Smartphones will kill off DSLR's soon/

[Nootmuskaatje]

I realised a while ago, most holidaymakers with DSLRs spent way too much time trying to get a perfect photo (and not succeeding), when they should have just been in the moment. Beautiful ancient ruins in the Cambodian jungle where photo after photo is just utterly horrible. Best to leave the 'pro' camera at home and enjoy the journey...

Or only take it out when you really think you've got a lovely shot. I got a big backpack with a tripod and space for 4 lenses for hikes and a small shoulder bag with 2 lenses for the rest. No hassle to carry. I only make a shot when the scenario's good, not bothering with simple things. I started with shooting 200+ shots in a day and keeping 3-5, having the camera in my hand all day, to shooting 200-300 shots in a 2 week holiday and keeping 30-50. While it's mostly in my backpack or small shoulderbag.

Taking the weight off with a small shoulderbag was such a relief, but I wouldn't want to skip it completely.

 

[mhardy6647]

That would be you yes

Yeah, I know... me and smart phones just ain't a propitious pairing.

 

[solderdude]

Have both.
Each serves a purpose but are not fully interchangeable.

 

[Zensō]

I have a full Fuji X system, but >90% of the photos I take are on my iPhone 13 Pro Max. I now use the Fuji primarily for wildlife/birding. For people photos the iPhone is amazing, while being far less intimidating to the subjects.

 

[eddantes]

The last DSLR and camera (Lumix something or other) I bought was well over a decade ago... While I miss the lenses (wide open 50 with glorious bokeh; or a superwide with the fun barrel distortion), I'm more of a F8+BE_THERE photographer... So my Pixel phones have seen 100% of the duty for the last 7-8 years... I seldom print, and when I do 11x14 is the largest, so... my usecase is filled by the phone. I'm in agreement with this assessment. Cameras will only be for pros and some serious hobbyists.

(To add - the panoramic/photoshere modes on Pixel are so much fun and allow for what used to be "impossible" photos. Caveat: when used judiciously)

 

[Offler]

That's a valid point. I agree.

Having picked up plenty of cameras with SD/CF cards still in them, I realised a while ago, most holidaymakers with DSLRs spent way too much time trying to get a perfect photo (and not succeeding), when they should have just been in the moment. Beautiful ancient ruins in the Cambodian jungle where photo after photo is just utterly horrible. Best to leave the 'pro' camera at home and enjoy the journey...

This is something that digital cameras and later mobile phones brought to the photography. When you have film, you are trying to get best out of it, because its relatively expensive and inconvenient - so you dont want to afford to take bad pictures. On digital, you take more chances...

a) I realized that I prefer small mirrorless systems, with quality lens.
This is embodied by Olympus EM10, with Lumix DG (Leica) Vario Elmarit 12-60 F2.8-4.0. This is something I use when I just want to be in the moment as you say. All the controls are so easy and natural to me, that i dont even feel that I am operating the camera or doing stuff like composition.

Body is sized as of a compact camera, no prism, no mirrors. Lens has 5x optical zoom, but its so small and light I can operate the camera with just one hand.

b) you can take dozens of "good enough" photos from parties and events with a phone. Yet you can take great photos with decent small mirrorless system and good flash.
But since there is so many eager photographers with a mobile phones, there is really only few people who would appreciate that.

c) Architecture photos are hard to take.
And zoom cant fix it, you have to walk to get it right

 

[Jmudrick]

This is something that digital cameras and later mobile phones brought to the photography. When you have film, you are trying to get best out of it, because its relatively expensive and inconvenient - so you dont want to afford to take bad pictures. On digital, you take more chances...

a) I realized that I prefer small mirrorless systems, with quality lens.
This is embodied by Olympus EM10, with Lumix DG (Leica) Vario Elmarit 12-60 F2.8-4.0. This is something I use when I just want to be in the moment as you say. All the controls are so easy and natural to me, that i dont even feel that I am operating the camera or doing stuff like composition.

Body is sized as of a compact camera, no prism, no mirrors. Lens has 5x optical zoom, but its so small and light I can operate the camera with just one hand.

b) you can take dozens of "good enough" photos from parties and events with a phone. Yet you can take great photos with decent small mirrorless system and good flash.
But since there is so many eager photographers with a mobile phones, there is really only few people who would appreciate that.

c) Architecture photos are hard to take.
And zoom cant fix it, you have to walk to get it right

I don't know what smartphone cameras you have but the better ones from Google, Apple, Samsung, LG, Huawei etc are quite capable of better than "good enough" photos. They are improved with use of manual controls in some situations just like my mirrorless setup though 99 percent of iPhone/Samsung users never bother. They are better than mirrorless without question in poor light without flash. They have wide angle lenses for architecture and some have hardware zoom. Great photos are taken by skilled, creative photographers not gear, mobile cameras are simply making it easier for them.

 

[001]

Great photos are taken by skilled, creative photographers not gear, mobile cameras are simply making it easier for them.

Quite so. I have never heard anyone say "That's a lovely cake, you must have a great oven", yet some people still remark "That's a nice photo, you must have a great camera"

 

[Trouble Maker]

I realized that I prefer small mirrorless systems

Someone (maybe OP?) posted a graph with the decline of DSLR sales and if I had to guess it has at least as much to do with the rise of mirrorless than smartphone cameras, probably more so. I'm sure the point and shoot is all but obliterated now though due to smart phones, and the high end mega zoom all in ones probably by a combo of smart phones and 'low end' mirrorless. I'm one of those people who might have bought a DSLR at some point. But by the time I got around to it mirrorless was taking off and the form factor was much better for me so I got one of those instead. It's possible one of the reasons I didn't get a DSLR (sooner) was due to the size.

you have to walk to get it right

This is usually true.

 

[mansr]

c) Architecture photos are hard to take.
And zoom cant fix it, you have to walk to get it right

And sometimes you need a tilt/shift lens. I'm not aware of any phone with one of those.

 

[Trouble Maker]

And sometimes you need a tilt/shift lens.

I've fallen out of love with my (mirrorless) camera recently, have wanted one of these for a while, and think it could rekindle the relationship.

 

[Jmudrick]

Someone (maybe OP?) posted a graph with the decline of DSLR sales and if I had to guess it has at least as much to do with the rise of mirrorless than smartphone cameras, probably more so. I'm sure the point and shoot is all but obliterated now though due to smart phones, and the high end mega zoom all in ones probably by a combo of smart phones and 'low end' mirrorless. I'm one of those people who might have bought a DSLR at some point. But by the time I got around to it mirrorless was taking off and the form factor was much better for me so I got one of those instead. It's possible one of the reasons I didn't get a DSLR (sooner) was due to the size.


This is usually true.

I posted the chart and made the point that while mirrorless sales have surpassed DSLR they still only compromised 3 million units.

 

[mansr]

Quite so. I have never heard anyone say "That's a lovely cake, you must have a great oven", yet some people still remark "That's a nice photo, you must have a great camera"

A good photographer can make the most of whatever equipment is available. A poor photographer will take bad photos regardless of the equipment. Phone cameras can produce excellent results in the right conditions. Other times all they can muster is a blurry mess.

Here's an airplane propeller as seen by a phone camera:

 

[Jmudrick]

And sometimes you need a tilt/shift lens. I'm not aware of any phone with one of those.

I think we're all of the understanding that there are specialist use cases that smartphones aren't good for.. Next time I need a tilt shift lens (never) I'll borrow a camera so equipped. No one will be buying one "just in case" .

 

[mhardy6647]

A good photographer can make the most of whatever equipment is available. A poor photographer will take bad photos regardless of the equipment. Phone cameras can produce excellent results in the right conditions. Other times all they can muster is a blurry mess.

Here's an airplane propeller as seen by a phone camera:
View attachment 211769

What, like panoramic photo mode meets cat?

I mean... art.

Plus, you know -- propellers are so analog.
Is Elon Musk building anything with propellers? Jeff Bezos?
You can get a propeller beanie, but no propeller VR headsets.
I rest my case.

 

[Offler]

I think we're all of the understanding that there are specialist use cases that smartphones aren't good for.. Next time I need a tilt shift lens (never) I'll borrow a camera so equipped. No one will be buying one "just in case" .

Thanks for pointing it out.

That is basically the reason why I go with M43 system instead of mobile phone camera. Specific lenses, specific use, specific bokeh etc. I want to achieve optical effects using lenses, and not simulate them in post.

This is something and old-timer photographers do - set of prime lenses is superior to zooms. Most photographers I know settle for one good pro-grade zoom, maybe two.

If you want camera with replaceable lenses, the questions are:
- do you work with perspective?
- do you work with barrel distortion in wide zoom?
- do you use bokeh for subject separation?
- do you use light/flash for subject separation?
for DSLR:
- sport photography where even new mirrorless is too slow? (you still can get attachable optical viewfinders for mirroless)

And if answers are "no" or "there are filters for all that", then you really dont need anything better than a mobile phone. If the answers are "yes", you are moving towards pro usage of camera and you might get either DSLR or Mirrorless.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

And sometimes you need a tilt/shift lens. I'm not aware of any phone with one of those.

Photoshop can do the corrections. Not as good as a tilt/shift, but good enough for most situations.

 

[mansr]

Photoshop can do the corrections. Not as good as a tilt/shift, but good enough for most situations.

Software can approximate the shift part well enough. Tilt, not so much.

 

[Promit]

Someone (maybe OP?) posted a graph with the decline of DSLR sales and if I had to guess it has at least as much to do with the rise of mirrorless than smartphone cameras, probably more so. I'm sure the point and shoot is all but obliterated now though due to smart phones, and the high end mega zoom all in ones probably by a combo of smart phones and 'low end' mirrorless.

Here's an alternate chart I think you'll find informative:

Unfortunately don't have separate numerical labels for ILC vs fixed, but it should give the basic picture. The compact/fixed market collapsed. The ILC market has undergone a significant contraction, but it's not nearly as radical and I wouldn't say the data in this history points to a pending major collapse of that high end camera market. Indeed it seems to imply that ~2011-2015 represented a temporary bubble that faded. The contraction has driven a push towards higher margin products (full frame!), though.

My own experience is that the iPhone and Samsung camera improvements have been entirely about computational imaging ("AI") and that my experience with that has been mixed at best. When the camera is applying AI it is no longer taking an image of what's there, but rather using the imaging as a starting point to create something new. That something new may or may not be a good representation of reality. In recent iterations of the Galaxy and iPhone, I'm actually experiencing a downturn in overall quality. Settings like night mode are able to do some impressive things that my R5 can't actually compete with, but normal photos are an overprocessed bizarrely colored mess if you have an eye for this at all. This has led me to sour considerably on the prospects of computational and AI imaging in the general case.

I have been through quite a lot of phones and cameras over the last decade or so that I've been shooting photos semi-seriously. I'd never use a phone for serious work, but a dedicated camera certainly isn't part of my everyday carry. I've tried integrating smaller cameras (1" and m4/3) into EDC but I find them to be an awkward middle ground. Either I am not serious and use my phone, or I am very serious and use the high end full frame monster.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

Software can approximate the shift part well enough. Tilt, not so much.

Obviously if I knew I was going to be capturing images of interior spaces etc, I would simply take my DSLR and tilt/shift lens, fisheye 15mm, lights and all the other stuff to do that job. All other times I would save my back and just use the phone.

That's why I keep my DSLR, for that 1% of instances where I get paid to lug the thing around.