Downy-No, wait: Hairy Woodpecker

A female (no red feathers on head)

I have two cameras. One is the Sony A1, which is a 35mm camera with a lot of top line features. Fast autofocus, excellent high-speed shooting (think sports and wildlife), and a reasonably high pixel count for high resolution. The other is a Phase One, a larger, medium-format camera with smaller pixels, an extremely advanced sensor with high dynamic range. The Phase One lacks almost every single ‘top line’ feature of the A1—it is completely dedicated to getting the best possible shot. It’s slow, it’s inconvenient, it lacks autofocus, etc. etc. But it does take a great photo, as you can see above.

(Not that the A1 is terrible! It’s a pro-level sports camera which also does a lot of other advanced things. But it’s 1/10th the cost of a Phase One. The A1 remains an excellent camera. It just can’t compete with the Phase One.)

In brief, the A1 has top of the line handling and features; the Phase One has top of the line image quality. The A1 makes a solid effort at image quality; the Phase One is nearly bereft of cool features. It’s all about the shot.

Here’s a full-size (100%) crop of the woodpecker’s head:

Some praise should go to the lens I used as well, an older Sigma 500mm f/4.5 with autofocus. I wanted the least expensive sharp lens at 500mm, and this (I hoped it would be!) is it. But it’d only good if the bird can sit still long enough for the shot, and of course, birds often move quite quickly, so I doubt I could use this setup in the field (it’s hard enough on my back deck!).

The bird at lower left in the wide shot is a Chestnut-Backed Chickadee, by the way—a very well-dressed bird.