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I think you’re about 2 or 3 years too late with this comment. The switch to mirrorless is already here, Nikon and Canon have the majority of their core lens lin

by cactus2093 6y ago

I think you’re about 2 or 3 years too late with this comment. The switch to mirrorless is already here, Nikon and Canon have the majority of their core lens lineups out already for these platforms so it’s unlikely they’d replace them again for the next decade or longer. And yes, they are mostly better than previous generations across the board. Which is pretty cool, that something based on such a simple idea that’s been around hundreds of years still has room for major improvements.

andi999 6y ago
What is the deal with mirrorless? (no mirror, but why does this improve optics?)
- jmarcher 6y ago
  Most mirrorless mounts are significantly wider (diameter wise) and closer to the sensors so they are able to develop new lenses that can take advantage of that.
- DeathRay2K 6y ago
  Every element the light interacts before hitting the sensor degrades the quality in some small way. But losing the mirror doesn't really improve optics significantly. It's more about reducing cost and complexity in manufacturing, moving things like autofocus into software. The benefits to the consumer are quieter shooting and a lighter body.
  - Arelius 6y ago
    Yes, losing the mirror doesn’t really improve optics, however removing the mirror and related mechanism does allow one to bring the lens closer to the focal plane, which in turn affects the size of the rest of the lens elements. And makes everything smaller and lighter as you allude to.
    - ip26 6y ago
      which in turn affects the size of the rest of the lens elements. Sort of. The diameter of the front element is predetermined, a function of the sensor size, focal length, and aperture. Mirrorless cannot escape this. But, the shorter distance from sensor to lens does simplify the design of a good wide angle. Sadly, wide angles were never the big heavy lenses in the first place. The whole smaller & lighter thing is not a lie but pretty oversold. Some of the RF glass is actually bigger and heavier than the equivalent EF glass.
      - chiefgeek 6y ago
        Heh. You've never carried a body with a Nikon 14-24 f/2.8 or a Canon 11-23 f/2.8. They are beasts! But yes, the teles are generally the heavy ones.
  - joliu 6y ago
    Doesn't a DSLR work by moving the mirror out of the way of the sensor when taking an image?
    - Baeocystin 6y ago
      You are correct. That motion of the mirror itself is responsible for most of the noise, and some wobble of the camera as well. It's a trade-off, though. Seeing the actual image through the lens, and not a digital representation, which is what you get with a mirrorless system, has its benefits.
      - nomel 6y ago
        > which is what you get with a mirrorless system, has its benefits I never found those benefits. What would you say they are? Early on, the problem was mirrorless were slow in autofocus, and they had relatively terrible EV quality. Now they have better autofocus than mirrorless, and more importantly, with the very high resolution EV displays they have now [1], what you see is exactly what you end up getting. You don't have to guess about anything anymore, like what's going to blow out, which is fantastic. What you see in an optical viewfinder with your eye is not what your sensor sees is going to portray. I don't see any benefit to optical viewfinders at this point. [1] 5.7MP OLED EV!: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1494679-REG/sony_ilce7rm4_b_alpha_a7r_iv_mirrorless.html https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1494679-REG/sony_ilce...
        Baeocystin 6y ago
        The true colors of what you're shooting, the true dynamic range, and the ability to see to edges of the focal plane with greater clarity. What you see in a mirrorless camera has already gone through a great deal of processing to approximate what you'd see naturally with an SLR system. Which is fine for what it is! If you aren't shooting in a studio, the reduced mass of equivalent lenses with mirrorless systems is a big quality of life upgrade all on its own, for example. But the color representation just isn't there, and it isn't going to be until we get better color in our display systems. It's being worked on, of course, but there's a long way to go.
- Max_aaa 6y ago
  Also less moving parts, so this results in a more reliable product.
  - jen729w 6y ago
    And smaller. I think the days of a big ‘hero camera’ are behind us. People just don’t want to lug around the weight if they don’t have to, and it’s no longer such a status symbol.
    - ghaff 6y ago
      We went through this period where people bought an APS-C DSLR with a relatively cheap kit zoom lens which never came off the camera shooting on (A)utomatic. They weren't "wrong" but a lot of those folks would have been just as happy with a higher end P&S like Canon's G series. And, today, they're just fine with a smartphone.
- rodgerd 6y ago
  As well as the comments already made, there's another thing to consider: in a SLR or DSLR, the path used to determine whether or not you're in focus is different from the path light follows to the medium: the autofocus system has a screen that takes light from a mirror, and then adjusts the lens based off that measurement. In manual focus, you're basic it off the path the light takes to the focusing screen, via a mirror. In either case, when the photo is taken, the mirror whips out of the road (which generates mirror slap, another problem), and the light travels to the film or sensor. Since this path is a different distance to the one used for focusing, it requires only a small calibration error between the body and lens to end up with out-of-focus images. It is very normal to have to tweak the focus (higher end bodies will let you do this), or to have to have a body or lens physically corrected. No matter how exquisite your optics - in fact paradoxically, this effect is worst with high-end optics - the way the light path works here can be a real pain for getting good focus. Because mirrorless systems focus and capture from the same medium, this literally can't happen with your mirrorless camera.
  - jodrellblank 6y ago
    Does it help with using cameras for video footage, or would it be no problem to hold the mirror out of the way for a long time? (I imagine it being held in some kind of tension that wouldn't like long term force on it).
    - earthboundkid 6y ago
      My DSLR had a hard limit of 30 minutes video time, but I suspect this is because of the software issues, not mirror tension per se.
      - detaro 6y ago
        That probably was a tax/duty thing, the EU treats (treated? not sure) cameras that can record over 30 mins or so as video cameras which have higher fees.
        6y ago
- hadlock 6y ago
  With mirrorless, you can put the back of the lens closer to the sensor (don't need to flip a mirror out of the way at high speed) which reduces the glass needed for the same effective focal length. Less length = less glass. Less glass = less mass, which means less force required for an electric autofocus motor to push around all that glass. Modern zoom lenses have anywhere from 11 to 30 elements, in 3-11 groups, that move at different speeds relative to each other. Doing that with a tiny electric motor, precisely, for a decade is a tough task, especially when the mass of the glass starts to exceed 1kg. With a mirrorless camera, you can reduce the mass of the lens by ~10% for a full frame camera. With an APS-C sensor, mirrorless, you can reduce the mass by 33%. With a "micro four-thirds" sensor, the mass of the lens is less than 50% of a full frame. Rough numbers. As with everything, there are pros and cons to going with smaller sensors than full frame.
- rangibaby 6y ago
  The mirror being between the sensor and lens means that there is a dead zone where there can be no lens, which severely restricts lens designs. For example, for many years fast normal lenses on SLRs were 58mm “Biotar” not 50mm because a a new kind of focusing (retro focus) had to be adapted to work with a mirror in the way.
- cactus2093 6y ago
  I think a lot of the replies you’ve gotten focus on the wrong thing. Mirrorless in practice really just means the camera works more like your phone camera. You view the image on a screen instead of through an optical viewfinder. That brings some nice benefits, none of them are necessarily a game changer on their own but together it makes for a major step forward in the experience. Now the viewfinder shows you the picture more like it will actually look, the processor can see the image as you’re composing it before you take the shot and provide hints and show you that information overlayed on the image, the processor is involved in auto focusing and can do things like use ai models to focus on eyes, plus the physical benefits like there’s a big complex moving piece the camera no longer needs. Camera makers then used this change to make a bigger platform shift at the same time. Just like a major version bump in software, if you have breaking changes you’ve been waiting to make you might want to make them all at once. They widened the mount diameter of lenses, which combined with the shorter distance to sensor because of the lack of a mirror gives more flexibility in letting in more light to the sensor. And they built a new set of lenses around it, whereas a lot of the lenses in their old lineups were sometimes decades old and not designed for the crazy high megapixel sensors we have now and in the near future. Most of these new lenses released in the past few years have been very high quality, so to answer your question that’s really where the improved image quality comes from, this new generation of lenses.
robotmay 6y ago
Oh yes in many respects the mirrorless switch is already done. I don't tend to buy new camera bodies though; my most recent purchase was a 1Ds MKIII from ~10 years ago, as I want the build quality/weather-resistance you get from those pro models. I'm really excited to see what a pro mirrorless camera might look like in a few years (Canon only just released the 1Dx MkIII so it's not arriving just yet). The switch is quite obvious from the Canon release schedule - I don't think they have a single non-RF (mirrorless mount) lens being released this year.

andi999 6y ago

What is the deal with mirrorless? (no mirror, but why does this improve optics?)

jmarcher 6y ago
Most mirrorless mounts are significantly wider (diameter wise) and closer to the sensors so they are able to develop new lenses that can take advantage of that.
DeathRay2K 6y ago
Every element the light interacts before hitting the sensor degrades the quality in some small way. But losing the mirror doesn't really improve optics significantly. It's more about reducing cost and complexity in manufacturing, moving things like autofocus into software. The benefits to the consumer are quieter shooting and a lighter body.
- Arelius 6y ago
  Yes, losing the mirror doesn’t really improve optics, however removing the mirror and related mechanism does allow one to bring the lens closer to the focal plane, which in turn affects the size of the rest of the lens elements. And makes everything smaller and lighter as you allude to.
  - ip26 6y ago
    which in turn affects the size of the rest of the lens elements. Sort of. The diameter of the front element is predetermined, a function of the sensor size, focal length, and aperture. Mirrorless cannot escape this. But, the shorter distance from sensor to lens does simplify the design of a good wide angle. Sadly, wide angles were never the big heavy lenses in the first place. The whole smaller & lighter thing is not a lie but pretty oversold. Some of the RF glass is actually bigger and heavier than the equivalent EF glass.
    - chiefgeek 6y ago
      Heh. You've never carried a body with a Nikon 14-24 f/2.8 or a Canon 11-23 f/2.8. They are beasts! But yes, the teles are generally the heavy ones.
- joliu 6y ago
  Doesn't a DSLR work by moving the mirror out of the way of the sensor when taking an image?
  - Baeocystin 6y ago
    You are correct. That motion of the mirror itself is responsible for most of the noise, and some wobble of the camera as well. It's a trade-off, though. Seeing the actual image through the lens, and not a digital representation, which is what you get with a mirrorless system, has its benefits.
    - nomel 6y ago
      > which is what you get with a mirrorless system, has its benefits I never found those benefits. What would you say they are? Early on, the problem was mirrorless were slow in autofocus, and they had relatively terrible EV quality. Now they have better autofocus than mirrorless, and more importantly, with the very high resolution EV displays they have now [1], what you see is exactly what you end up getting. You don't have to guess about anything anymore, like what's going to blow out, which is fantastic. What you see in an optical viewfinder with your eye is not what your sensor sees is going to portray. I don't see any benefit to optical viewfinders at this point. [1] 5.7MP OLED EV!: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1494679-REG/sony_ilce7rm4_b_alpha_a7r_iv_mirrorless.html https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1494679-REG/sony_ilce...
      - Baeocystin 6y ago
        The true colors of what you're shooting, the true dynamic range, and the ability to see to edges of the focal plane with greater clarity. What you see in a mirrorless camera has already gone through a great deal of processing to approximate what you'd see naturally with an SLR system. Which is fine for what it is! If you aren't shooting in a studio, the reduced mass of equivalent lenses with mirrorless systems is a big quality of life upgrade all on its own, for example. But the color representation just isn't there, and it isn't going to be until we get better color in our display systems. It's being worked on, of course, but there's a long way to go.
Max_aaa 6y ago
Also less moving parts, so this results in a more reliable product.
- jen729w 6y ago
  And smaller. I think the days of a big ‘hero camera’ are behind us. People just don’t want to lug around the weight if they don’t have to, and it’s no longer such a status symbol.
  - ghaff 6y ago
    We went through this period where people bought an APS-C DSLR with a relatively cheap kit zoom lens which never came off the camera shooting on (A)utomatic. They weren't "wrong" but a lot of those folks would have been just as happy with a higher end P&S like Canon's G series. And, today, they're just fine with a smartphone.
rodgerd 6y ago
As well as the comments already made, there's another thing to consider: in a SLR or DSLR, the path used to determine whether or not you're in focus is different from the path light follows to the medium: the autofocus system has a screen that takes light from a mirror, and then adjusts the lens based off that measurement. In manual focus, you're basic it off the path the light takes to the focusing screen, via a mirror. In either case, when the photo is taken, the mirror whips out of the road (which generates mirror slap, another problem), and the light travels to the film or sensor. Since this path is a different distance to the one used for focusing, it requires only a small calibration error between the body and lens to end up with out-of-focus images. It is very normal to have to tweak the focus (higher end bodies will let you do this), or to have to have a body or lens physically corrected. No matter how exquisite your optics - in fact paradoxically, this effect is worst with high-end optics - the way the light path works here can be a real pain for getting good focus. Because mirrorless systems focus and capture from the same medium, this literally can't happen with your mirrorless camera.
- jodrellblank 6y ago
  Does it help with using cameras for video footage, or would it be no problem to hold the mirror out of the way for a long time? (I imagine it being held in some kind of tension that wouldn't like long term force on it).
  - earthboundkid 6y ago
    My DSLR had a hard limit of 30 minutes video time, but I suspect this is because of the software issues, not mirror tension per se.
    - detaro 6y ago
      That probably was a tax/duty thing, the EU treats (treated? not sure) cameras that can record over 30 mins or so as video cameras which have higher fees.
      - 6y ago
hadlock 6y ago
With mirrorless, you can put the back of the lens closer to the sensor (don't need to flip a mirror out of the way at high speed) which reduces the glass needed for the same effective focal length. Less length = less glass. Less glass = less mass, which means less force required for an electric autofocus motor to push around all that glass. Modern zoom lenses have anywhere from 11 to 30 elements, in 3-11 groups, that move at different speeds relative to each other. Doing that with a tiny electric motor, precisely, for a decade is a tough task, especially when the mass of the glass starts to exceed 1kg. With a mirrorless camera, you can reduce the mass of the lens by ~10% for a full frame camera. With an APS-C sensor, mirrorless, you can reduce the mass by 33%. With a "micro four-thirds" sensor, the mass of the lens is less than 50% of a full frame. Rough numbers. As with everything, there are pros and cons to going with smaller sensors than full frame.
rangibaby 6y ago
The mirror being between the sensor and lens means that there is a dead zone where there can be no lens, which severely restricts lens designs. For example, for many years fast normal lenses on SLRs were 58mm “Biotar” not 50mm because a a new kind of focusing (retro focus) had to be adapted to work with a mirror in the way.
cactus2093 6y ago
I think a lot of the replies you’ve gotten focus on the wrong thing. Mirrorless in practice really just means the camera works more like your phone camera. You view the image on a screen instead of through an optical viewfinder. That brings some nice benefits, none of them are necessarily a game changer on their own but together it makes for a major step forward in the experience. Now the viewfinder shows you the picture more like it will actually look, the processor can see the image as you’re composing it before you take the shot and provide hints and show you that information overlayed on the image, the processor is involved in auto focusing and can do things like use ai models to focus on eyes, plus the physical benefits like there’s a big complex moving piece the camera no longer needs. Camera makers then used this change to make a bigger platform shift at the same time. Just like a major version bump in software, if you have breaking changes you’ve been waiting to make you might want to make them all at once. They widened the mount diameter of lenses, which combined with the shorter distance to sensor because of the lack of a mirror gives more flexibility in letting in more light to the sensor. And they built a new set of lenses around it, whereas a lot of the lenses in their old lineups were sometimes decades old and not designed for the crazy high megapixel sensors we have now and in the near future. Most of these new lenses released in the past few years have been very high quality, so to answer your question that’s really where the improved image quality comes from, this new generation of lenses.

robotmay 6y ago

Oh yes in many respects the mirrorless switch is already done. I don't tend to buy new camera bodies though; my most recent purchase was a 1Ds MKIII from ~10 years ago, as I want the build quality/weather-resistance you get from those pro models. I'm really excited to see what a pro mirrorless camera might look like in a few years (Canon only just released the 1Dx MkIII so it's not arriving just yet). The switch is quite obvious from the Canon release schedule - I don't think they have a single non-RF (mirrorless mount) lens being released this year.