I know.
Real photographers carry a Fairchild K-6 to the top of Denali.
Only if the tool they are using to carry it is an airplane
(I remember those "real programmer" posts on USENET and the whole
Real Men Don't Eat Quiche BS. As a person who sold programs written in FORTRAN, BASIC, Structured BASIC, Pascal, Object-Oriented Pascal, and C++, and on computers ranging from a CDC Dual Cyber to an Amdahl V7 to a Nova 1200 to a VAX to a Kaypro to a PC, I can say that Pascal programs made me the most money when calculated in terms of hourly pay. I wrote software as a side hustle, and was paid a commission on each license seat sold, not by the hour, so minimum time to product was important. I happily gave that up a little less than 30 years ago, when I discovered I actually do like quiche, and when I discovered I don't actually like programming all that much.)
My first large-format camera was a Linhof Kardan Color, while in architecture school. I learned then that my teenage years spent stocking groceries--carrying bales of barrel bags and kitty litter and milk crates three at a time around the store--wasn't going to go to waste, at least in terms of upper-body strength. That thing was a beast! The big Pentax is a good compromise of image quality and portability, but I still miss the image control capability of a view camera, and so still have lots of 4x5 film in the freezer. (Now, all I need is someone willing to process color sheet film with some semblance of convenience and affordability.)
The only thing worse that struggling to carry a heavy camera is not having it when the once-in-a-lifetime image appears when turning a corner.
Kiev 60:
Pentax 67:
Canon 10D (a mere 6 MP):
Canon 5D (only 13 MP):
Pentax 645z:
Sinar F2:
On the screen, all of these could have been done with an iphone and a lot of software manipulation, well, except for the lack of lens diversity. But the Pentax (both of them) and Sinar images can be enlarged to prints measured in feet with no loss of the sense of endless detail.
Rick "any excuse to show pictures
" Denney