BTM_Pix

Brilliantly contrary sir. Well played. And the most interesting choice as well IMO as it might be the one where Sony get everything right, for me at least. I've so very nearly bought both A7S's, both AR7s and the A6300 (as in been in the shop with the card poised) but always just stepped back at the last minute. I reckon this one might be the one I finally go through with and make use of the lens adapters I'd already sprung for before backing out of the purchases!

You're making a New Romantic comedy with a cast of five? Surely there aren't going to be too many laughs to be wrung out of a biopic of Visage. Presumably the last shot will fade to grey rather than black though.

I'll be honest, I'd want V-Log in it for that price. Mind you, if it was eight grand we'd probably all be a bit keener on extracting every last drop of use and performance out of what it did do rather than fixating on what next week's version from another manufacturer might have in it. Sometimes stuff being too cheap is a problem all of its own.

Those two QX cameras from Sony a few years ago might have been a hit if they hadn't made them the size of a can of coke and stripped a load of features off them. Seemed the perfect way to let someone who was ostensibly a casual smartphone photographer to have a bit more performance for holidays and special occasions. And for pros too actually so they could have something on them all the time if the need arose. But, being the size of a can of coke (albeit a mini bar one) kind of negated that, as did culling a lot of features. If something like that had become a hit and become the ubiquitous way of offering consumers a special occasion cameraphone (which is all they want really) then manufacturers could have kept their offerings completely separate and, ahem, focused on the needs of each user instead of constantly trying to shoehorn features up and down their ranges. The one that would be absolutely ideal would be this one but it would rely on a) More phone manufacturers offering the clip on concept and b) It not being abysmal quality. How Hasselblad have lent their name to something that actually downgrades the capture quality of the phone its connected to is beyond me But if they got it right then I think that due to the way people live their life with their phone welded to them it would be the product that would put most consumer cameras to bed once and for all.

Apologies for adding to the confusion, I was referring to the spec of the lens being a 2.8 rather than that the actual aperture that has been set.

Exactly. And this is the salient point here. Go and actually put a 200mm f2.8 on a M4/3 and then put a 400mm f2.8 on a FF and point them at the same thing. They'll look completely different. This web page is actually a decent source for it and the differences would become even more obvious with longer lenses than the 58 and 85mm used there. http://neilvn.com/tangents/full-frame-vs-crop-sensor-cameras-comparison-depth-of-field/

If there is only a marginal image difference between the two then due to the size differences it might well come down to that old adage that the best camera in any situation is the one you've got with you. The Mavic is very seductive to me because of that form factor. Even a 'small' drone like the Phantom ends up only being taken out when you specifically know you're going to do aerial stuff - and often only aerial stuff - as its not something you can pop in your bag on the off chance. Completely different proposition with the Mavic. The Karma might long term prove to be the better platform as you can change the camera but the Mavic looks the better product today to me.

And I doubt we ever will. There is an entire eco system involved that, as with Nikon evaluating getting into the cinema market, is just so well developed that it wouldn't make sense for other manufacturers to get involved. Its not just the obvious stuff like where are their 400mm 2.8s but everything else that is needed to get a picture from a camera to a picture desk in seconds under any sort of environmental conditions. That goes from everything like bullet proof wireless and ethernet modules through to the basic robustness needed to cope with the elements and the general physical battering they get. Its not that we don't want the advantages of mirrorless in terms of the weight reduction and cost reduction (particularly the ongoing highway robbery maintenance costs with shutter replacement) but unless it helps perform the overall task better than what we've got then we won't be changing. Ultimately, as RED found out with the RED ONE, its the overall task that really counts when its being used professionally rather than just the imaging module itself, as thats only one piece of the puzzle. If it doesn't fit into an overall eco system it'll be a big ask to get working pros to take a chance on it. Because of that, when we go mirrorless - and we definitely will - it will be with Nikon and Canon because the rest of the puzzle is already there. As for stills extraction, leaving aside the quality issue there are numerous reasons why it would need serious work to get it to fit into an editorial workflow. For one thing, we just don't have time to be scrolling through video to do the extraction. If a goal goes in then we're currently dealing with probably 10 or 12 frames to pick the best one and it then goes in one button press to be ingested, edited, captioned and ftp'd to a picture desk. And all of this is going on while the game is continuing and you're still shooting. Switching modes, scrolling through, marking frames, doing the translation to a still before we even start the rest of it? We just don't have the time for that and I know this for a fact because I've done live trials of it. However, the biggest issue is a bit more fundamental than that and its to do with media rights. Stills shooters are subject to heavy restriction at events as broadcasters have paid eye wateringly large sums for the motion rights. These restrictions determine how many sequential shots of a particular incident you can wire and a restriction on the overall number of shots per event so they cannot be reconstituted into a motion sequence. The restrictions are also related to the capture device itself so you can't use a DSLR in video mode unless you hold the broadcast rights. If you are seen using one in this way then you won't only be asked to stop, you'll have your accreditation revoked and removed from the stadium or event. Because of that, I'm going to say that the amount of pro sports shooters Nikon and Canon are losing D5 and 1DXii sales from to the likes of GH4 or anything else with stills extraction is likely to be zero.

I've got a foot in both camps with this really. I shoot with Nikon professionally as a stills shooter and it would make my life easier not to say cheaper if they were to push further/harder on the video side so that I wouldn't have to use my Panasonic/Blackmagic and RED gear for motion projects. On the other hand, I don't really want them to be diverting any resources away from developing and supporting what the core discipline it is that I'm using it for. Whilst its true that they don't have a cinema line to protect they do have their base to protect and, at least in the area of the business I'm in, they are in hand to hand combat with Canon for control of it. I can't imagine there'd be much appetite for diverting any resources away from those areas and risk losing that battle to fully open up a second front that they would already be playing catch up in. When I'm working at a major event and one of my bodies or lenses develops a fault, I'm not going to be too thrilled to go to the Nikon service desk and find out that they're all doing a roadshow at a local dealer trying to flog the D5 as a film making tool. Thats not me being conservative or a luddite, it just that I'm making a living from using their gear for what both they and I have determined its best suited for. Its a trust thing where I trust that they'll build and maintain a system that I can use for the purpose I need it and they trust that I'll keep buying 5 grand bodies and 8 grand lenses off them if they do! These things are only tools and as it currently stands, Canon make great chisels and great screwdrivers and frustratingly compromised chiseldrivers. Nikon make great chisels and maybe the lesson they've learnt from Canon is that chiseldrivers aren't just a bad idea merely because you've got a screwdriver line to protect but because chiseldrivers are just not a very good tool full stop. RED tried this the other way round. I was suckered into the idea that EPIC would herald a brave new world with its stills extraction and whilst yes it could do it, it was just so clunky to be rendered useless for anything other than very specific controlled circumstances. And could be outperformed by a dedicated device a fraction of its price just as my D5 is for video by any number of consumer mirrorless devices. What I don't really get though is the scorn for Nikon and by extension its users for them not diving headlong into this stuff. They make very good chisels and people who just need chisels are quite happy with them. It doesn't mean these people don't know what a screwdriver is or even don't have a use for a screwdriver. They just, you know, use a screwdriver for that stuff.