I think many pros are perfectly willing to evolve. However, they generally don't want to be forced to do that until the 'improvement' is actually an improvement. That was my point about Canon a few posts ago. They clearly get this, and generally do not introduce a major technology change in their pro cameras without first testing it on the consumer cameras for a while.
Hell, I still miss the focus screens of large format cameras (ever look through a 12x20 camera? They're not bright, but you can really compose something with that interface!), but I'm not going back to film for that.
I get the advantages of EVF, but I think there is a basic disconnect that some people have in composition, and it is important in some compositional mindsets (this is not terribly important in fast-acting reportage, for example, but it can be useful even there). This comes very much from the perspective and process of using a view camera, so if you've never gone there, this may sound a bit laborious, but it becomes a natural part of the vision process, and can be done rapidly and intuitively with practice.
The subject of the photograph is right there in front of you. Pull your eye from the camera and look directly at it. Move around and 'get' it's three-dimensionality. determine what the photograph should be before you even pull the camera up to your eye. Once you are familiar with your lenses and camera, you'll even know what the focal length will probably be before you start with the camera.
OK, now, pull up the camera and see how well the limitless three-dimensional subject works when placing framing limits on it. See what happens when the third dimension is flattened to a two-dimensional representation. If things aren't as they seemed or desired, the composition can be 'worked' in two dimensions on the focus screen, or even three dimensions with some movement.
EVF doesn't negate this approach, but it does disconnect the reality of the subject from the screen. While that will be very beneficial at times, for the way I photograph, I would prefer to be feeling the subject on the screen as close to the same way that I feel the subject when I look at it directly. Brightness, color, contrast are all compromised.
Theoretically, an EVF is a more direct representation of what will be captured in the file. That's great for a lot of circumstances, but I do not believe it is a better representation of the subject, and that is where my hang-up is. Don't get me wrong, I'll learn to use EVF effectively like any other tool that I have had in my camera bag over the years. I just think there is a distancing of reality that is happening that I would prefer to avoid.
I can just imagine trying to work in a dark place with an EVF; you are peering into the milky darkness of some cathedral somewhere and you see an architectural feature that emerges from the blackness, and you want to get a photograph of that. You pull the camera to your eye, and *bam* the magic is gone because the camera has adjusted exposure, color, and contrast to it's formulas before you had even a chance to do some basic composition with the subject the way your eyes see it. That's the disconnect I am talking about.
---Michael
