frostburg

A few more using Cinestill 800, Nikon F3 50mm 1.2
 
1.

 
2.

 
3.  The lights look funky because Cinestill is a motion picture film that has had a certain layer removed.

They're extremely close. Nikon generally has better control ergonomics on prosumer crop bodies (this matters a lot more than 4 megapixels at this level), but the Canon ones are really similar to each other. To be honest I'm not particularly impressed with consumer Canon bodies from an IQ standpoint (disclaimer: I only shoot stuff that stands still using only primes), they're entirely serviceable if you know what you're doing, but you're generally going to do better with other equipment.
 
You should also consider Nikons and possibly a Sony A6300. If you only care about image quality you're kinda in the price range of a first-gen A7 full frame mirrorless, but you're going to pay dearly for lenses thereafter. If you only care about image quality and are really brave the Sigma SD Quattro exists.

Just get the longest one you can afford, if you don't have some special reason otherwise. Even for coins or dead insects, a longer working distance help avoiding unwanted shadows.

A lot of "harsh environment" cases for industrial usage exist, but they're probably not very suitable to the needs of gaming builds. I'd consider something like the Silverstone MM01 before trying to build an airtight custom case.

I can't bring myself to scan 6x6 with a flatbed because I get better results from 35mm and a dedicated scanner, which kinda defeats the point of carrying a very heavy camera around.
 

Contax G2, Zeiss Planar 2/45, Adox CMS 20 II in Adotech III, Plustek 8100
 
Another very heavy camera that is a joy to use anyway is the Contax AX, as far as I know the only body that can provide autofocus for manual focus lenses (by moving the film plane):
 

 
The focusing mechanism can also be used as a built in macro ring:
 

Contax AX, Zeiss Planar 50/1.7, Ektar 100, Plustek 8100
 

I get that people here are not probably the target audience for coffee table books, but that price is firmly mid-tier for the segment. Check Taschen or Phaidon. Or the Modernist Cuisine cookbook. Or Gestalten. Or Franco Maria Ricci. Or Lars Müller.

I get that people here are not probably the target audience for coffee table books, but that price is firmly mid-tier for the segment. Check Taschen or Phaidon. Or the Modernist Cuisine cookbook. Or Gestalten. Or Franco Maria Ricci. Or Lars Müller.

At least 95% of the people on this forum will never get this.  They're mostly kids who haven't even reached puberty, teenagers going through puberty and people barely into their adulthood.
 
They even ignore the point that the photos in the book by Apple are taken by Andrew Zuckerman.  And I can tell anyone from experience, because I've copied it before, that the style of photography in the book, while it may look simple and easy to do, is not quite easy at all.
 
While the $200 and $300 price tag may be a bit on the high side, it's not really that much higher than other photo books of similar sizes and using similar paper quality and binding.
 
 

$300 is cheap when you consider that there are photo books out there that costs thousands.
 
Sebastião Salgado's Genesis collectors edition from Taschen costs €3000.  I own a copy of the smaller 50 Euro version of the book and I've also been to the exhibitions.  To appreciate many of the photos by Salgado requires them to be printed in very large sizes, that 50 Euro book is too small for his photos.
https://www.taschen.com/pages/en/catalogue/photography/all/02613/facts.sebastio_salgado_genesis.htm
 
Henri Cartier Bresson and Henri Matisse's Decisive Moment can be as expensive as $9200
https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=17672943187&searchurl=sortby%3D1%26tn%3Ddecisive%2Bmoment%26an%3Dcartier-bresson
 
Robert Frank's Les Américains costs around $75000 with a cheaper edition costing $750.
https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=16070769767&searchurl=yrh%3D1958%26x%3D36%26yrl%3D1958%26y%3D12%26bi%3D0%26ds%3D30%26sts%3Dt%26bx%3Doff%26sortby%3D1%26tn%3DLes%2BAm%E9ricains%26an%3DRobert%2BFrank
 
This book has only about 190 pages, but it costs $160.  Nick Brandt is one of my favorite wildlife photographers.
http://www.nickbrandt.com
https://www.amazon.com/Nick-Brandt-Earth-Shadow-Falls/dp/1938922441/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1479392460&sr=8-5&keywords=Nick+brandt
 

Nice picture, but you can see the loss of quality due to the film -> minilab scan -> print -> flatbed scan workflow. Keep in mind that the most of the difference in sharpness between my picture and yours isn't due to my use of an extremely sharp rangefinder prime lens, or the exotic 20 iso ultra-high-resolution film, but rather in massive image degradation in the last part of the process.
 

Contax G2, Zeiss Planar 2/45, Adox CMS 20 II in Adotech III, Plustek 8100
 
Oh, since you probably get your b&w film developed by a lab, you should probably shoot Ilford XP2 Super, which is a C-41 b&w film, so they can't get it wrong.

It's tricky with C41, but you can easily and quickly (20 minutes / roll) develop B&W film without a darkroom. You just need a room dark enough to load the spirals and then do the rest in your kitchen or bathroom, using a lightproof tank. 
 
I have an Hasselblad, too:
 
:
 
Sadly I don't use it as much as I would like, because scanning 6x6 negative in worthwhile quality requires very expensive equipment. Scanning 4x5 large format can be done decently on a good flatbed, so that's actually less of an issue (and you can still use lightproof tanks to develop without darkroom for those, too).