Everyone seems to be talking about it! So I thought I'd better jump on the bandwagon.
I had my first decent camera back in the eighties (Yikes!) which was a Minolta and I loved it. Suddenly I felt like a proper photographer .. which I wasn't, but I wasn't bad. For some reason I resisted the urge to go digital for years and struggled on with my old film camera until finally one day I gave in. I'm always late to the party! I went digital with a Canon 450D. I looked around at most of the big names until I got bored and settled on either one of the two biggies .. Nikon or Canon. Reviews of both were very good so it came down to budget, and Canon nipped ahead. I loved that little camera with its 2 kit lenses and I learnt so much from it but the time came a couple of years ago when I felt I wanted an upgrade .. something a bit more intermediate than entry level. As I had got to know the Canon layout I figured I might as well stick with it so decided on a 60D. It wasn't the latest model at the time but it was good enough for me. I also got a couple of really decent lenses as well on the second hand market. I loved it and it has served me really well .. but man alive it's heavy! And I've only got a 70-300mm lens .. how heavy would a 500mm be?? Actually, I borrowed a friend's to try out so in fact I KNOW how heavy!!
Anyway, last year I kept hearing talk of these new mirrorless cameras that were really starting to get noticed. I didn't take too much notice until my friend switched her system from Canon to Olympus. Oh my, it's pretty. It's got the silver top which gives it that retro look .. and I wanted one. So my research began. I kept looking then walking away, then looking again. A bit like the early days when I resisted the urge to go digital, I convinced myself I couldn't afford to switch and backed off a bit. But then curiosity got the better of me. I met up with a friend and had a good old look around his Olympus EM-10, I spoke to friends at my camera club and then looked at Fuji XT-3 and then I got seriously into online reviews of all brands. I finally settled on Sony. OMG am I happy!! Light as a feather with a short 16-50mm lens on and still not particularly heavy with the 70-350mm .. compared to the Canon at least. The autofocus consistently gets wonderful reviews and the Sony has an animal eye tracking system so that once it locks on it somehow manages to .. well .. track the eye! It's witchcraft! It's also bloomin fabulous and gives a higher keeper rate than I've been used to getting that's for sure. I only switched in November last year so with all the lockdowns I haven't been able to use it relentlessly like I would have hoped but from what I've seen so far, if you've been thinking about dSLR vs mirrorless then my advice would be to do it. I can't wait to be able to get out again properly and do some real work with it. I've dabbled but I think I've only scratched the surface. I always love the spring but this year it's just going to be a bit more photographically successful!
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