The Freedom of the Pancake Lens

There is a specific trajectory that almost every photographer goes through. You start out romanticizing the craft. You look at the masters, you look at the legendary film bodies, and you inevitably buy into the mythos. For a long time, that mythos wore a Leica badge. We convinced ourselves that if we just had that perfect, tactile, prestigious tool, our vision would finally unlock. But if you stick around this subculture long enough, a funny thing happens: you experience gear burnout. You realize that heavy camera bags, precious luxury gear, and endless hours staring at the Lightroom RAW-editing backlog are actually killing the exact spark that made you pick up a camera in the first place. I’ve had a front-row seat to this exact creative arc, watching it play out across the entire industry before it finally hit home in my own life.

From the Front Lines of the Mirrorless Boom

I started shooting street photography in 2007. Living and shooting in New York City, I watched the genre explode from a niche pursuit into a massive global culture. Even more unique, I spent over a decade working camera retailer industry starting in 2010. I was there for the chaotic birth of mirrorless. I watched the DSLR titans stumble while early Sony NEX and Olympus PEN bodies tried to find their footing. I handled the gear, talked to the photographers, and saw firsthand how the industry transitioned from bulky workhorses to trendy, hyper-marketed status symbols. During that early 2010s boom, you couldn’t talk about online street photography education without mentioning Eric Kim. If you haven't checked in on Kim since his early blogging days, his modern iteration might shock you. Back then, he was the dominant voice for casual street enthusiasts—before becoming a highly divisive figure for his confrontational, in-your-face flash techniques. Today, he has completely abandoned the "trendy Leica" lifestyle. He publicly ditched the brand, openly calling out luxury gear culture as an elitist trap. Instead, he preaches a philosophy of absolute "gear liberation." His current setup is built entirely around extreme minimalism: a pocketable Ricoh GR III, a compact Lumix S9, and his iPhone. He argues that a new camera won't fix your vision, and that the best setup is the one with the smallest physical footprint. While his modern pivot into crypto, Stoicism, and stream-of-consciousness essays isn't for everyone, his shift away from gear obsession toward practical utility mirrored my own evolution perfectly.

New York City to Milford: A Shift in Subject Matter

While Eric Kim and I arrived at the same creative conclusion regarding gear, our lives took entirely different paths. In 2020, my wife, our two kids, and I packed up our lives in NYC and bought a house out here in Milford, Michigan. Leaving the chaotic energy of the city changed more than just my zip code; it completely transformed what I put in front of my lens. I don't shoot street photography anymore. My daily landscape isn't crowded subway platforms or Manhattan crosswalks. Instead, my photos consist of my kids, our family activities, and the quiet rhythms of suburban life. Occasionally, I’ll take a little time to myself to photograph on my own, but for the most part, my camera is there to document my family. When your primary subjects are moving children and real-life family moments, the last thing you want to do is carry a massive kit or spend your evenings chained to a desktop editing RAW files. You need a setup that is fast, full of soul, and completely friction-free.

The Modern Sweet Spot: The $159 Setup

To fit this new chapter of life, my setup evolved into something beautifully simple: a Nikon Zf paired with the incredibly compact SG-Image 35mm f/2.2. At just $159, this little pancake lens completely changes the physics of the camera. It strips away the intimidation factor of a professional machine, making it a casual, lightweight companion I can toss into a bag for a family day out. But the real magic is the workflow liberation. Instead of shooting flat RAW profiles, I lean heavily into custom, baked-in image recipes sourced from serbanjpg.com. Whether I’m using a warm, nostalgic film look like his Kodacolor S or a punchy digital throwback like Modern Fujichrome, the look is baked straight into the JPEG the second I press the shutter. No Lightroom queues. No color-grading fatigue. I pull the JPEG straight from the Nikon Zf to my phone, and it's done. Ultimately, the lesson of the last two decades of photography isn't about which sensor or brand wins the spec war. It's about getting the technology out of the way of the experience. Whether you're chasing frames on the streets of Manhattan or just trying to capture your kids running around a backyard in Michigan, the goal remains exactly what it was in 2007: just being present enough to catch the moment.