Are Full Frame SLRs Obsolete?

Started 11 months ago | Discussions thread
Scott Larson
Veteran MemberPosts: 5,305Gear list
Re: Crop sensors are certainly obsolete
In reply to socode, 11 months ago

socode wrote:

It was arbitrarily chosen by the manufacturers of 35mm systems as their target format, which is why it does not make sense to call 35mm cropped within the context of a 35mm system. Which is what the conversation was about. Do keep up.

So you're saying those lenses with baffles are 35mm lenses however those that don't have baffles (most of my lenses) aren't 35mm lenses?

Also if you take a look at the image projected by at least some of the lenses with baffles you'll find that there is a lot of image outside the "full frame" area. I just tested my 135mm f2 which has baffles. At the registration distance the image area is oval. It's surprising how much of the image is being thrown away. even with "full frame" sensors.


That's not relevant. The manufacturer will still have applied their tolerance/standards within the full area when they were producing a lens for 35mm. Anything outside the mind has tradeoffs.

It's extremely relevant when you want a photo that has corner to corner sharpness which many of these so-called "full frame" lenses cannot produce despite the manufacturers applying their obviously loose standards to that part of the image area. Fortunately these lenses perform much better with so-called "crop" sensors and that's one reason why I use them.



Do note no-one was talking about box brownies but specifically a 35mm system intrinsically being a crop format with respect to itself.

No one was talking about it because someone claimed circular formats never existed until I pointed them out, which showed that statements were being made out of ignorance.


Which is not relevant to a discussion about 35mm, specifically.

The origins of the 35mm crop format is completely relevant when people are ignorantly claiming it's not a crop format. It is an arbitrary "crop" format just like so-called "crop" cameras. With so-called 35mm lenses it also causes completely relevant problems with vignetting which cameras have to digitally compensate for and corner sharpness which no camera can compensate for.

The solution: crop from a smaller image area. Vignetting is now mostly gone (not quite with my 85mm f1,2 unfortunately). Corner to corner sharpness is now much improved.

It's ridiculous to say that "full frame" is the "right" format when it's completely arbitrary and comes with unavoidable disadvantages.

 Scott Larson's gear list:Scott Larson's gear list
Reply   Reply with quote   Complain
Post (hide subjects)Posted by
Keyboard shortcuts:
Color scheme? Blue / Yellow