Roger. Thanks for the Leica/Pentax correction.
As to the future of mirrorless, I am biased because of my working methods which are weird if you didn’t grow up in the journalism end of things. I always liked the small size of the Leica and, for a lot of work, the viewfinder of the SLR. In part the affection for the small size of the Leica won out because I tended to use multiple bodies with high-speed fixed focal length lenses rather than zooms. I certainly wasn’t man enough to carry the equivalent weight and size in SLR’s And now that I’m older and DSLR’s are bigger, I’m certainly not man enough. And, sadly, as an almost retired person, I’m not affluent enough to carry a bunch of M 240’s and Leitz lenses. One of my basic rigs is 3 APS C mirrorless bodies with the equivalent of 28, 50 and 90mm full frame lenses, pretty similar to what I standardized on with Leica rangefinders. I cheat; I carry bright line accessory viewfinders for those focal lengths and occasionally slip them into the accessory shoes of the mirrorless bodies. But, for the most part, I’m happy with the cameras out of the box. The image quality suffers more from my failures than the sensor’s. And I sure do like that lighter, smaller gadget bag.
On sensor AF will be slower than dedicated AF systems, that is pretty much certain for the given future. The sensor cannot feed to the EVF when it is capturing, hence one can expect blackouts on EVFs in the forseeable future. I have as much concluded that mirrorless bodies will never replace alternative technologies in terms of sports and action photography. The SLT may be a better solution, and I like the idea of two AF systems collaborating with each other. I still use Canon for sports work, but if Sony manages to deliver a body with 1D-level specs, I will be taking a long and hard look at it.
But outside of football games and the Olympics, I believe mirrorless will eventually replace DSLRs at every tier of the market. I'll list a few reasons below:
1. Body cost. It is much, much cheaper to build cameras without mirror boxes. Look at the $400 NEX (Alpha?) bodies and the $600 Canikon entry-level DSLRs, they basically have the same specs. The A7 is a well-rounded, decent-performing FF body, the equal of the D610 or 6D sans AF speed. How much is the A7 in China and Japan? $1,200. The
kit is cheaper than the D610 body, and people are noticing. Sony's lenses remain expensive, but how much of problem would this be when you can save close to a grand on the body?
2. Low cost of switching systems. I work in a place with Canon sponsorship, but I can use all of the lenses with the A7 and NEX-7 via a $250 adapter. AF and stabilization still works, too. Compared to the cost of, for example, switching from Canon to Sony Alpha mount, adding a mirrorless body to the existing system is essentially costless, and paves the way for a full-scale migration.
3. EVF is more practical for both pros and beginners. People may prefer OVFs to any generation of EVFs, but nobody can doubt that being able to preview exposure, white balance and focus indications over the entire frame makes life easier. I believe that there is still much potential to be tapped from the EVF interface - zebra, peaking and split image overlay are good examples of existing implementations. Entry-level DSLRs also often have small, dark optical finders that I find even less enjoyable than cheap EVFs.
I might be the outlier here, but when Sony announced the NEX-3 in 2010, I expected to see an FF NEX in 5-6 years and deep integration with the Alpha mount. So I bought an NEX-3 and later a C3, held back on APS-C E-mount lenses and instead loaded up on Leica M and Minolta gear. With the A7 I can finally juggle between Canon, Sony/Minolta and Leica with a single body, and use all of these lenses at the focal length and DOF they were designed for.
