Sony DSC-RX100M6. HDR mode Jpg.
As a professional-level pocket camera, the RX100 VI still is an amazing experience. But in terms of 'perfection', things fell apart a little. Unlike the Nikon 1 v2 I previously mentioned, the issues were related to the photography itself - how its zoom speed and amount gets randomized (such as cases of zooming out or in instead when I rotate the zoom ring to zoom in... or out), the unpredictable P mode glitch that disables taking photos or force-cut off the video recording, and that just a few days of rough use led to a vast collection of dust in the lens - which is basically unsolvable unless paying a sensor replacement fee.
Another part was the pocket size factor. After I got a new phone, the need for carrying around my RX100 camera was greatly reduced. I don't find my phone's camera (and phone camera photography, in general) powerful enough to replace dedicated cameras, but it felt enough to strip away the convenience of pocket size from my RX100 - a one big characteristic of that camera.
Photography still was a big part in my life, but I lost motivation to carry around my camera again, and my photography was about to be stuck as only a matter of one shutter button press/touch. After some months of this void-like photography period, I got to meet a camera that completely changed my way of life once again.
Meet the (currently broken) Canon EOS 60D and the EF-S 17-85mm F4-5.6 lens, found in my sister's drawer.
I was first interested to find a big, chunky camera with a pretty fresh state of about 4000 shutter counts (100k to 150k shutter count is when this kind of Canon DSLR gets in risk of shutter failure). Unfortunately the web reviews I found were not favoring it, especially with Canon's ancient autofocus system of then having a hard time at "anything". The 18MP and lack of touchscreen were immediate lacking points compared to the RX100 VI, and it also didn't have weather sealings featured for usages under rain, storm, or snow. After searching about this camera, it only felt like an outdated camera that has no redeeming features for me. That was, until I did a test shot with a tomato on my table one day.
Left is Canon EOS 70D, 26mm APS-C (22.5 x 15.0 mm). Right is Sony RX100 VI at 19mm 1-inch (13.2mm x 8.8mm) sensor. Set at ISO 1600, Shutter speed 1/30, aperture f/5. The Left APS-C one has more natural blurred out background and more clear details (among the many other differences).
I was shocked to see the difference. It was when I realized sensor size does matter - again. The EOS 60D's larger APS-C sensor was able to capture a lot more detail than the RX100's 1 inch sensor - when I thought 1 inch sensor was big enough to make a significant difference from phone cameras. I then decided to go further with trying out something I would've never considered before...
I remember posting about my visit to Everland as one of the very first Cohost post (when excluding the pinned intro post), writing a lengthy essay about my feelings after visiting a theme park for the first time in about 7-8 years, more than 10 years if limited to Everland. At the end of last year's October, I suddenly thought that a theme park could be a nice place to test out my skills and gears, along with to recover my moods after doing pretty bad on my Statistics midterm.
Traveling to there that day filled me with regrets. Other than the weather being cloudy all day until sunset, I had to ride the highway bus in standing position for about an hour, had to detour because of my failed predictions in traffic (both road-wise and passengers-wise), and end up arriving at the place a lot later than I expected. After arriving at about 11AM, I began my photographic journey - no rides, no meals (only occasional coffee), focusing on mascot and animal photography, and spending rest of the time doing assignments. I remember returning to my dorm after 12AM the next day and collapsing on the bed.
Despite the unplanned and stressful journey, I'm still happy about the experience. I was able to think about what shot will I be taking with the optical viewfinder only giving indications, instead of the electronic viewfinder and the live view that lets me instantly see the end result. I figured out what aperture, ISO, and shutter speeds are with spinning the multiple dials on the camera body, instead of letting my camera to figure everything out before my shutter press. Even the ancient autofocus gave me a valuable chance to figure out the manual focusing.
I will say that the ancient autofocusing did fail me a lot, and for certain moments - especially with the photographs during at a dark stage show and for nighttime parade - I couldn't help feeling the RX100 would've performed better with shutter speed and dynamic range issues. But the EOS 60D still holds significance in making me realizing that photography involves more than just a point-and-shoot... and left me wondering if I have been considering art only something as simple as 'point-and-shoot'.
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This photo is one main reason it took me so long to post this. This was the moment I instantly fell in love with, and the moment I still vividly remember fiddling with the manual focus ring, trying to picture it as close as what "my mind sees".
Maybe it's because I tried to keep it in a special place or something, but despite the days of search through the clouds and all the storage I got, I couldn't find the raw (CR2) file for it - only having the adobe denoised jpgs with heavy editing. So far, this is the biggest depression I got from the disappearance of a single digital file.