Interesting Revelation

USCGC Eagle Bowsprit
Olympus E-M1, Olympus 40-150mm f/2.8 PRO lens @ 150mm; 1/1000th sec. @ f/5.6; ISO 200  (click to enlarge)
Shot through a very dirty office window.

Over the past several days, I have written about and posted images of the United States Coast Guard Cutter Eagle's visit to the city in which I work.  The ship was moored directly outside my office window so I took the opportunity to photograph it as it arrived the first day.  The above image is one through my office glass window.  The glass is just not very dirty, but the outside is coated with some sort of non-removable grit from the shipyard and very large floating drydock directly across the river.  That, whatever it is, has come to stick on the window.  Would shooting through the window a waste of time?  Look at the above image as well as a few others from the same vantage point (see previous posts) and you decide.  

(Hint:  Adobe's new "Dehaze" feature really is some sort of super slider in that I now use it on many of my images.  It removed any performance degrading issues from the dirty window!)

The following day, I was able to board the ship and make many photographs of many of the details of the ship.  Finally, on the third day, I noticed the cadets were learning to climb the rigging (learn the ropes, so to speak?) in the morning, then in the afternoon, the crew was checking masts, pulleys and sails high above the deck before the ship's departure.  On this third day, I took that opportunity to make images of the people of the ship, rather than the ship itself.  Overall, I made a several hundred images.

Here is the interesting part and where the revelation comes in.  On day one, I had my Olympus E-M1 gear.  On day two, I had my Nikon D810 and on day three, I had my Fujifilm X-T1 gear.  I actually planned it that way.

After using mirrorless cameras the majority of the time over the past three and a half years, I have really adapted to them and their benefits.  So, when using the Olympus on day one, I felt at home.  But on day two, on board the ship, when carrying the D810 with the Nikon 24-120mm lens along, I found I was second guessing myself for proper exposures after every shot!  I had never done that before.  I found myself checking the LCD and looking at the histogram, the accuracy of focus (mirrorless focuses off the sensor itself and is inherently more accurate than phase detect sensor systems in digital SLRS), as well as the shallower depth of field of the SLR to ensure I captured a scene exactly how I wanted to capture it.

With the Nikon, I could not pre-determine what the final image would look like just by looking through the optical viewfinder and adjusting exposure compensation as I can do with my mirrorless cameras.  I knew in my heart, that if I didn't check the LCD and the camera's meter missed the exposure, focus or just the right depth of field, there would be no going back to photograph the same subjects again.  I disliked having to do that.

In the end, I found no advantage whatsoever to the optical viewfinder and, in my opinion, it actually slowed me down. It wasn't any brighter, didn't cover more than the 100% my EVFs cover and didn't give me more information than I get in an EVF.  In fact, it gave me less information.

I think I can safely say, no—I will say, I now prefer an electronic viewfinder to an optical one. That, to me, is a very interesting and unexpected change in my photography after 45 years of using optical viewfinders.  The future for me has definitely arrived.

Which set of images from which cameras gave me the most satisfaction?  Next post...

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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