saying, “I really enjoyed your podcast this week about the cropped/full-frame sensors. It got me thinking about my next step in photography but I have a bit of a dilemma.
I currently use a Canon EOS 100D (18MP) DSLR which I have had for quite a few years now and I’m really happy with it. It has a cropped sensor and the current lenses I use are all EFS mounts and Canon lenses (50mm prime 1.8; 10-18mm IS; 18-55mm kit lens with IS; and a 75-300mm zoom lens without image stabilization). I want to eventually get into macro photography but am doing a lot of portrait photography at the moment and wanted to better that with regards to quality and sharpness of my images.
I am looking to either upgrade my camera to a full frame DSLR or buy a much better quality lens (with an EF mount now) so that I will still be able to use it when upgrading in the future. I don’t have a lot of space to move around when I set up the studio as I do all of that in my living room currently. When using the 50mm prime to get the best quality photos I always have to step back quite a bit and if I did eventually buy an 85mm prime this would be even more difficult for me. The kit lens is good but I don’t get as great picture quality with it.
Would you recommend staying with Canon or moving to a new brand of camera? Should I stay with a DSLR or move to mirrorless? My budget isn’t a lot at this stage but wanted to know what I should be saving for and wanted some advice from you as I know you know a lot about this.
Please let me know if you need any more info from me.
Answer: My thinking is that if you stick with DSLR you should give yourself an expectation of about 5 years with it. Let’s say you stick with Canon. And you get a better lens now and eventually you get a 5D4 or some such. The prices are coming down with the market shifting to mirrorless systems such as the Canon R and Sony etc. But, all the EF lenses will also come down in price when looking on the used market especially. So with that, you’ve got something easier on the budget. Especially that 85mm f/1.8. That has already depreciated in price quite a bit on the used market, and will continue to slide over the next year I’m sure, though not to the degree other EF lenses will slide.
I’ve chosen to give Sony a look for one major reason. The mount is the same between their crop sensor and FF bodies AND all the lenses are interchangeable between the bodies. I like the flexibility that it gives. Plus, the mount is smaller than the new Canon and Nikon mounts and I like the actual size savings I see in the Sony crop sensor cameras. They’re really doing good work there.
However, switching camera systems is a HUGE undertaking both in workflow expectations and finances. Your current kit isn’t worth a whole lot on the used market so you don’t have the advantage of lessening the blow financially by selling it. There’s some value there, but not a whole lot.
So here’s what it comes down to, in my opinion anyway. Stick with canon for now. Give it 3-5 more years and take advantage of the price drops that will happen due to most everyone else switching to the R system or other camera systems. At that time you’ll be that much further down your photography journey and you can decide if the R system is fleshed out enough to stick with canon or to bail. At that time there will also be a lot of Sony A7Riv models out there on the used market so switching to Sony (if that’s your desire) will still be cheaper and whoa, what a camera!
For myself, I’m considering switching to the A7R3 as the camera on the used market is looking fairly decent and I don’t feel I need 60+ MP right now (though I would absolutely like it!) I’m also being tempted by the Fuji GFX system and if money were no object to me I’d go Leica SL2.
I’m starting a few new things this year. A part of me says I’m biting too much off, I’m going to deep into it. But I think I’ve got a good plan and I’d like to share it with you.
1. I want to get out more and more. I just love shooting. I plan to dedicate more time to shooting locally, up to three hours drive away.
2. I want to shoot more Astro, but right now I don’t have the best lens for it. So I’ll do what I can for now, I do have a star tracker I can use, so that helps, but I’d like to eventually work my way up to more deep space (longer lens) nigh photography. That will require some serious trial and error on the star tracker side of things.
3. I have one of two tracks for “getting out” that I plan to
follow. Either a.) visit at least four national parks this year or
b.) travel to two different international destinations that require
a flight (i.e. Driving to B.C. Canada doesn’t count, but if I
visited a National Park that would count for that goal) I’ve yet to
make my decisions but that’s the idea for how I see this shaking
out.
One idea for the National Park visits is a return to Alaska. I’m
going to apply for an Artist in the Park program up there and see
if that works out. In general they offer 8–12 day opportunities
going out in the backcountry with a ranger and I think that would
just be loads of fun and would be an amazing opportunity for some
incredible photographs.
4. Camera gear. Sony? Canon, others? Discussion on this topic.
1. Urban Access 15 by ThinkTank Photo http://bit.ly/2ml3QbU
2. BH-1 by Kirk Enterprises
Brent: Texture. Go hunting for texture and work to emphasize it. Find a type of texture and see how many different subjects you can shoot that speak to that type of texture. But only spend an hour or two doing this. Give yourself a time crunch to see what you can come up with.