Hi all,
I had been wanting to take better photos than those I get from my phone's camera, and in 2017, I got myself an inter-changeable lens camera with a "Micro Four Thirds" (M43)-sized sensor.
Over the years, the main benefits I've found from using a M43 camera system are:
a. Much bigger sensor than that on hand phones
The M43 sensor is 10 to 13 times bigger than those on smartphones. Bigger sensors take in more light and are hence more versatile in being able to take photos under challenging light conditions.
b. Physically much smaller than the "professional" cameras
At the same time, the M43 sensor is about a quarter the size of that in the popular "full-frame" cameras from manufacturers such as Canon, Nikon and Sony, and only a tenth the size of the sensors in "medium-format" cameras from Kodak and Hasselblad.
While bigger sensors give more versatility in taking photos, they require bigger camera bodies and especially bigger lenses to let more light in to hit the bigger sensor.
For me, M43 cameras hit the sweet spot of better images than phone cameras, while not being too physically unwieldy for me.
c. Capture images in Raw format
Most smartphones take photos in jpg format. This is where the camera makes decisions on things like the brightness (or darkness) and white balance of a scene and discards any information of the scene that it doesn't use in its final image. With this image, you will no longer be able to recover details which were discarded e.g. in underexposed or overexposed parts of the image.
Raw files keep all that data so that we can decide on things like the brightness and white balance later with all the captured details.
While some smartphones these days have a mode which captures Raw files, they are usually in some "Pro" mode which have limitations like having to be in fully manual mode.
d. Optical zoom
With optical zoom, we can easily capture a wide angle to include more of the scene or zoom in on faraway subjects without losing resolution in our pictures.
Even with all the computational photography abilities of smartphones today, manufacturers are acknowledging that there's no replacement for optical zoom and are including multiple lenses and sensors in their phones. They may include an "ultra-wide" lens of 0.5x and a telephoto lens of 2x or 3x. But with an interchangeable lens system, we can use lenses from 0.3x to 10x.
e. Better handling
The form factor of smartphones are so that they can fit in a pants or jacket pocket. As a result, they are not ergonomic for taking photos, usually needing to delicately hold the edges of the phone while trying not to drop it, and then carefully stretching a finger to tap the trigger button.
A proper camera is simply designed for taking photos, with buttons and scroll wheels right where the appropriate fingers are.
I started a blog in 2017 to log my experiences and lessons in my continual journey to take better photos. Since then, I'll filled up the free space given at that site and so started this new one.
I'm still updating my previous blog if I revisit the places covered there, but any new places I visit will go into this blog instead.
Cheerios!
