Not too long ago I was in Auckland and Sydney and carried along my new Nikon D800. As some of you world travelers may already know, carrying around a big camera during travel like this seems to get heavier and heavier (unless you are paid to do it I suppose).

Then in Sydney I purchased an Olympus OMD (which I had been unable to find in the U.S.). So light, so easy to carry, and the pics are amazing.

On returning home I sold my D800 and lenses and have been rebuilding my arsenal around the Micro 4/3 platform. Call me crazy but so far there's no regret.

So, the question. Is the mirror-less frontier the real deal? Or is it fad? I'm not so sure Mr. Wheeler could live without mirrors and long lenses on the MotoGP grid. What say you?

I think what matters is the lenses and to some degree the sensor. What's making micro 4/3 cameras so interesting is that the sensors are now good enough and the quality of the lenses that are being released are really, really good. Sure you can use an adaptor and put just about any lens on a m4/3, but the purpose built prime lenses for the system that are coming out are incredible.

Shawn that's a good summary. You sound like my pro friends who seem to care 90% about the glass. I'm a gadget junkie so a slick new body will always catch my attention. But to your point, when I purchased my OMD I was able to also get a 12mm Olympus m zuiko prime. Spectacular lens. My next will be the 75mm for more portrait shooting and in the studio. My concern though is why they don't have that quality yet in a shorter lens. The 45 may not be quite the quality.

Again, to your point, when the glass is greatness then the tides may shift. It may be a while before our Motogp pals with really long AND fast lenses will be served in that market.

So perhaps I will be the only dissenting opinion for now, but I am not a huge fan of the mirror-less world of cameras. For me it really has to do with the viewfinder, I can't seem to really appreciate the digital one. The X-Pro1 was nice and I am still considering picking one up, but I think I would prefer my standard mirror or my rangefinder! I understand the benefits of the mirror-less system, but there is something a little irritating to me personally whilst using one.

It does concern me though that my precious DSLR's might get thrown to the wayside!

Seraj - I do understand a bit. But the nicest viewfinder I've ever had was on the d800. And what I have noticed that my now 40+ year old eyes cannot capture even a perfect manual focus through the big D800 viewfinder. It's frustrating but that's how it was for me and this resulted in my switching more often to auto focus to have the camera correct what my eyes can't.

I nearly purchased the X-Pro1 instead of the Olympus OMD. The Fuji has an amazing viewfinder. Where the Fuji lost it for me, and this makes no sense, but the manual focus ring takes too many turns to zoom.

What I like about the Oly is the manual focus assist where it zooms to the center, giving me a blown up image to focus through the VF. That's big enough for my older eyes

by the way I realize the manual focus assist is probably hated by my old schooler pals. But for me it works. These days I require reading glasses and my up close focusing ability needs that extra little bit of help. I don't know how the pros did it back in the day... When they had all manual... And FILM! But to your point about the range finder. The brilliance of the range finder is the focus. Lining up the two images in the view finder is just the best scenario I could imagine. With less than perfect vision I can always get the images to line up on a range finder. An example is on my AE1 that uses similar range finder focusing. Love it. But do I need to get an M9 to achieve that level of viewfinder focusing? That's a lot of cabbage.

I wish they more accessible, I have a film Leica and I tend to default to it whenever possible, I love how it focuses as well. I realize it's really expensive, it's why I don't own the Leica M Monochrom yet, or the new M which if you could justify it might give you the best of both worlds.

I guess I'm really more bothered by the mirror-less allowing the camera makers another excuse at not giving everyone affordable access to a full frame sensor and improving that format.

I'm not all that taken with the 4/3's camera's. For me, when it comes to sensor size, I'm firmly in the camp of "bigger is better". I understand it's more about the whole 4/3 system, but right now I don't see me using mirror less for work, so I'm not looking to build an arsenal. I'm definitely looking for a travel camera and that's where I see mirror less working for me. But with the new crop of APS-C sized cams available, 4/3's isn't really on my short list.

So that's a good point, Matt. The APS-C sized mini's are definitely a new twist on the whole removable lens, mirror-less thing. I think that consumers will ultimately go for size... if they can have big sensor size in small form factors. It's easier mass marketing. Then potentially leaves the micro 4/3 as fancy niche toys for geeks like me.

I honestly haven't looked that closely at 4/3's to know enough about their strengths relative to other mirror less options. It does seem that Oly has put all their eggs in that basket though, and they're producing a near pro product in terms of overall performance.

Whenever I put down my 5D III and try a "high end" small camera (mirror less or otherwise) I'm instantly frustrated with the lack of responsiveness with the shutter, AF, menu, etc.. That and having to dig through menu controls to change things that should have a dedicated button. I'd LOVE to have the capability of the 5D in a smaller, lighter package. I'd even give up sensor size for that. As far as I've seen, we're not there yet.

Matt, as with all technology, I hesitate to "bet" on any single platform. But I'd suggest you give a micro 4/3 camera a try. Many of your issues you state such as responsiveness with the shutter, AF, sensor size (and thus image quality) are really good in the latest cameras like the Olympus. And the whole point is smaller and lighter. For image quality examples, there are a lot of pro photographer blogs extolling the virtues and qualities of the system but one of my favorite is Steve Huff:

stevehuffphoto.com

And there's that 75mm 1.8 calling my name again. The Huff post Shawn is referring to features that lens. At first I thought the 75 would be a bit long (somewhere around 125-150mm on a FF) but the butter smooth bokeh gets me every time. That's my next lens and it will fit well with my OMD.

Matt - the Oly line got really good with the EP3. Those you can still find and the prices are probably 1/2 what I paid 18 months ago. With a pancake lens you would have a fast and small shooter.

Some more great photographs from the OMD.

alpineexposures.com

That's an amazing adventure. Would be so much better for carry in that scenario than an SLR.

Ah crap, that Steve Huff blog has me intrigued. My bank account does not need this...

Welcome to the dark side...(or the small side in this case)

Here's a pretty good blog I follow. A guy in Japan named Ming Thein. He is a good shooter and does lots of reviews. If you dig in you will see some good lens reviews and micro four thirds. The guy is always blogging and goes pretty in depth. I don't know how he find the time...

blog.mingthein.com