In this thread, post good things about crop sensors!

ann · Sep 9, 2009

How did this discussion end up in the film section:er:

The D700 is heavier and IMHO people who have these also have high end glass which is usually (not always) 2.8 lens and they are bigger and heavier.

I was testing some lenses on the D700 and after a half hour i couldn't hold the camera still with the 105 2.8 len. Don't have that issue with my D100.
Perhapes it is old age, or some bodies are getting heavier; or both

robertwsimpson · Sep 9, 2009

Big Mike said:
Sensor size doesn't really equate to more or less weight. In Canon's line up, the 5D & 5DII are about the same as the 40D/50D/7D. It's the design/layout of the body and the materials used that affect the weight.

yes because your zoom lenses zoom farther!

Click to expand...

Not really...but we know what you mean.

One good thing about crop sensor cameras is that they have a deeper DOF than full frame bodies in the same scenario. It's not always a good thing, but sometimes it is.
For example, lets say you are shooting two people in low light. With a full frame camera, you might need to stop your lens down to F5.6 to get enough DOF to keep them both in focus. With a crop body camera, you have a deeper DOF, so you might be able to use F4 or F2.8, getting a faster shutter speed.

a very valid point! (although you could just step back, and then crop the photo after... that would irk me though)

robertwsimpson · Sep 9, 2009

Derrel said:
Many crop-sensor bodies are lower priced than larger, pro bodies. Some can be bought for under $500 with careful shopping. There are beginner, intermediate,and advanced crop-sensor models available. They can use the same lenses as full-frame bodies use. Kit lenses for crop bodies are small and light and inexpensive. Crop body cameras are getting better with each advancing generation. They DO produce deeper depth of field per picture angle compared with FF cameras, but that can be a good thing in many social photograhy and PJ/sports situations where the smaller capture format and correspondingly shorter focal length per picture angle gives the photographer 1.6x to 2.85 times more in focus area than with a FF camera.

The light little Pentaxes and Oly's and D60's and so on are inconspicuous,and do not draw much attention. A silver-bodied camera makes you look like just another snapper and keeps security people from hassling you.

lol @ the security guard comment!

true though

robertwsimpson · Sep 9, 2009

ann said:
How did this discussion end up in the film section:er:

The D700 is heavier and IMHO people who have these also have high end glass which is usually (not always) 2.8 lens and they are bigger and heavier.

I was testing some lenses on the D700 and after a half hour i couldn't hold the camera still with the 105 2.8 len. Don't have that issue with my D100.
Perhapes it is old age, or some bodies are getting heavier; or both

not sure, I thought I made it in the digital photography section.

I agree, when you're dropping 5 grand on a body, usually you can afford 10 grand on a lens too.

Garbz · Sep 9, 2009

The weight is marginally the result of the crop factor. The larger sensor needs a slightly larger mirror, but what it really needs is a larger pentaprism in the view finder. That takes up all the weight but again this is nothing.

What really gives the weight savings is the lenses!! An equivalent f/2.8 lens on a crop factor is much much lighter due to having less glass and needing to cover less area.

For instance the Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 is a good 350g lighter than the Nikkor 24-70 f/2.8. That's 12oz for you oz inclined people.

musicaleCA · Sep 9, 2009

Big Mike said:
One good thing about crop sensor cameras is that they have a deeper DOF than full frame bodies in the same scenario. It's not always a good thing, but sometimes it is.
For example, lets say you are shooting two people in low light. With a full frame camera, you might need to stop your lens down to F5.6 to get enough DOF to keep them both in focus. With a crop body camera, you have a deeper DOF, so you might be able to use F4 or F2.8, getting a faster shutter speed.

That's a good point, though on a FF you're just as likely to make use of it's better signal-to-noise ratio and just up the ISO to compensate. And use a flash if you can and are shmart. But I know that that's saved my butt a little sometimes already.

Antithesis · Sep 9, 2009

Garbz said:
The weight is marginally the result of the crop factor. The larger sensor needs a slightly larger mirror, but what it really needs is a larger pentaprism in the view finder. That takes up all the weight but again this is nothing.

What really gives the weight savings is the lenses!! An equivalent f/2.8 lens on a crop factor is much much lighter due to having less glass and needing to cover less area.

For instance the Nikkor 17-55 f/2.8 is a good 350g lighter than the Nikkor 24-70 f/2.8. That's 12oz for you oz inclined people.

Not to mention half the size, lol. That 24-70 is seriously as large as some 70-200's.

For some reason I prefer crop-bodies at this point. There are cheap lenses out there with all the modern amenities. Also, lenses are often more compact and have higher quality glass because a lot of lens technology has grown up alongside the DX format cameras. One example that comes to mind is the 18-200 VR. Another is all the cheap wide-angle zooms you can get from third-party manufacturers these days. I always thought it would be the opposite until I got a 5D and then found out that most wide-angles for full frame either have decades old design, are absurdly expensive are are just plain poor performers.

I also have to say that the ability to transform a 70-200 into a 140-300 F2.8 is awesome. That was probably something people probably only dreamed about previous to DX sensors.