[Thanks to Bru]
Smartphones versus DSLRs versus film: A look at how far we've come, article. (The first page is here.)
Splitting the difference between candlelight and daylight, around 6 years of technology has made up for the massive difference in the size of the lenses and sensors between the best phone and the $2,000 DSLRs.
I was stunned.
This isn’t saying that the Nokia is a better camera than a 2007 Canon EOS 40D. It’s not. Detail makes up just a tiny fraction of the goodness of a camera, and none of what makes it a pleasure to use. The Nokia is much slower, can’t focus on moving targets, can’t easily defocus part of the picture, can’t change the perspective and feel of pictures by zooming or changing lenses, and can’t capture the same range of brightness in one shot that the latest SLRs can. Yet.
The curious thing about this list is that everything on it except one — changing lenses — can be fixed with faster processing.
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I don't know how electronics will replace zooming or selective defocusing, but they probably will.
And so in 10 or 20 years, peasized embedded cameras will have replaced big, beautiful, specialized cameras, and I'll be a bit sad, because I like cameras as much as the results.
Update:
emptyspaces said...
That's an interesting article. For their tiny sensors, smartphone cameras are truly remarkable now.
But just try and get this shot with any smartphone out there.
Canon 40D and a $200 lens I bought used, taken through a double-paned glass sliding door (and not a particularly clean one). Just saying.
Still, I have gotten a few pretty great shots with my iPhone 4 in certain light, just because it was the only camera I had with me. But I always wished I had a real camera with me once I started screwing with the shots in Lightroom.
Good point, and very nice picture.
Well, somehow and some day, phones will have zooms or tele lenses too.
And background blur can be nicely faked, just a question of easier masking.
It's true, we must remember all the things they still can't do. But we must also remember that these barriers are moving constantly.
Just like in Hollywood vs digital. I've just ordered for rent Side By Side, a documentary Keanu Reeves made about digital/film film-making.
Me, I am always on the side of speed, effectiveness, convenience. Laziness sides with invention. Others are always on the side of the older medium. Either one can be an irrational and emotional stance, I guess.
I think it's Tarantino (and surely others) who gets *irate* about digital, like it's somehow forcing everybody to forever stay with the resolution of DVDs, instead of already now *enhancing* the quality and workflow of films remarkably. I just can't be having with that. Man is supposed to Think and Look a bit, not just... emote.
"The magic of movies is connected to 35mm."
I'm sorry, that's like saying that paintings has to be made with oil paint, otherwise it's not art. It's just such an incredibly limited viewpoint.
I'm guessing many people have had very strong artistic experiences when they were young, and they subconsciously have an equally strong association between that extraordinary experience and the medium it happened to be served on. So when that medium is threatened, they react badly.
Another example is knee-jerk attacks on ebooks "because they don't smell like books". (The only time I notice the smell of books is when they've been keept in humid rooms and smell a bit of mildew.) Take the text out of the books, and you just have dead trees.
Update:
emptyspaces said...
That's an interesting article. For their tiny sensors, smartphone cameras are truly remarkable now.
But just try and get this shot with any smartphone out there.
Canon 40D and a $200 lens I bought used, taken through a double-paned glass sliding door (and not a particularly clean one). Just saying.
Still, I have gotten a few pretty great shots with my iPhone 4 in certain light, just because it was the only camera I had with me. But I always wished I had a real camera with me once I started screwing with the shots in Lightroom.
Good point, and very nice picture.
Well, somehow and some day, phones will have zooms or tele lenses too.
And background blur can be nicely faked, just a question of easier masking.
It's true, we must remember all the things they still can't do. But we must also remember that these barriers are moving constantly.
Just like in Hollywood vs digital. I've just ordered for rent Side By Side, a documentary Keanu Reeves made about digital/film film-making.
Me, I am always on the side of speed, effectiveness, convenience. Laziness sides with invention. Others are always on the side of the older medium. Either one can be an irrational and emotional stance, I guess.
I think it's Tarantino (and surely others) who gets *irate* about digital, like it's somehow forcing everybody to forever stay with the resolution of DVDs, instead of already now *enhancing* the quality and workflow of films remarkably. I just can't be having with that. Man is supposed to Think and Look a bit, not just... emote.
"The magic of movies is connected to 35mm."
I'm sorry, that's like saying that paintings has to be made with oil paint, otherwise it's not art. It's just such an incredibly limited viewpoint.
I'm guessing many people have had very strong artistic experiences when they were young, and they subconsciously have an equally strong association between that extraordinary experience and the medium it happened to be served on. So when that medium is threatened, they react badly.
Another example is knee-jerk attacks on ebooks "because they don't smell like books". (The only time I notice the smell of books is when they've been keept in humid rooms and smell a bit of mildew.) Take the text out of the books, and you just have dead trees.
That's an interesting article. For their tiny sensors, smartphone cameras are truly remarkable now.
ReplyDeleteBut just try and get this shot with any smartphone out there: https://secure.flickr.com/photos/38416856@N04/10230149304/in/set-72157634692910297
Canon 40D and a $200 lens I bought used, taken through a double-paned glass sliding door (and not a particularly clean one). Just saying.
Still, I have gotten a few pretty great shots with my iPhone 4 in certain light, just because it was the only camera I had with me. But I always wished I had a real camera with me once I started screwing with the shots in Lightroom.
Good point, and very nice picture.
ReplyDeleteWell, somehow and some day, phones will have zooms or tele lenses too.
And background blur can be nicely faked, just a question of easier masking.
It's true, we must remember all the things they still can't do. But we must also remember that these barriers are moving constantly.
Just like in Hollywood vs digital. I've just ordered for rent Side By Side, a docu Keanu Reeves made about digital/film film-making.
Me, I am always on the side of speed, effectiveness, convenience. Others are always on the side of the older medium. Either one can be an irrational and emotional stance, I guess.
I think it's Tarantino (and surely others) who gets *irate* about digital, like it's somehow forcing everybody to forever stay with the resolution of DVDs, instead of already now *enhancing* the quality and workflow of films remarkably. I think that's just low IQ.
ES, what lens is that?
ReplyDeleteGood price, was it used?
I'm sorry, that's like saying that paintings has to be made with oil paint, otherwise it's not art. It's just such an incredibly limited viewpoint.
ReplyDeleteI do sometimes wonder if people are imagining it when they say things like "film is better than digital" or "vinyl sounds better" when in fact it sounds worse - you have the hissing and popping you don't get with lossless audio (now mp3 is obviously vastly inferior to vinyl).
I'm guessing many people have had very strong artistic experiences when they were young, and they subconsciously have an equally strong association between that extraordinary experience and the medium it happened to be served on.
Sometimes the digital version can be too perfect - and you get a kind of variation on the uncanny valley idea. Like in comic books, where the lettering was once done all by hand. Now, it's almost always done by computer - but mimicking hand lettering except that every letter is identical, which I find creepy. But I'm in my 30s, and someone much younger might not have that same feeling about it. It's not the same as illuminated manuscript vs printed book, though, because except for the earliest ones they didn't try to imitate hand lettering.
I also dislike digital coloring of comics because you get a precision never possible from a human and I like that human touch. Again, though, this might be to do with age - it's the way it was done in the comics I read as a kid.
Another example is knee-jerk attacks on ebooks "because they don't smell like books". (The only time I notice the smell of books is when they've been keept in humid rooms and smell a bit of mildew.) Take the text out of the books, and you just have dead trees.
I dislike ebooks not because I like the smell of real books but because I just prefer to have a paper book in my hands. It's not accurate to say they're just dead trees, though, because if you buy a really top quality edition you'll often get linen paper, and they might even be able to make it out of something else. Some countries are printing their money on what is essentially plastic. I also like having the individual books on a shelf rather than having thousands on one electronic device. I also wonder about the permanence of the technology. A book on quality paper could survive when civilization crumbles (I'm not serious about that).
Tarantino is spot on. It's a better experience. I was skeptical at first, thinking it was like the vinyl vs digital debate, but it really does make a difference.
ReplyDeleteYou fools are wasting your time. Eolake isn't interested in any opinion but his own. I'm not sure why he allows comments.
ReplyDelete