DigiCam Reflections

Yesterday and today I've had some random musings and chats with a few other people about camera equipment, which made me decide to do something other then one of my weekly reviews and reflect and rant some about some conceptions and misconceptions when it comes to camera equipment and digital photography.

Before I go too far into this Rant, I digress that yes doing Digital Photography on a $8,000 camera kit or an iPhone is perfectly valid! You can get some good shots on both and the most important thing about Photography is that the Photographer is pleased with their own Photos; not what others think about them.  

The most important part of Photography is that you enjoy and have a passion for it regardless of what tool(s) you use.  Those who lose sight of this will find their photos to be un-inspired and will even lose interest in doing photography as a whole; finding it either as a chore or something to do mindlessly with no enjoyment of it. But that's a topic for another post.

With that said, let's move onto the Rant and let me geek out about why shooting more then just the "same $5000 camera or my Smartphone" for everything brings me a lot of Joy to a world that is otherwise quite depressing:

To start off we will establish that a DigiCam enthusiast like myself is fighting two mainstream photography "absolutes".  These absolutes are very much on the polar opposite ends of the spectrum.

The first Absolute of many Photographers is "The Most Expensive Equipment is the Best and will make you The Best".  This is the one that has always rubbed me the wrong way; whether it would be would-be "pros" with this mentality or people who do it because "they can" and don't mind flaunting their money.

But first I digress, there is a lot of cameras and lenses in a wide arrangement of prices, so some of the cameras in my collection where I "Only" paid $400-1000 for may be out of someone else's budget and look just as intimidating to them.

So yes, to a point I am slightly Hypocritical when I go off on really high end value cameras as some of the stuff I shoot is still an investment even if its less so. Or it becomes the same investment but spread out in an entire room full of cameras instead, the biggest difference of course is these were purchased over years of collecting vs dropping $5,000-10,000 all at once. 

I am still driving a point home from a prospective of that you don't need expensive gear to take good photos.  Some of my best shots ever were taken on a $100 camera with a $30 lens.  

Even if I still do on occasion take out gear worth slightly more then this I'm also just as happy to find joy in shooting something I found at a thrift store for $20. For me it all comes down to value; as one of my "High End" $800 camera kits is still an incredible bargain over an $8000 one.

It often feels pretty intimidating when someone pulls out their $4000 flagship MICL camera with a $3500 lens and half the time they are just doing it for attention. "Look at how much I spent on my Camera! Isn't it a great camera!?" Is the first thing that comes to mind any time I see someone wield a Sony a9, Canon R3 or Nikon Z9/Z8.  I won't even get into what the few Digital Medium Format shooters out there come across as at first glance to me.

Put in another perspective, here are some recentish photos of some of my camera collection, noting that a few of these cameras I may no longer have and it doesn't include a good portion of my collection (The photos cut off a good portion of my lenses as well as some of the more recent acquisitions such as my working ZS100 and ZS50 pocket cameras and Canon Rebel T2i DSLR)  

This gives you an idea of what I have to play with and I'll point out that every camera in these photos put together in these photos is worth LESS then a "Gear Chaser" full on pro body and "Professional Lens" alone; and this should clarify my perspective on this post:

A DigiCam collector like myself turns away from the "Less is More" mentality of many photographers. Why would I want one camera and 2 lenses when I could have 10 cameras and 20 lenses for the same price???  Our Thrifty nature decries that if we had $3000 we'd rather own 30 $100 cameras vs one $3000 camera body; we feel this would be a better Value to us. 

An enthusiast would see a collection like this and understand that the photos from every one of these cameras is going to look different then the other and that's what we pride ourselves on.

Since I'm a seasoned and experienced photographer I know how to pick up and use almost any (and I do say almost any as a few of these cameras are indeed absolutely terrible and far beyond saving) of these cameras and get some really amazing shots that are just as good or in some cases exceed shots taken with a camera that costs 10-20x more.  A skilled photography veteran will take better photos with a 20 year old DSLR then handing a random person who has never used an advanced camera before a Flagship Mirrorless Camera kit that's worth 40 times more.

I could (and may) someday do an entire argument on "Crop vs APS C" which would tie into this; but suffice it to say there are also old Full Frame DSLRs out there that now fall into the "Bargin Range" of a DigiCam enthusiast, so I can't be hard on that technology just for the sake of arguing sensor sizes.  

To that point there is indeed one Full Frame camera hiding out in this collection (an original Sony a99); but on a good day this camera is only worth about half to a third of what a brand new Entry-Level Full Frame camera would cost to acquire. The Sony a99 also has some unique quirks and flaws which give it the personality I seek (which I will mention when I review it later this year).

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The Second "Absolute" to Digital Photography is Smartphone Photography. Using your phone for photography stems from the adage that the "Best camera is the one you have on you". This is often a Core value of a DigiCam shooter that Smartphone companies have used to Zombify the public at large into accepting that their phone is the only camera they will ever want or need.

In the 2010s Smartphone manufacturers preyed on the people who believe that the only cameras that exist are huge full frame luggable DSLRs or a smartphone. During this time a lot of people were made to believe cameras like a Sony RX100, Canon Powershot G9x or Panasonic ZS100 were "Antiquities of the past that haven't been made in 20 years and my Phone is Better anyway!" without a second thought of considering a pocket camera as a viable alternative for everyday photography.

To a DigiCam enthusiast the answer to "The Best Camera is the one you have on you" is to pull out that Canon Powershot S100 we had tucked into a pocket alongside our smartphone.  This might be a shock to the public at large of why we would do this, but we have learned of a greater truth that many people are now starting to wake up to.

Marketing of Smartphone cameras in the late 2010s was insane.  Smartphone manufacturers made big claims about their phones such as "This Smartphone has a 48 megapixel sensor! Hey that's more then this Professional DSLR which Only has 24 MP!  See the Phone is Better!!!!" to ads depicting misleading impossibly clean photos that were either shot with a full on Pro end Camera and then claimed to have "Been shot with an iPhone! Honest!  We have no way to prove it but you have to believe me this was taken with an iPhone!!!" or used AI and hours worth of Photoshop edits to re-render a blurry smartphone shot into something way better then the phone camera could have possibly captured on its own.

As a result of this constant marketing onslaught of driving people away from standalone digital cameras by 2018 Smartphones had dwindled down the Digital Camera market to the point where serious camera review sites and magazines were starting to use the words "Is this the End for Dedicated Digital Cameras?" and the answer to that was thankfully, No.

In the early 2020s Digital Photography started to bloom on the heels of the Pandemic; and in doing so also started a Renaissance for "Non Smartphone Digital Photography" and the "DigiCam Revolution".  

A substantial amount of people started to wake up from the haze put over them by Smartphone Marketing. They started to look at photos taken from dedicated digital cameras from years past and realize "Hey these photos look different and better then what I can get on my phone!!" and thus the DigiCam revolution was born.

Old digital cameras that were discarded as E-Waste in the late 2010s were suddenly sought after.  Cameras that sold for $5 at garage sales and thrift stores a few years earlier were now popping up for $150 on E-Bay. 

I held out against the swarms of Cellphone shooters with my pocket cameras in the 2010s, and I'm glad I did.  Because I found something cool before the rest of society started to view it as cool.  I was a DigiCam Rebel long before the DigiCam revolution began.  

Even in 2018 I was fighting the good fight against both the $5000 DSLR and the newest iPhone because god damn was it so much more fun and interesting shooting with a collection of  old and weird cameras vs carrying a camera that costs as much as a decent used car or a non-dedicated device that is super awkward to take photos with as my primary camera.

To wrap up this wall of text thought dump I've got two mottos to share: Long Live the dedicated Digital Camera!  Long Live the DigiCam Revolution!