MarkLeeds2k5
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When I felt like I had outgrown my point & shoot, I upgraded to an Olympus E-M10 micro 4/3 camera. I'm now wondering if I went in the right direction, or if an aps-c would've been a better option.
Wildlife/Nature/Birds are by far my main photographic interest. With that in mind I went with a 75-300mm lens (600mm FF equivalent, longest currently available for M4/3), and for reference the camera has a 16mp sensor. One of the great positives about it is that it's surprisingly easy to hand hold at 300mm. However a big negative is the continuous autofocus (the equivalent of Canon's Servo AF) is terrible when it comes to small fast moving targets - which of course are a big part of my kind of photography.
Also, even at 300mm, more often than not I end up cropping photos (no teleconverter is available), so that 16mp image often ends up as 4mp-6mp, which has been a bit limiting when I've come to print things out.
And lastly for nature photography, where small details can make a big difference, I've found 800iso to be my preferred upper limit for preserving maximum detail. Not ideal here in the almost always cloudy north of England...
Basically, I have been wondering if it would be worth changing to a Canon 70D with either the 100-400mm or 400mm prime lens.
In theory it seems I'd get:
- Faster AF speed (particularly Servo AF for birds in flight)
- Potentially longer reach, either with teleconverter or availability of longer lenses
- higher mp images to crop from (20mp@640mm FF equiv vs. 16mp@600mm FF equiv)
- Better noise performance allowing a higher iso
And in theory the downsides are:
- Bigger/heavier system. Not too fussed about this as I'm young and fit, and the E-M10 with long lens is far from pocketable already.
- Hassle/financial loss of selling the M4/3 gear, as I couldn't justify owning both.
Here are a few photos I've taken with the E-M10 to give an idea of A: the type of photos I take, and B: the image quality I'm getting:
My gut feeling is that if I could go back in time, I would buy the 70D instead of the E-M10. However since I can't do that, I'm left with the question of is it worth changing systems now, with all the hassle that entails, or would I not see a big enough difference in the useability of the cameras/quality of the output to justify the change?
Ultimately only I can answer that definitively, but I would really appreciate some insight on the matter from those with more experience!
Wildlife/Nature/Birds are by far my main photographic interest. With that in mind I went with a 75-300mm lens (600mm FF equivalent, longest currently available for M4/3), and for reference the camera has a 16mp sensor. One of the great positives about it is that it's surprisingly easy to hand hold at 300mm. However a big negative is the continuous autofocus (the equivalent of Canon's Servo AF) is terrible when it comes to small fast moving targets - which of course are a big part of my kind of photography.
Also, even at 300mm, more often than not I end up cropping photos (no teleconverter is available), so that 16mp image often ends up as 4mp-6mp, which has been a bit limiting when I've come to print things out.
And lastly for nature photography, where small details can make a big difference, I've found 800iso to be my preferred upper limit for preserving maximum detail. Not ideal here in the almost always cloudy north of England...
Basically, I have been wondering if it would be worth changing to a Canon 70D with either the 100-400mm or 400mm prime lens.
In theory it seems I'd get:
- Faster AF speed (particularly Servo AF for birds in flight)
- Potentially longer reach, either with teleconverter or availability of longer lenses
- higher mp images to crop from (20mp@640mm FF equiv vs. 16mp@600mm FF equiv)
- Better noise performance allowing a higher iso
And in theory the downsides are:
- Bigger/heavier system. Not too fussed about this as I'm young and fit, and the E-M10 with long lens is far from pocketable already.
- Hassle/financial loss of selling the M4/3 gear, as I couldn't justify owning both.
Here are a few photos I've taken with the E-M10 to give an idea of A: the type of photos I take, and B: the image quality I'm getting:
My gut feeling is that if I could go back in time, I would buy the 70D instead of the E-M10. However since I can't do that, I'm left with the question of is it worth changing systems now, with all the hassle that entails, or would I not see a big enough difference in the useability of the cameras/quality of the output to justify the change?
Ultimately only I can answer that definitively, but I would really appreciate some insight on the matter from those with more experience!
