Incongruence, Or Why Things Don't Make Sense Except When They Do!

Tom's Cove before sunrise; Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge, Assateague Island, VA (Click to enlarge)
Olympus E-M1, 12-40mm f/2.8 PRO lens @ 30mm; 1/60th sec. @ f/4; ISO 400

INCONGRUENT:

at variance   conflicting   contradictory   contrary   discordant   incompatible   inconsistent  disparate     divergent, etc. etc.......



As most of you regular readers know, I currently own three different format camera systems.  That, to me and by my measure, is too many.  I feel somewhat gluttonous in owning that much gear. However, also as most of you regular readers know, I'm been having a devil of a time divesting myself of at least one of those camera systems.  I like using all three systems, but I just don't need three. I can't seem to choose which needs to go.

I think I finally figured out why I'm having difficulty choosing which system needs to be sold.  Incongruence!  My 'photographic' life view and all of my distant past experience is inconsistent (or pick another synonym from above) with my current photographic experience.  What does that mean? Even though I know what is true concerning my gear and the images each is capable of producing, my mind keeps pushing doubts to the forefront and makes me question what is actually true.  Let me explain.

For most of my film photography days, which would represent about 30 years (pre year 2000), I mostly used medium format cameras for my serious photography.

I didn't care much for the quality of prints from 35mm film (negative or positive), from even the best cameras or lenses—and I used and owned Leicas, Nikons and Canons.  I found prints that were as small as 8" X 10" lacked smoothness in tonality transitions, had objectionable grain in shadows and skies, they didn't render the subject detail as I desired and the colors (in color film) didn't seem as well reproduced as they were in 120-sized color film.  In the end, most all of my 35mm work was in Kodachrome in those instances where slides were necessary.

In the mid-1970s I quickly jumped to medium format and found what for what I was looking.  For a while, I also used 4" X 5" (5X4 for those of you across the Atlantic) cameras and lenses for even better quality, but developing my own black and white 4 X 5 film, one sheet at a time, was somewhat tedious.  I standardized on 6X7 cm format.  Over the years, after trying many cameras, my camera of choice became the wonderful but clunky Pentax 6X7.  I made gorgeous negatives and positives with that camera along with Pentax's wonderful lenses.

Now comes digital and the incongruence.  My years of experience tells me that I need a large sensor to be completely happy with my images, just as my mind told me that medium format film was required to completely satisfy my standards for image quality.

When digital first arrived, my first digital camera was a Canon G2.  It was a 'toe in the water,' an experiment to see what all the fuss was about.  I still have it.  I was blown away by the quality of the images until I looked at them very closely.  At 4mp, the images looked as smooth in tonality as medium format film but there just wasn't much detail and certainly hardly any dynamic range.  But that was back in about 2000 or so.  But the colors were beautiful, there was no "grain" and the images had that same beautifully smooth tonality as did my 6X7 images.  How could that be?

Jump to today.  I don't have to go into all of the terrific improvements from which we all have benefitted from digital innovations.  I jumped to "full frame," in other words, a sensor that was the size of a piece of 35mm film (as that was as large as I could and can afford) because nothing less than that would meet my standards!  But wait!

In my photography today, I'm perfectly happy with 99% of my M4/3 images made from my Olympus E-M1 and the terrific Olympus PRO lenses.  Only on rare occasion, do I lament about some digital noise.  Very rarely.  Additionally, I don't lament about anything, except focus tracking, with my Fuji X-T1 and terrific Fuji lenses.  It has a larger, APS-C sized sensor.  Except for the weight and size, there is nothing negative of which I can complain about with the Nikon D810 and Nikon's top-notch lenses.  Nothing operationally at all.

My digital experience says that I am perfectly happy with a format as small as M4/3 (I have proved that over and over to myself over the past three years) and certainly I am happy with the image quality from APS-C, but psychologically, the incongruence in my mind tells me that there is no way possible I can be happy with those small formats.  How could it be?  They are so small!  They can't possibly produce images that meet my standards.  But they do!  But that can't possible!  But they do....

My mind tells me I better not sell the APS-C or full frame system as something will come up that will make me regret selling them because, again, M4/3 can't possibly do the job! But, again, it does!

Well, not to go on and on, but you get my drift.  At least know I think I know why I am having issues selling any of my gear.  My distant past photographic experience is in conflict with my current experience and my brain can't seem to successfully resolve that conflict.  Or, is it I just like all three systems and enjoy using each?

At some point it time, I think I'll have to get "photopsychotherapy" to bring my mind back to congruence.  LOL  

Seriously, I'm determined to make a choice and divest myself of one of my systems during 2016 (I think I may have said that about 2015 as well.  If I did, I failed.)  I think I want to see what Olympus and Fuji have up their sleeves, so to speak, in their next generation of cameras/sensors/lenses before I decide.  If I think what is probably coming out from them, actually is introduced, I shouldn't have any issues making a choice.  

I plan on keeping my Nikon gear for now as I'm trying to learn wildlife photography and that full frame system, excellent focus tracking, etc. is by far the best of the bunch for that function.  However, that too, may eventually be on the block if Fuji, Olympus or Panasonic up their game in focus tracking.

Ah!  The problems of the first world.  Why am I even complaining.  Shame on me.

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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