Deep DOF does have an advantage when you don't have to stop down as much. If you soot your M43 body at f/4 and you have to use f/8 on your FF body that equalizes light gathering. That's what Tomas says and he's right. And it does make it easier for your AF system.
HRM is not perfect. I wrote that. It has potential and I haven't learned to process it but I can see the possibilities. It does reduce noise and makes smoother skies and better color. It struggles with detail and motion. Some say Panny handles issues better. Maybe. I have no experience with it.
I also write if my primary use was landscape I'd go FF.
Thomas uses the D800 because it's a budget FF Nikon. He says for what it does it gives him 100% of what he wants for most of his work. He spends his money on lenses. You can see it in his video where he compares the two systems.
He prefers a FF system for his professional work because he says it's easier for him to get what he wants but he can do it with M43 and he does use the OM-1 for professional work when he doesn't want to carry the FF kit or it gets in the way. He photographs studios, portraits, events, concerts, and fashion shows that I know of. A lot of it in very low light with motion he says. He says the deeper DOF of the M43 system helps him get the subject focused because FF is too thin in low light with lenses wide open and it's more difficult for the AF system to find focus. Generally, he prefers the D800 but says he can do all is professional work with his OM-1.
Sorry, your top photo is not interesting, the bottom 1/3 of your bottom photo is black nothingness. You can't recover anything of it? There is data in there. I can see it. If you can't HDR would have been better.
You might know more than Thomas but from his photos and your photos and his background as a multidecade professional and a YouTuber with thousands of subscribers I'll go with Thomas.
I'm just a motorsports guy. It isn't demanding. It's mostly a matter of getting credentialed so you can get to the best parts of the track wheel the action is and you have a clear view where the public is not allowed to go so they don't get hit by a race car and disturb the event. You have to have access to the pits and garages, hang out with the corner workers in their stations, and avoid $500 entry fees. You need assignments from editors who trust you to write something on time that readers want to read and back it up with action photos. The photography is not so demanding. Since everything moved on the web they don't want more than 2000 lines horizontal and 1500 vertical. If you send them a gallery of 20MP images they complain the files are too big and they make you resize them.
Their readers like blurry backgrounds from panning but not all out-of-focus backgrounds. They want variety. IQ is not that important. They want action, not the ability to count rivets. It's more important to be in the right place at the right time. They like the photos in focus but don't need perfect focus. They like some out-of-focus when the shutter speed is too slow because is different.
Putting up 3MP images works pretty well because people steal them off your website. Very few people are honest about this. A cell phone image isn't worth much so who cares? These creeps won't pay for any photography. They think free = good enough. Some will buy a big print and it has to be in focus, it's clear and the car looks good and it's in an interesting location and angle on the track the buddy can't get to they will pay for it. My competitor shoots the newest Canon kit on a tripod. He rents it. His photos are excellent and he makes a living at it, enough to live in San Francisco. He sells 75-100 digital photos for $100 because they are really only 25-33 copies of the same photo. He's on a tripod. I sell a few photos for $100 because I roam the tack. Different business. We are friends and competitors. Our customers buy some from both of us. His photos are technically better but not as interesting. He freezes everything unless I come to the event. Then he has to show motion or the cars look like they're parked on the track. My photos more interesting and not technically as perfect. I want to do better. That's why I bought the OM-1. The EM5.3 and EM1.2 I used were good enough but not as good.
I shot an event with the 5D III and the R5 in rain and gloom, at a Rally school in the mountains over a few days when the temps ranged from the 20s to the 60s and the OM-1 hoping the OM-1 was almost as good. It's better. That surprised and pleased me. The R5 was better than the 5D III the facility owns for their own photography and slightly better than the R5 they rented to test as a 5D III replacement because it's getting pretty old and sed up and their 80Ds died.
After viewing hundreds of photos from all three cameras the school PRO photographer and I decided on average the OM-1 photos are better. We concluded they were better focused which made up for lower resolution, or was it lower resolution made them LOOK better focused? I'm still wondering about this. I'm not wondering which camera made the constantly best images. The OM-1. I also had 50% more reach in a kit that weighed little more than half the weight when I used the f/4 zoom and the images are equal or better. I enabled to take some images that were too far away for the Canons. Yes, they can crop more but you have to be able to see what you want to know when to fire the shutter. More reach = better. I don't see much difference in the DoF between them, not enough to matter to most people who would look at the images.
It even worked better with the 40-150 f/4 compared with the Canon 70-200 f/2.8, even in rain and goom. I could keep the ISO down because I was panning. Usually, you are in motorsports. I don't have to tell you how much easier it is to wander around a 300-acre field with trees and bushes and mud and snow and frozen ground and rain for 6 hours a day for several days with a 2lb kit, vs a 3-4 lb kit. It's a big difference. To make images as good or better with a light kit is a big bonus.
Image separation, DoF, and backgrounds look about the same in this application.
You don't believe me but I know what I see and I only care to convince myself. I have the best camera of the three. Whatever is out there, after this torture test, I don't need anything better.
For years, more than a decade, I was unwilling to break my back with three FF body kits the AP photographers humped up the hills of Laguna Seca in 90-degree+ weather in the desert sun for 7 hours a day over four days. They looked at me with disdain but I was on assignment with them and no editor ever rejected a single one of my photos even though I sometimes use consumer-grade lenses and CDAF-only bodies. They were not all world-class images but they were good enough to earn money. I wanted to do better to satisfy myself and now I can. You can find my work on Sports Car Digest, CorvSport BikeWorld, and Stuttcars. I haven't taken the OM-1 on assignment yet. The images were all made with older 16MP OLY cameras and better, some with the EM1.2 and some with the EM5.3. Some with an EM5, some with a PL7, some with a PM2 I had to use when the EM5 shutter broke out of town on assignment. Out of warranty, OLY fixed it for free. I think they sent me a new camera.
I've taken probably 100,000 motorsports and auto event photos. You can see some here if you care too -
harvey sherman motorsports - Bing images
And here -
Harvey Sherman Motorsports Imaging (smugmug.com)
Here are some photos taken way back with a PL7 and the 75-300 when the EM5 shutter broke. CanAm cars gong 100MPH+. I'd get whiplash if I tried this at the wall. Not perfect you can see from the crops, but very deep crops you can see from the resolution. Slightly cropped they can be sold as professional and they were. Few people could pan these and most pros were on tripods and could not take these images at all. That's the benefit of mobility. The OM1 and the 40-150 f/4 compared with FF and the same reach feels like carrying nothing at all. It's a one-lens trackside solution. I need two lenses and two bodies to cover the races with FF. For me, it isn't worth it when I've never been held back professionally from a smaller sensor.
These were taken with a CDAF-only body and a slow consumer-grade zoom. I can do a lot better now but for the date and gear I had, good enough to publish. Very difficult with this kit. Easy and better with the OM-1 and the 40-1450 f/4. Good enough for sure. I don't need anything better.
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"The Pelican Squadron" - Harvey Gene Sherman
https://www.amazon.com/Pelican-Squadron-Tale-Internet-Bubble-ebook/dp/B08FCY6V7Y
