[nosnoop]

A Simple B&H search of B&H Dslrs includes both G1 and GH1

That's just because they have no other category to put them under, and they "looK" like a DSLR.

But just think, how can GH1 be a DSLR when it is "D", it has "SL", but there is no "R"!
If there is no "R", it's not a "DSLR"!

[lithos]

No. Because EVF is answer to a question no one asked. If the world had been up-side-down; we had EVF and no optical viewfinder, the invention of the latter would be a huge breakthrough - finally see exactly whats there with no interventions, with unsurpassed quality.
Optical binoculars are there because they are the best solution to a problem. We have glass windows in our houses instead of LCD screen displaying what the windows otherwise would have shown, because it is the obvious and logical way to do the job.

LCD screens in digital camera have their uses. EVF however, is cost saving measure and optical viewfinder will always be the high-end solution.

Aye. Oh, people say that in ten, fifteen years, "we'll have EVF quality approaching OVF quality"...but why wait for something that's not gonna be as good as what we have now?

Ain't nothing electronic that can approach the quality of a chunk of optical glass, or even a slew of mirrors. It just seems pointless and trivially expensive, for the sake of being expensive. Using an expensive hunk of circuitry, LCDs or OLEDs and power to do what a simple prism and a lot less circuitry...it's just pointless technophilia.

I think it'll be tough to sell that, since the Olympus Pens (with the smaller film size) were actually pretty hard to sell to anyone but serious photogs who had the bigger systems already and wanted something teeny-but-serious for when they knew what they didn't need.

...

I think the point where cameras stop being a device to do photography and communicate with a digital world, and become a mere intrusion of the digital world into the rest of life, well, that's when they stop being 'instruments' and start becoming 'appliances.' Sure, people'll take 'getting and having' images for *granted,* but they won't be photographers.

The very *appeal* of still photography, both artistically and even sentimentally, is *not* trying to make a poorly-stage-managed TV show out of things. When people look at old photographs, whether they're of artistic or technical merit or not, it's more contemplative than that. Folks are going to need things as always, to *stir* memory, not supplant it.

Aye. Very poignant, appropriate, and well-thought, RML.

Unfortunately, we've reached the "appliance" stage, or fast approaching it. I saw a poster for a Samsung phone with an 8MP camera on board; ask most any one if a meniscus-lensed sensor the size of a grain of salt counts as a camera, they'll say yes. This leads to many other questions.

And photos are becoming as untrustworthy as they are disposable. Philip Blenkinsop talks about that. Iranian missile test photos, anyone? Kim Jong Il not ill, walking around?

Given the choice of learning photogrammetry (the analysis of photographs - for signs of tampering, etc) or just giving up and saying, "Nah, they're all Photoshopped these days"...most people are gonna go with the latter.

And that has grave implications for us all.

(I don't know if what I said has any bearing on what you said, RML.)

[Art Vandelay II]

Has everyone seen this?

Olympus E-P1 Micro Four Third finally leaked | Photo Rumors

Olympus E-P1 (m4/3) front view | Photo Rumors

More Olympus E-P1 leaks | Photo Rumors

While I don't think it competes with the K-7 anywhere aside from the street shooter market, I'll be shocked if that camera doesn't eat up sales of entry level SLR's. I don't know a single "soccer mom" shooter that would rather have a K-M/Rebel/D60 over that Olympus EP-1. Man, that is one nice looking camera. Now I'm torn, I was really stoked about the K-7 (one camera to do it all), but now I believe I'll have keep my big honking Nikon and just get the EP-1 to go along with it. That EP-1 just looks too damn nice not to have.

[PNTXFTW12]

pentax GH1 eh, never heard of it :P

[offertonhatter]

Interesting topic, this.

However, as the "modern" SLR has been around since the mid 30's, and the pentaprism variant in the early 50's, but no further changes since then, surely this means the the whole original design was so right, that nothing has been able to better it. Even with digital and "bridge" cameras could not better the rightness of the SLR.
The Panasonic G1/GH1 is not a DSLR, nor should it be considered so, it is effectively a interchangable lens compact or bridge camera. It was designed for a certain type of market, that demanded a small light camera with the flexibility of interchangable lenses to improve the IQ over the compromised bridge cameras. It was not designed to compete with the DSLR's of this world, only to improve the low IQ of compacts.
An EVF that the G1, will never better a good quality pentaprism, or even a pentamirror of a DSLR, even with advances of technology on LCD's, its simple physics.

However the G1/GH1 does have one big advantage over SLR/DSLR's, which is the time between pressing the shutter and the image being taken, yes, the mirror going up.... Now we have all got used to this time span, but the G1/GH1 gives you always veiw whilst the image being taken.
The G1/GH1 does also have one major disadvantage, which is that the sensor is always exposed, so when you change a lens, the sensor is exposed to the elements, even when the camera is switched off. At least with DSLRs have the shutter to protect the sensor during these times.
I could see Pentax going the route (just like Samsung) of the interchangable bridge camera, to compliment the DSLR range, but to replace? Too many compromises, and I would consider a backward step.
The SLR in its various guises has been around for over 60 years, and if something has been around for that long without any sort of system to replace it, just proves that the initial concept was so right in the first place, so why change it?

If Pentax decided to abandon DSLR's and go for this "bridge" type, I for one would change systems.

[offertonhatter]

I have to admit though, the Olympus E-P1 looks like a digital version of my old Olympus Trip camera, crossed with the Leica D-Lux4. Might be worth getting for times when I don't want to take my DSLR.

[Photomy]

pentax GH1 eh, never heard of it :P

Its a typo, but they will not allow corrections to a title for some reason. Should be Panasonic GH1.

[Photomy]

Interesting topic, this.

However, as the "modern" SLR has been around since the mid 30's, and the pentaprism variant in the early 50's, but no further changes since then, surely this means the the whole original design was so right, that nothing has been able to better it. Even with digital and "bridge" cameras could not better the rightness of the SLR.
The Panasonic G1/GH1 is not a DSLR, nor should it be considered so, it is effectively a interchangable lens compact or bridge camera. It was designed for a certain type of market, that demanded a small light camera with the flexibility of interchangable lenses to improve the IQ over the compromised bridge cameras. It was not designed to compete with the DSLR's of this world, only to improve the low IQ of compacts.
An EVF that the G1, will never better a good quality pentaprism, or even a pentamirror of a DSLR, even with advances of technology on LCD's, its simple physics.

However the G1/GH1 does have one big advantage over SLR/DSLR's, which is the time between pressing the shutter and the image being taken, yes, the mirror going up.... Now we have all got used to this time span, but the G1/GH1 gives you always veiw whilst the image being taken.
The G1/GH1 does also have one major disadvantage, which is that the sensor is always exposed, so when you change a lens, the sensor is exposed to the elements, even when the camera is switched off. At least with DSLRs have the shutter to protect the sensor during these times.
I could see Pentax going the route (just like Samsung) of the interchangable bridge camera, to compliment the DSLR range, but to replace? Too many compromises, and I would consider a backward step.
The SLR in its various guises has been around for over 60 years, and if something has been around for that long without any sort of system to replace it, just proves that the initial concept was so right in the first place, so why change it?

If Pentax decided to abandon DSLR's and go for this "bridge" type, I for one would change systems.

Film has been around even longer. That kind of logic says we should not be using digital because film has proven to be very reliable, etc.

[offertonhatter]

Film has been around even longer. That kind of logic says we should not be using digital because film has proven to be very reliable, etc.

I was'nt talking about the thing that records the image, only the machine that takes it. two different things.

[junyo]

Anybody that doesn't shoot with an 8x10 field camera has sacrificed image quality and "process" for convenience and ease of use. A camera is a means to an end, not an end unto itself. Therefore if it makes it easier for me to make images I'm happy with it's good tech. Smaller, lighter, more data at a glance are all good things. Don't really care about the mechanism by which that happens.

[uccemebug]

However the G1/GH1 does have one big advantage over SLR/DSLR's, which is the time between pressing the shutter and the image being taken, yes, the mirror going up.... Now we have all got used to this time span, but the G1/GH1 gives you always veiw whilst the image being taken.

It's been several weeks since I played with a G1 in the store but I don't recall there being anything particularly impressive about the shutter lag. It didn't strike me as being an advantage over a DSLR, that's for sure.

In fact, I've been disappointed in such usability aspects of all of the street-photography contenders I've looked at. DP2 has controls that get in the way, Ricoh cameras have great ergonomics but but have more lag than I expected, and the G1's viewfinder put me off. (I plunked down some more money to have my 1971 Rangefinder tuned up for another year.)