The entire photographic industry is trying to grow their business by offering the next big thing to its potential customers and who can blame them, it's business. Some of the things they are offering are genuine improvements, but some are just "fluff" designed to create their own perceived need and seldom make any difference to real photography.
Recently I did a little job for a local school photographing their school play. Not being familiar with the location I packed everything I felt I may need for the job;
2 OMD EM5 mk1 bodies, lots of batteries and cards,
45mm f1.8, 75mm f1.8, 25mm f1.8 and my 75-300 fslow zoom just in case.
The reality bouncing around not too quietly in my head was that if I needed a long and fast lens, I was pretty much screwed. Everything I knew about photography told me that small sensor cameras, slow zooms, poor light and movement are a recipe for disaster.
As the universe often does, the worst case scenario presented itself. Distance and mixed to poor light, and plenty of movement! With no choice but to soldier on I did.
Images on the rear screen were encouraging, but can be misleading, so it was with minimal confidence I started editing the files in Lightroom. To my surprise I found them colourful, sharp, relatively smooth and the hit/miss ratio was better than 75%*.
ISO 1600 OMD 75-300 at about 200mm and f5.6 (400mm on a full frame!), hand held at 1/125. There are lots more, but they show the faces of students.
The moral of the story? We have come a long way in short time, so look for real solutions where they were not found before. Limitations in ISO, focus, stabilisers and mediocre lens quality are no longer real issues as they were not very long ago.
For the greater part of my photographic life, these limitations have been set in stone, but each year the photographic industry breaks down more barriers, giving us all enough power, its just a shame these benefits are often hidden behind a cloud of useless fluff.
*It did not stop me buying a long f2.8 zoom though, just in case!