Medium format landscape & wildlife photography?

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Abinoone

Abinoone

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Has anyone had experience using medium format cameras for landscape and wildlife photography? I'm fascinated with the incredible color and detail provided by these amazing cameras, and wonder if there are many photographers using it for landscape and wildlife images. I do realize that it's comparatively expensive, relatively heavy, and generally has fewer lens options and features most nature photographers depend upon (fast frame rate, AF tracking, etc.), but the quality of the images is nothing short of astounding!

Here are a couple of nature/wildlife photographers I've found using this technology:

www.outdoorphotographer.com

The Medium Format Landscape

Though more expensive than smaller-sensor cameras, medium format cameras do offer advantages, especially for landscape photographers.
www.outdoorphotographer.com www.outdoorphotographer.com

www.peterdelaneyphotography.com

African Wildlife Fine Art Prints | Delaney Wild Art

Fine-Art Wildlife Prints of African Wild Animals. Impressive Wildlife Wall-Art for your Home or Office. Gallery Quality Fine-Art Wildlife Prints Delivered 5-7 Days.
www.peterdelaneyphotography.com www.peterdelaneyphotography.com

I'd be interested in your views!
 
I have never used on but they are beautiful.

That claw marked Aspen tree in color is awesome!
 
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Abinoone said:
I'd be interested in your views!
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I shot some medium format film but haven't shot MF digital yet. It's a great format for landscape work but can be tough for anything other than very large and very close wildlife work due to the media(sensor) size and what that means in terms of lens focal length vs field of view.
 
dtibbals said:
Following. I’m actually looking at either Fuji or Hasselblad medium format for landscape and city scape shots. Since I’m switching systems rather than spending a bunch of high quality lenses for Dullframe I’m thinking of keeping the full frame for tele and action and use medium format for the rest.
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Thinking out loud. I have mentioned Hasselblad MF to my better half a few times since she has a keen eye for landscapes. But she is certain she wants to take over my Nikon stuff instead. I should talk her into putting it up for sale and put it towards a medium format set up for her and keep her 7500 and a couple lenses for convenience. After my Sony transition of course...lol
 
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Abinoone said:
Has anyone had experience using medium format cameras for landscape and wildlife photography? I'm fascinated with the incredible color and detail provided by these amazing cameras, and wonder if there are many photographers using it for landscape and wildlife images. I do realize that it's comparatively expensive, relatively heavy, and generally has fewer lens options and features most nature photographers depend upon (fast frame rate, AF tracking, etc.), but the quality of the images is nothing short of astounding!

Here are a couple of nature/wildlife photographers I've found using this technology:

www.outdoorphotographer.com

The Medium Format Landscape

Though more expensive than smaller-sensor cameras, medium format cameras do offer advantages, especially for landscape photographers.
www.outdoorphotographer.com www.outdoorphotographer.com

www.peterdelaneyphotography.com

African Wildlife Fine Art Prints | Delaney Wild Art

Fine-Art Wildlife Prints of African Wild Animals. Impressive Wildlife Wall-Art for your Home or Office. Gallery Quality Fine-Art Wildlife Prints Delivered 5-7 Days.
www.peterdelaneyphotography.com www.peterdelaneyphotography.com

I'd be interested in your views!
Click to expand...

I share your view of the gorgeous tonality and overall quality of medium format, and it's an idea I toyed with a number of years ago. What kept me from seriously pursuing this track (aside from the cash outlay) was the weight and bulk of the equipment for a similar image on the larger capture surface, or alternatively getting a lot closer, or altering my vision to landscapes with wildlife... changes I have not been willing put in the effort to make.

On a practical level, from what I've seen the increased sales potential of medium-format images is negligible (people buy some really poor quality images) so the audience would be almost entirely myself. I've been quite happy both commercially and personally with small-format digital i.e., "full-frame" so it's extremely unlikely I'll pursue medium format at all.
 
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Hut said:
Thinking out loud. I have mentioned Hasselblad MF to my better half a few times since she has a keen eye for landscapes. But she is certain she wants to take over my Nikon stuff instead. I should talk her into putting it up for sale and put it towards a medium format set up for her and keep her 7500 and a couple lenses for convenience. After my Sony transition of course...lol
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That is a great plan. I am torn between Fuji GFX100s and the Hasselblad X1D II. The Fuji is the better value, size is now comparable, the AF is faster but for what I would use it for that doesn't matter, frankly it could be manual focus and I would be ok with it, but the Fuji is 102 MP vs 50 MP. They have similar output in color but the Hasselblad from what I have seen has the most amazing color science I have seen in any camera. I could do 2 Fuji lenses and the body for $10K, Hasselblad would be closer to $15K and half the MP. Ugh first world problems. I suspect Hasselblad will come out with a X1D III in the next year as their 100 MP body is a larger sensor and $40K. $10K I could wrap my brain around but $15K IDK, I am thinking a full frame camera can get me by for a bit but if I get serious I suspect I could find some nice used gear that would cut the amount down.
 
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I suspect that the cameras will be heavier than a 35mm FF camera. Not sure about resolution if the 35mm has focus shifting. But one thing will be for sure, while your camera bag will be heavier you rest assure that your wallet will be lighter, much lighter.

Question i have for those who have used 35mm FF cameras and MF cameras.

At the color better, or just different. Can you get the same colors from both system though you may need to do a bit extra work with the FF camera?
At what print size do you begin to see a difference when viewing the prints at a reasonable distance (no pixel peeking)?
 
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RichF said:
I suspect that the cameras will be heavier than a 35mm FF camera. Not sure about resolution if the 35mm has focus shifting. But one thing will be for sure, while your camera bag will be heavier you rest assure that your wallet will be lighter, much lighter.

Question i have for those who have used 35mm FF cameras and MF cameras.

At the color better, or just different. Can you get the same colors from both system though you may need to do a bit extra work with the FF camera?
At what print size do you begin to see a difference when viewing the prints at a reasonable distance (no pixel peeking)?
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From what I've read and seen, the MF colors are closer to what the eye actually sees than FF cameras, and the quality of prints much better. Getting 80" wide prints still keeps them sharp. This is why most fashion photographers use MF cameras. And yes, you're absolutely right about the expense and weight!
 
If you want huge landscape prints you could always stitch together vertical shots with a full frame. One of the awesome landscape photographers here in Eastern Washington that has a strong online presence is Nick Page. I notice he does a lot of vertical pan shots and then merges them together in post process. In the end a very dramatic high resolution final product. But a lot of work...
 
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Abinoone said:
From what I've read and seen, the MF colors are closer to what the eye actually sees than FF cameras, and the quality of prints much better. Getting 80" wide prints still keeps them sharp. This is why most fashion photographers use MF cameras. And yes, you're absolutely right about the expense and weight!
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Yup. The other thing is you have 16bit raw files. The pixel shift has very limited uses as nothing can move. So even with landscape it’s a challenge as clouds, leaves, grass often move. The MF cameras also do pixel shift so they can still out do a FF camera doing it. I’ve watched some videos where they do it and the non pixel shift MF was still sharper and more detail then a FF doing pixel shift. So I’d rather have a camera do it without any pixel shift.
 
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I think there is a lot of romanticism about the benefits of medium format. Like anything else there are horses for courses. Full frame sensors are about 60% of the total area of smaller medium sensor cameras so there have to be some technical advantages to medium format with the corresponding light per unit area and deep well capacity, and full frame are still 14 bit, nothing to sneeze at since our eyes can't see much past 8 bit, vs the medium format's 16 bit. But can we see the differences side by side? Probably not as much as we want to believe we do.

For example the D850 is nicknamed the poor man's medium format camera. Printing up to 40 inches on the long side I doubt anyone's eyes could tell the difference in color, resolution, any kind of comparison. Printing larger than that I would say consider medium format.
 
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Abinoone said:
From what I've read and seen, the MF colors are closer to what the eye actually sees than FF cameras, and the quality of prints much better. Getting 80" wide prints still keeps them sharp. This is why most fashion photographers use MF cameras. And yes, you're absolutely right about the expense and weight!
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I don't understand, not that i don't believe. Colors are function of the sensor and profiles. This implies that MF sensors are better than 35mm sensors. I would think between Sony, Canon, Nikon, ... that one of them would have great natural colors. :unsure:
 
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bleirer said:
I think there is a lot of romanticism about the benefits of medium format. Like anything else there are horses for courses. Full frame sensors are about 60% of the total area of smaller medium sensor cameras so there have to be some technical advantages to medium format with the corresponding light per unit area and deep well capacity, and full frame are still 14 bit, nothing to sneeze at since our eyes can't see much past 8 bit, vs the medium format's 16 bit. But can we see the differences side by side? Probably not as much as we want to believe we do.

For example the D850 is nicknamed the poor man's medium format camera. Printing up to 40 inches on the long side I doubt anyone's eyes could tell the difference in color, resolution, any kind of comparison. Printing larger than that I would say consider medium format.
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The difference between a well exposed 14 and 16 bit image (which BTW is actually 15 bit, a 16 bit computer number runs from -32,768 to 32,767, 0 to 32,767 is 15 bits) is very small. I can get into computer hardware if you want, but that is way off topic. Bottom line - you will not see the difference unless you are pixel peeking.
 
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RichF said:
The difference between a well exposed 14 and 16 bit image (which BTW is actually 15 bit, a 16 bit computer number runs from -32,768 to 32,767, 0 to 32,767 is 15 bits) is very small. I can get into computer hardware if you want, but that is way off topic. Bottom line - you will not see the difference unless you are pixel peeking.
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Well, you guys might be entirely right but I just paraphrased what I had read about MF photography. God knows I'm no expert, just a curious photographer. Read the Outdoor Photographer article in my OP and see what you think. I do know fashion photographers almost entirely rely upon MF cameras, primarily for color rendition and sharpness.
 
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Abinoone said:
Well, you guys might be entirely right but I just paraphrased what I had read about MF photography. God knows I'm no expert, just a curious photographer. Read the Outdoor Photographer article in my OP and see what you think. I do know fashion photographers almost entirely rely upon MF cameras, primarily for color rendition and sharpness.
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Or to create an aura that what they are doing is special and deserves high fees :sneaky:
 
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I'm not sure there's a good comparison between film and digital for the FX/Medium Format comparison. There were a lot of film 'medium formats' - 2-1/4 square, 6x4.5, 6x7 etc etc and the rest, all much bigger than 35mm. 6x7 (60x70mm) was HUGE by comparison to 35mm. FX sensors are 35mm film dimensions (36x24). No digital medium format sensor is close to medium format film sizes. Phase One is roughly 50x40mm, Fuji is (I think) 43x32.

The sensor technologies used today for FX and MF basically are the same, I think. In fact FX is probably more advanced technically since the volumes support bigger investments.

As sensor size goes up, lens size does as well. My Pentax 6x7 lenses are massive and my longest is only roughly 85mm EFOV. We're not going to be chasing wildlife and BIF with medium format any time soon.

The reason studio/fashion photographers can get away with MF is that they don't have to carry the things! :)
 
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eaj101 said:
I'm not sure there's a good comparison between film and digital for the FX/Medium Format comparison. There were a lot of film 'medium formats' - 2-1/4 square, 6x4.5, 6x7 etc etc and the rest, all much bigger than 35mm. 6x7 (60x70mm) was HUGE by comparison to 35mm. FX sensors are 35mm film dimensions (36x24). No digital medium format sensor is close to medium format film sizes. Phase One is roughly 50x40mm, Fuji is (I think) 43x32.

The sensor technologies used today for FX and MF basically are the same, I think. In fact FX is probably more advanced technically since the volumes support bigger investments.

As sensor size goes up, lens size does as well. My Pentax 6x7 lenses are massive and my longest is only roughly 85mm EFOV. We're not going to be chasing wildlife and BIF with medium format any time soon.

The reason studio/fashion photographers can get away with MF is that they don't have to carry the things! :)
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Yeah, I agree that MF is a little unwieldy for fast moving wildlife, but I'm intrigued by the potential for landscapes.
 
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