So I'll quote myself;
"I have often had to tell working professional photographers to open up, change power on their packs or shutter speed, and the image will be sharper."
Rich,
I understand now. Honestly, I didn't really know what you were talking about with that sentence; now I see that you were in fact referring to diffraction. Yes, I have been shooting thirty years, and boy did it take me back when, several months ago, I took the time to test these HC lenses. It came about because I rented a 120HC Macro on a still life job, and I shot the final file at f32. But when I ran the file, it just did not look sharp to me. I even sent the RAW to the digital tech and asked what he thought. Then I began to think about that Diffraction thing. (Yes, sometimes you DO learn something from the LabCoat Guys!) My whole life, I always thought, "Well hell, if f16 is sharp, can you imagine how sharp that f22 will be? And then imagine how much sharper that f32 will be after that?" When, in truth, the inverse is true -- once you stop down past f13, the whole file begins to fall apart dramatically.
Next, after that, I now bring up the subject of "Sensor Bloom", as the LabCoatBoys like to call it. I suggest anyone that uses a Phase back, that shoots anything on a white cove, in the studio, to really watch out for this. So yes, I guess this is me again, "attacking the precious Golden Child medium format", but if you've ever tried to retouch Sensor Bloom in post, you'll pull your hair out.
But will you ever get a Warning Letter from your "MF Dealer, who's your partner in the large investment", about watching out for Sensor Bloom? No, I doubt you will. Yet, if you show them a file, they'll say, "Yeah, that's Sensor Bloom. Don't shoot anything with hard horizontal lines against a white blown-out cyc wall". And then I think, "Wow, thanks for the warning. I'm glad you knew about this, but didn't pass it on".
I'm not bitching -- I'm just talking Real World, and Real Jobs, and Real Situations, (where your reputation is at stake).
Yeah, it's Personal.Edit:
The reason I read this forum is to learn about The Bad Stuff. I know the cameras are good; all of them. But I read this forum to identify the Snakes In The Grass, that are waiting to bite me in the ass, and ruin a job. Be it Error Messages on an H body, or Mirror Slap, or Sensor Bloom, or Diffraction -- with digital, there's always a snake lying in the grass. And very seldom, if ever, (like Rainer says) will you ever hear it from one of the dealers or manufacturers. They'll gladly come on here when there's an Upgrade Special or New Model, but I'll be damned if I've ever seen them come on here and announce, say, a problem with Leaf Capture 10, or that the new Capture One is (still) crashing. You've almost got to beat it out of them, if there's anything negative (that could threaten your paying job). That's why I get mad. And like that TMARK guy said one day, I'd hate it if some young kid came on here, thinking that a new Hasselblad camera was going to change his life, or put him on the map overnight, and all he got was hype, (like that
www.hassynyc.com site), and not a balanced picture of the whole equation. Because I was that kid one day, many years ago, and my money was hard-earned; I would have appeciated it if someone spoke up.