14 DAY TRIAL // Recently, the World Press Photo contest finally revealed the winner of the Photo of the Year 2013 award, in the person of John Stanmeyer of VII Photo Agency, with his photo simply titled “Signal.”
As usual, the gear always comes in second place after the photographer’s creativity, but the infographic created by Hastalosmegapixeles gives as an insight on the gear used by press photographers who participated in the contest.
As you can see in the image attached to this article, Canon EOS-1D X is the most used digital camera, while EOS 5D Mark II and Mark III come right after it, making Canon the preferred camera choice for press photographers.
The second place goes to Nikon, with D700 being the most used camera among other models like D800, D800E, D4, D80, D3, D3X etc. Leica claims the third place on the infographic, with models like Leica M, Leica S, or Leica M9.
Other interesting bits of information show that one photographer used an entry-level Canon Rebel T3 / 1100D to grab his shot, while another used the world's first full-frame compact camera, the Sony RX1.
In addition to that, it seems that press photographers also choose to use mirrorless cameras in some cases, as the Sony NEX-5N is also present, while the Olympus OM-D E-M5 was left out of the infographic.
When it comes to digital versus film, it seems that the analog format is still used by photographers like Danila Tkachenko, who won the first prize for the Stories categories with his “Escape” photo shot with a medium format Mamiya 7 rangefinder.
Although mirrorless cameras have registered an increase in sales in comparison with the DSLR segment, the latter is still the most popular among press photographers, with the exception of a few, who chose to tell their stories using an interchangeable lens camera.