Smart Idea, Dumb Idea

You've said it and heard it before, "I was out and saw this great ... but I didn't have my camera with me to take the pix", or "I never take all of my camera gear on vacation with me it's too much to carry" etc. There are any number of laments from photographers about the images they missed because they didn't have their large, bulky SLR with them to capture it.

Then there are the innumerable people who do get the image because they have an I- Phone, or small low res camera with them that are easy to carry around. The problem is the low res images these devices, particularly the I-Phone take are generally useless except for viewing on the web.

Enter the smart idea: an adopter that lets you put any of your high priced Canon or Nikon lens on your I Phone. With it you can take sharper images, and control depth of field just like you would, if you were using your DLSR.




But it really is a dumb idea. If you own larger lenses, you probably (read absolutely) own a DSLR to use them. Why buy an adopter to use the lenses on a 5 (or possibly a new 8 megapixel) I-Phone when the DLSR can take much better quality images? Also, what advantage is it to have a small camera to shoot images, if you have to carry around such large lenses and an adopter to get better quality images from it?

The reality is somewhere in between. Everyone misses images at times because their equipment is too bulky to lug around everywhere. Everyone would love to have a device that takes top quality images of today's DSLR's, but at the same time is portable for carrying everywhere (and also does all the things an I-Phone can do to make it useful enough to want to carry it around all day).

The devices previously featured in this blog hint at how manufacturers are approaching the demand for high quality/portability/functionality. The EVIL cameras are winning over a lot of photographers as a useful second camera, and their power to take excellent images is only going to get better as they get smaller. The WVIL concept of putting the image chip on the lens itself, and combining it with a small computer/phone/camera back, is a unique approach that would allow users to upgrade either component as technology progresses. This design also offers the ability to shoot images with the lens detached from the camera body.

Finally, there is a new camera concept called Light Field photography that promises to revolutionize the way images are taken and processed. Lytro claims to have developed a technology that allows the camera to capture and process light from many different angles resulting in images that can be manipulated in various ways after they are taken. Images don't have to be shot "sharp", but instead can be processed after capture to achieve a variety of different effects.

It will be interesting in the future to see how the demand for higher quality, greater portability and functionality "converge".