This is in support of Mark Dubovoy’s article: I am restricting my comments to those technical aspects of his article regarding the audiophile analogy and the photo comparison. When I read Mark’s articles I keep in mind that he is, in my opinion, a perfectionist with a technical bent. Not everyone’s cup of tea orientation of course, but I can relate to it so therefore I like to read his articles.
Although I found the article interesting and informative, others obviously have not, and some even have called for future articles to be heavily edited or censored altogether. This is a serious over-reaction in my opinion. Surely there is room for a variety of world-views, so to speak, in the articles on this site. If you don’t like an article, or think it’s full of hogwash- fine, just ignore the articles in the future and/or criticize them at that time as is being done now. But elimination of them – way over the top!
One of his major points is his opinion to not rely on engineering specs (DxO specs for example, as related to photography). Test a product and look at the final results. Regardless of specs and test lab results in restricted circumstances, the results in real-world conditions (your shooting conditions) may yield different conclusions as to how ‘good’ a lens is (at least as it relates to each photographer). I heartily agree. Does anyone really disagree with this?
Test results can be a good guide as to things to look for, but I have encountered many instances where I prefer a lens that didn’t test out in published lab test as well as another one – it could relate to the bokeh, or micro-contrast or whatever, for which there may not be adequate tests (not to mention just pure personal preference as to various tradeoffs in lens qualities).
As to his photo comparison I do think it would have been better to use a small sensor camera that shoots in raw, something that has similar DxO specs to the medium format back used in the test (dynamic range, color sensitivity etc.). Then, try to get the ‘best’ out of each, using a raw processor such as Adobe Camera Raw, or LR. Then present the results. Not layers and such - just simple raw processor adjustments such as black/white points, highlights recovery, etc. Not an objective test, but I believe it would be a more practical and valid comparison. It might show that DxO is right on the money, or it might show that the specs don’t tell enough of the story (as Mark asserts).
Mark used audio as an analogy for contrasting actual experience vs. specs. I think it’s a useful analogy on an absolute basis. However on a relative basis- meaning percent improvement vs. cost, perhaps not that universally applicable (and so far most of the comments on this forum indicate that is an understatement). While his power cable portion of the analogy may be a bit much for me, I support much of what Mark said, via my own personal experience.
I have a fair amount of lay-person experience in music – I play several instruments, my mother was a professional singer, and my late father was a mechanical engineer an amateur recording engineering using old-time pro equipment – 15ips tape, tube equipment, high end (for their time) speakers etc. I have attended many live music performances of small and large groups; gone to many audiophile shows, performed extensive listening sessions in various showrooms, and have tried out a large amount of mid to high end equipment in my home (and some years ago purchased some low-end audiophile equipment that has given me much enjoyment to this day).
I have heard live music vs. almost immediate recorded playback, analog via tape vs. live, vs. CD, DAT, LP, direct-to-disc, etc. As the result of my experience I do believe that the best analog is superior, in some way or ways, to the digital I’ve heard. And very generally speaking, expensive equipment often sounds a lot better than inexpensive equipment. I don’t feel that expensive cables and such are worth much to me, and the differences in sound can perhaps be replicated in other ways. But that doesn’t negate the other aspects that relate to tubes vs. transistors, and distortions in the digital recording and playback chain (that have more deleterious effects in some ways than the analog distortions).
The 1st generation of digital, marketed as perfect sound, sounded dead and unmusical to me. Succeeding generations of digital is trending much better. Yes digital has perhaps more headroom/dynamic range, less noise, less harmonic and non-harmonic distortion, and better frequency response in some respects than analog. But there is something about analog that is more real and more natural sounding to me. I have yet to see specs that relate to this.
Some will say that I’m deluded, or that I prefer the large euphonic harmonic distortion of analog (tube pre-amps / amps for example). Well, whatever – fine, I’ll take what sounds more realistic and truly musical to me. I know how music sounds, and I know that digital sounds inferior to me in some regards.
OTOH, as a practical matter, most music is released on CD, not on LPs, and I don’t want to deal with having to make sure my stylus is aligned perfectly and that I keep the records totally clean etc -Just like I gave up shooting large format film with all its maintenance requirements, not to mention the processing. Plus, digital audio is getting better, with improvements in jitter reduction, digital to analog conversion etc. Now if only most audio would be released in a widely available format beyond the regular CD :-)
Most of the population seems to be involved in the convenience of downloading compressed music and video, and playing with the so-called art filters on photos from their smart phones, rather than obtaining better sounding fidelity such as from CD and better video such as from Blu-ray.
And, yes - art matters more than technical quality to most people, but what is wrong in pursuing both, or at least discussing both?
The topics discussed on LL don’t concern most of the population, as they are too esoteric and quality driven. Mark’s technical quality objectives seem to be another cut beyond most photographers objectives. I’m not saying that Mark's objectives are important or should be to others, or should not be to others. I’m saying that they are worthy in their own right, and since they are applicable to at least some people beyond just Mark, that they deserve a hearing.
I look forward to Mark's next installment.