One of the new more popular camera formats is the mirror-less camera they are available in full frame now as well. I have watched a few online courses were certain professionals rely strictly on this camera. After learning a little bit about it it definitely has its place in the professional photographers arsenal.
However, just understanding what everything means can be an exercise in frustration, especially when all you likely want to do is buy a camera you can enjoy using.
To that end, I’m going to try and dispel a bit of the confusion regarding mirrorless cameras and hopefully give you some information so as to make an informed choice the next time you are in the market for a new piece of photography gear. We’ll explore some of the history of how cameras are constructed, as well as discuss some of the benefits and drawbacks to this new technology, but I’m going to stop short of making the subjective judgement call about whether mirrorless cameras are better than DSLRs. For me it’s not about which camera is better than the other, it’s about finding one that works with your style and lets you shoot the photographs you want. You can debate all this in the comment section if you like, but what I’m here to do is simply present information and try to be as unbiased as possible.
What is a mirrorless camera?
To understand the word mirrorless it helps to know a bit about the way most DSLR cameras are built. Almost all Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Pentax interchangeable-lens cameras share a similar industrial design: light enters through the lens and gets bounced off a mirror, through a special prism, to end up at the viewfinder. When you click the shutter button, the mirror flips up, which allows light to hit the actual image sensor on the camera, and voila your photograph is taken. This process might seem like a high-tech solution, but it’s actually a bit of an anachronism. Long before digital cameras existed, most of their film-based counterparts employed this same method to get light to the viewfinder, because it was a useful way to compose your photo before clicking the shutter. But thanks to advances in modern technology, this flip-up mirror method is no longer necessary, and a whole new breed of cameras is beginning to make inroads into modern digital photography. These new models have no flip-up mirror, and thus the term “mirrorless” was born.
There are many different types of mirrorless cameras on the market: some have interchangeable lenses, others offer a single built-in lens, and some with their own types of image sensors and other characteristics that are suited to more niche markets. But the one thing they all have in common is the absence of a flip-up mirror.
Believe it or not, you probably already own a mirrorless camera. All smartphone cameras are mirrorless, as are most point-and-shoot models. Instead of a tiny little viewfinder that you hold up to your eye, you can see a preview of your image right on the phone or on the back of the camera itself. And if you like shooting your DSLR in “Live View” mode, where you look at the rear LCD screen to compose your shots instead of the viewfinder, you are essentially using it as a mirrorless camera already. (The click you hear when you enter Live View is the mirror flipping up. It stays like that until you exit Live View.) In fact, many of the higher-end mirrorless cameras have even gone so far as to replicate the traditional eyepiece viewfinder, but instead of reflecting incoming light from a mirror, it simply shows a very tiny version of what would normally be displayed on the back of the camera.
Sensor size
Another component of mirrorless cameras that is a bit more technical in nature, but just as important to understand, is that of sensor size. In digital cameras the image sensor is essentially a piece of digital film that captures light, in much the same way actual film does. Full-frame DSLR cameras have image sensors that are the same size as a piece of 35mm film, but most consumer-grade DSLRs, and most mirrorless models, are crop-sensor cameras (below is a link to a full frame mirrorless camera). This means that the image sensor is smaller, which has two notable implications:
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The Sony a A7II is both mirrorless and full frame
They are not as sensitive to incoming light as full-frame cameras.
They affect the way lenses behave when it comes to focal lengths and depth of field.
The most common format of mirrorless cameras are in a category developed by Olympus and Panasonic called Micro Four Thirds, which refers to the size and shape of the image sensor itself as well as the types of lenses that can be used on these models. Other mirrorless cameras use an APS-C sensor, which is the same size sensor used in common DSLRs such as the Canon Rebel T5i and Nikon D3200 (however, even Canon and Nikon use slightly different image sensor sizes), but there are some models such as the Sony A7R that use full-frame sensors as well.In terms of surface area, full frame image sensors reign supreme. But cameras with smaller sensors are still quite capable, and there is more to a camera than the size of its sensor.
While it’s doubtful we will see crop-sensor cameras (whether micro four thirds or APS-C) reach the same high ISO sensitivities as full-frame models, many of them today are perfectly capable of shooting at values such as 3200 or 6400 without too much degradation in image quality.
Finish this article over at Digital Photography School
Source: Digital Photography School
Image Source: stanhua
