Print It - Nikon D500 vs Olympus OMD EM 1
The title is actually a trick. I'm not comparing the two cameras and in fact haven't used this particular Nikon. But I do want to make a point.
The D500 looks like a great camera. It's a DSLR with an APS-C sensor (or a crop factor of 1.5 compared to full frame) and the Olympus is a micro 4/3 with a crop factor of 2. It is also a great camera. And me, being me, recently fell into the rabbit hole of comparing specs between the two and reading the hundreds of pros and cons from various users who swear by Nikon or Olympus.
And then I read one article that stopped me cold. The article was on print size, as in what size of print would look good from shots taken by these cameras. And all though you'd rarely know it nowadays, that was, way back when, the idea of taking a picture; namely to print it. It was the only reference for whether you had taken a good picture or a bad one, and a roll of un-printed negatives wasn't much good for anything at all. The article I read was on the Olympus but I know the same could be said of the Nikon or most any good quality digital camera. Would you like to guess what size of print you can make from a shot taken at ISO 200 (on the Olympus EM 1 with its 16 megapixel sensor) that is rated as 'outstanding'? If you don't know the answer to this you might want to sit down, because it is 60" x 40". Not cm, inches. As in 5 feet by 3 1/2 feet. With outstanding print quality. The biggest picture I have ever printed (or had printed) in my life is 19" x 23" - 60" by 40" is a wall mural for god's sake!
So I ask; people are taking pictures with cameras with this spectacular capability, and they are worried about whether there are 158 or 129 focus points? whether it shoots to 26,000 ISO or 154,000 ISO? whether it has 16 or 20 or 21 megapixels of resolution? The real question is, who gives a rat's tutu? It doesn't matter (certainly not to the vast majority of people considering a Nikon D500).
Fuji has recently brought out a medium format digital camera - it sells in the $8000 range. However, word has it that it isn't selling well because, in spite of a dramatic increase in resolution over the current best digital cameras, i.e. full frame, you can't actually see any significant difference in the pictures between them.
Okay, I will do a brief comparison of the two cameras, because even though I haven't used the Nikon, I used to own them and have a pretty good idea of what that package brings. And what it brings imho is old school. It isn't so much a question of what it has, but what it doesn't; no image stabilization is built into the body, and in this day and age that is a major step backwards; it uses an optical viewfinder instead of an electronic one, and that means when looking through the viewfinder you cannot see what picture the camera is actually going to take - you have to hope that your exposure and white balance etc. are right, another step backwards; and last but not least it is bigger and heavier than the camera it is replacing, yet another step backwards.
Why insist on carrying around some obese camera? So you can print 70" x 50" pictures instead of 60" x 40"? Why buy the latest and greatest version of cameras when probably the one you have right now can outperform any expectation you will ever have of producing a print? Make that an outstanding print.
Just asking.