And I haven't said they are; But I also think you grossly overestimate how important these advances are in the bigger scheme of things (the way a photograph looks), simply because you are rather interested in cameras in themselves, and your extremely detailed reviews and posts on how particular cameras operate reveal that very clearly.
There's nothing intrinsically wrong with being interested in cameras for themselves, but let's not fool ourselves: If I showed someone two 10x8 prints of much other than a macro at normal viewing distance , or indeed two 1024x768 jpegs on Flickr, one made from my old Canon IXUS at 7.1mp and one made with an RX1 at whatever it does, would anyone really be able to tell much difference?
If I look at the street pictures you were making a few years ago with your E-P2, Ray, they look no different to the street pictures you made with the RX1. See also Nic's point about FF vs APS.
I simply don't buy this idea that it's somehow objectively "easier" with every new generation of cameras to make photographs. It's certainly physically less stressful to go to the Tetons with a compact camera than to haul a 10x8 + tripod over there; but how much easier is it to take a picture of the Tetons with a NEX FF than with an XPRO1 (or whatever the current rave Fuji is)?
I agree that if you look at the street photos I made available for general viewing in 2010 or 2011 versus the ones I do now,
the ones that make the cut look largely similar. But what you never get to see is all of the misses from back then and the relative lack of misses today. The other thing you didn't see much of in 2010 (although this changed with the X100 in 2011) is very much in the way of low light shooting and more or less NO low light street shooting. And this is mostly due to improvements in the gear, not in my technique or skill. I started playing around with street photography in 2010 with an EP2 and I have a number of shots done in that time with that camera that I still like today. But my keeper rate was abysmal, due to a lack of ability to zone focus (without workarounds I hated trying to use) and the lack of much useable ISO beyond about 800-1000. Then I started using an LX5 which added zone focus to the mix, but the sensor was less flexible yet. The improvements in high ISO shooting don't just make a difference in really low light either - they make a big difference in sort of marginal light when you're trying to maintain both a fast-ish shutter speed and a small enough aperture to ensure deep enough DOF - high ISO is the only variable left and if it's there you get the shot and if it's not your odds go waaaaay down. And the improvements in DR on the sensor make a big difference too. As I'm walking in and out of shadows and shooting variably into the sun, away from it, from a shadow into light or from light into shadow, I'm constantly working the exposure comp dial on any camera I'm using. But even two years ago, I really had to nail that setting to get it right. Today, the gear is so much more forgiving - I obviously still try to get it right, but shots where I didn't quite get there are much much more useable than they would have been with lesser gear. The bottom line is that today I very very rarely miss a street shot because of technical problems - I miss plenty because my timing is off or it just didn't end up looking the same in the frame as I anticipated, but when I get those things right, the shot is almost always useable. Two or three years ago, I can't tell you how many shots I nailed in terms of catching the moment and framing it well, but they weren't useable due to an exposure miss or some motion blur or just missing focus. That almost never happens now. And I almost take it for granted until discussions like this cause me to remember it. There have been a few incremental improvements along the way that have all really contributed to this change. The latest has been the auto-ISO setup in the Nikon A that absolutely frees me from thinking about one of the key exposure tradeoffs (between shutter speed and ISO) that I used to have to put a lot of energy into monitoring and adjusting on the fly. Overall, the changes in just 2-3 years have made a Big BIG difference in my shooting experience. And more critically, in my keeper rate - to the extent I get more good street shots today than I did back then, its probably because my keeper rate is higher, not that I snapped fewer good shots in those days.
I agree that when it comes to shooting things like landscapes and architecture in good light, the differences between 16 and 24 megapixels doesn't matter much beyond the level of pixel peeping. But that's for me, because I don't print murals of my landscapes. I'm not gonna judge those who find that important for their own uses, but it's not a big deal to me. If it was I'd probably just own all three Sigma Merrills and nothing else because the resolution and detail on those is just scary, and I do enjoy looking at them at 100% as sort of a guilty pleasure. But they don't ultimately matter to me in the format I ultimately show and view my work, so I don't own any of them. But in low light or with big light/shadow discrepancies, shooting with the RX1 is an entirely different experience than shooting with the EP2 or EP3 would have been and is even a clear improvement over the OMD or Fuji X or Nikon A, although those are all very useable. But here's a somewhat extreme example of before and after of a quick grab shot I got with the RX1 this summer near Capri, Italy. Bright sunny day, shooting into a narrow opening in a rock, where the "tunnel" was very dark and the sky beyond was very very bright. This was no multiple exposure HDR shot - just a much easier time with highlight and shadow recovery than I've ever had with any other camera. I probably could have gotten something useable with a current m43 or APS camera, but not AS useable, and probably not as easily as with the RX1. The same thing applies in very low light shooting - I can get better results in more challenging conditions with the RX1 than I've been able to with any APS sensor. In some cases, by a little, in others by a lot.
View attachment 78455
Capri RX1-49 by
ramboorider1, on Flickr
Capri RX1-49-Edit by
ramboorider1, on Flickr
To answer your other question (or perhaps statement), yeah, I'm into gear. I've said a number of times that I consider photography and gear two highly related, but different, hobbies. I've always loved gadgets of all sorts and cameras are no exception. But I wouldn't be into it if I didn't see any utility in it. I wouldn't be into the whiz-bang just for the sake of the whiz-bang. But when I see the difference it can make and then experience it for myself, I'm real happy that I'm into both. Maybe we'll get to a point someday where the gear is sooooo damn good it stops mattering. I've thought we might be there a couple of times recently and was pleasantly surprised to find I was wrong. I actually don't know when or how deeply I'll get into a full frame ILC system because I don't think there would be many lenses I'd want at a size I'd be happy with. But I suspect I will at some point when there are a few good wide angle primes out there, whether its a Sony system or Fuji, or someone else. For street shooting, I still find APS to be a better sweet spot because deep DOF is a real advantage and what the full frame gains in IQ and DR and even in low light, it gives up in DOF. But if the sensors in a couple of years are another stop or two better than the current ones, I'll find that useful too - not because of the ultimate appearance of the photograph, but because of the range it gives me for the light I can shoot in with both deep DOF and a reasonably fast shutter.
So, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it. I don't begrudge anyone else their preferences, whether for extreme resolution, extremely deep DOF (some street shooters may always prefer the small sensor GRD3/4 over the new APS pocket cams), great DR, lightning fast tracking AF for action, or whatever. I have my own criteria and so far the gear keeps getting better in ways that matter to me, as well as in ways that don't matter to me, but clearly do to others. I can't dismiss any of it just because only a small part of it applies to my shooting.
