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09/04/2003 05:25:03 AM · #1 |
Digital technology has been growing by leaps and bounds....
from my perspective.. it seems things have advanced especially in the past year. Lots of new cameras, better prices... yet I keep waiting for the 8 MP camera - at an affordable price.
I just noticed on dpreview.com that there is a new camera announced. What maker? Who else? Sony.
The New 8 MP Sony DigiCam
I have not read the whole review.. but couldn't wait to share with those of you who may not have heard about it ... like me :)
My feeling is other manufacturers will soon follow suit - so I am saving the bucks, and will begin to keep my eyes peeled.
Sony puts out a good product.... hmmm.
Anyone have any math stats on what a 8 MP cam is capable of? |
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09/04/2003 07:31:15 AM · #2 |
# of pixels isn't the be all and end all of how big you can print, but straight from the camera at 8Mp resolution you can do an 8x10 at 300dpi or a 21"x16" print at 150dpi (generally considered the lowest dpi you can 'get away' with for a good print)
It remains to be seen how much you can resize the output of the Sony to, but assume you can probably get away with close to double that for a low noise image.
But you'll have to find somewhere to store your images, an 8MP sensor churns out a 19Mb RAW file per shot, or a 22Mb TIFF - no wonder they gave up on just memory sticks |
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09/04/2003 09:22:10 AM · #3 |
Also Karen, 8MP is nice, but to really see a GREAT improvement in your images over your current camera the E-20 @ 4.9 MP you would really need to wait until a 10 or 11 MP camera is at a reasonable price.
My first real digital camera a Casio QV3000 at 3.2 MP turned out some VERY nice photos, and prints up to 16x20 looked awesome, and that was from an image not even shot in the full 3.2 MP size.
My sony 707 which I shoot mostly in 1024x764 cranks out some awesome images.
My Canon D60 I shoot in 2048x1360 98% of the time and I have had great success with that.
Of course this is my own personal preferences and have chosen the images sizes I am happy with. And people ask me if my 8x10 prints were from film cameras, I tell them no its digital and they act like they dont beleive me....
The reasons I got the Sony and the Canon were based on pure features alone, not the amount of MP it can shoot.
James |
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09/04/2003 09:51:11 AM · #4 |
Like I said in the previous post, megapixels is only a really small part of what makes a good quality image.
One of the 3Mp Nikon pro digital cameras for example will produce vastly superior pictures to say a 5Mp Nikon coolpix, and the 3Mp images will be able to be printed at a much larger size due to the much cleaner image. Unless you need to often print at 11"x14" or larger, a 6Mp is probably more than sufficient and always will be sufficient.
Message edited by author 2003-09-04 09:51:57. |
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09/04/2003 11:07:37 AM · #5 |
True.. there are other features I look for.... for instance my next cam will be a true D-SLR.
6 MP are sufficient for 8X10, that is true, but does anyone know what the equivalent MP's are vs. 35mm film? And what of medium format resolution equivalency?
Storage is always a big consideration - to be sure.. of course, what we have now for storage some of us would have never dreamed of even 3-4 years ago.
So, the biggest contributor to good images then is not just the MP, but the lens quality I would imagine.
What are the top 5 (arbitrary no.#) features you all look for in a digi cam for the best possible images for a "reasonable" price? |
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09/04/2003 11:17:44 AM · #6 |
Originally posted by KarenB:
True.. there are other features I look for.... for instance my next cam will be a true D-SLR.
6 MP are sufficient for 8X10, that is true, but does anyone know what the equivalent MP's are vs. 35mm film? And what of medium format resolution equivalency?
Storage is always a big consideration - to be sure.. of course, what we have now for storage some of us would have never dreamed of even 3-4 years ago.
So, the biggest contributor to good images then is not just the MP, but the lens quality I would imagine.
What are the top 5 (arbitrary no.#) features you all look for in a digi cam for the best possible images for a "reasonable" price? |
1. Lense quality (especially since mine is not a DSLR, so the lense is stuck)
2. Range of manual features
3. Megapixels
4. Zoom and Macro capability
5. flash - hot shoe capability
These are just 5 that I thought of. Not necessarily my top 5, I guess, and not necessarily in this order.
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09/04/2003 11:21:09 AM · #7 |
Originally posted by KarenB:
True.. there are other features I look for.... for instance my next cam will be a true D-SLR.
6 MP are sufficient for 8X10, that is true, but does anyone know what the equivalent MP's are vs. 35mm film? And what of medium format resolution equivalency? |
There are some that claim that 35mm film is equivalent to about a 45Mp image. There are others that claim that the current Canon EOS 1Ds is equivalent to medium format quality.
There is also a distinction that can be drawn between raw information and useful information. There is a lot of grain in some films, but is that useful ? Does it make the picture easier or harder to enlarge ?
If you have a really low noise digitial sensor and high quality optics, with a 4Mp picture you might be able to enlarge it to the same size as a medium format or 35mm shot and have equivalent or more detail in the digital print.
Lens quality is the single biggest thing I think in terms of image quality - you can take a $5000 digital camera and put a $100 consumer zoom lens on it, and get something that is as good as $200 camera in temrs of optical quality.
Top 5 arbitary features I'd look for in a camera
1/ Enough megapixels for what I want to use the images for.(I have 20"x30" prints on my wall that I wouldn't need more detail in, from a 6Mp image) If I only cared about web, 1Mp is sufficient, if I cared about 4x6s then 3Mp is more than enough. StevePax mentioned cropping and certainly if you want to crop your images, more megapixels gives you more options. I don't think I've cropped an image more than 3 or 4 times in the last year so this doesn't matter much to me though it could for others.
2/ Manual controls - you need good exposure control for the best possible images. (High end point and shoot, or SLR.)
3/ Bright, clear, viewfinder with full coverage. You can't take good pictures if you can't see. (This typically means SLR camera.)
4/ Fast shutter response/ low shutter lag - the bane of point and shoot digital. I want to press the button to take the picture I see, not what it is in 5 seconds time. (This also typically means SLR.)
5/ feature related to the type of photography you like.
e.g., macro enthusiasts want manual focus control and mirror lock-up with a good range of macro lenses and lighting options.
Sports biased photographers want huge burst rates, fast shutter, big buffers and fast/ accurate auto focus.
Portrait/ wedding photographers - the abiity to print larger and with huge detail (why medium format is often used for wedding photography)
Nature/ outdoors photographer - weather seals, rugged construction
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+
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other biases depending on preferences.
1DS compared to medium format
D60 vs medium format
D30 vs 35mm film
Message edited by author 2003-09-04 11:25:51. |
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09/04/2003 11:30:23 AM · #8 |
I will say this. I Had a print out of my Violin at 16x20 from my fuji 602 in 6mp Fine mode. I showed it to my father in law who shot medium format professinaly for a few years as well as 35mm. He said in his oppinion that a 35mm shoot blown up to 16x20 would not have as good a quality (sharpness of detail) to it as the one I shot with my Fuji 602 in 6mp mode. He has been doing it for a while so I respect his oppinion.
John (TurboTech) |
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09/04/2003 05:35:12 PM · #9 |
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09/04/2003 06:16:36 PM · #10 |
I wouldn't get too excited about it.
8 megapixels in the same sized sensor... usually it means HIGHER noise than the previous 5 megapixel camera unless some new revolutionary process technology has been achieved. 8 megapixels would also be an excess if the lens can't resolve enough.
The Canon D30, a 3 megapixel camera, outperforms the Sony 717 (5 meagpixels) by leaps and bounds. Why? It has a LOT less noise, and it can see all the pixels that any Canon lens can offer.
I am afraid that Sony will run into the same issues that has made the full frame Kodak 14n a flop -- they crammed 14 megapixels in the 35 mm frame, but they didn't solve the noise issue, instead, because there are so many pixels crammed into the same space, there were some significiant noise problems. Canon seems to have solved that issue with the D60/10D series -- if you map out 10D's sensor and rescale it for a 35 mm, you'd get about 16 megapixels. Sony's sensor is about 1/2 the size of 10D, i seriously doubt they can cut the noise down to compete against it, instead, i think most of the increase of pixels for the Sony 828 would be lost due to noise issues.
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09/04/2003 06:34:33 PM · #11 |
I was really eyeing the Sony F828 but knowing how I am already fighting noise in shots taken with my F707 due to a realtively small sensor I can't imagine the F828 being much better in that regard even with 8 Mp's because of the same size sensor. I really want the option of interchangeable lenses and a better viewfinder of the DSLR's. So I am more than willing to trade off a couple Mp's in favor of the Canon Digital Rebel or 10D. More Mp's is always nicer to a point but the size and quality of the sensors is much more important to me. As long as the details that you can see are clean and noise free than it doesn't always matter if there was some details that couldn't be recorded. It's fun to see lots of detail, especially in shots like landscapes, but I figure as long as the image is still sharp and clean it will still look beautiful. Cameras that can take beautiful shots that can be enlarged are already here so it is indeed a great time for digital photography.
T
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09/05/2003 12:22:16 AM · #12 |
| Does anyone know how much this camera is running for$$$? |
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09/05/2003 03:24:11 AM · #13 |
A pertinent article on sensor size. I don't recall if it mentions visible diffraction which is also a problem. For example, an 8x10 print from the F828 will have visible diffraction (10 inch viewing distance) at anything below f/4! This does assume you're aiming for 5 lp/mm or better. You can almost reach 4 lp/mm at f/5.6 on the F828. 4 lp/mm isn't a bad target of course...I think it corresponds to roughly 200dpi.
Anyway, the extra 2MP (from Canon 300D to Sony F828) doesn't go very far @300dpi (or even 240dpi for that matter).
What they didn't do, but should have done, was increase their sensor size. Canon should have also done this with the 10D at the very least. Oh well, tomorrow is the future. |
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09/05/2003 08:49:17 AM · #14 |
I say blame Intel.
Technical comparisons for 90%* of the population boil down to a processor speed value for computers. (The other 10%* like shiny things and buy Apple*)
For digital cameras, the equivalent is megapixels. For the majority* of non-technical evaulations, more megapixels is good, so this Sony must be the best camera ever, just after the 14Mp Kodak camera.
* All statistics, trends and facetious comments in this post are for purely illustrative purposes. Please don't bother trying to refute them as they are extremely refutable, it will likely make them cry.
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09/05/2003 05:10:17 PM · #15 |
| 1200.00 US dollars was price i saw. |
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09/05/2003 06:24:22 PM · #16 |
Originally posted by ellamay:
1200.00 US dollars was price i saw. |
seriously!??
you yanks obviously get everything cheaper than us in the UK.
Here a Nikon D100 body (6MP) goes for £1500 (about £2300) and the Kodak 14N (14mp) is £4225!! |
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09/05/2003 06:32:43 PM · #17 |
| I think companies just find the whole currency conversion thing tiresome and just sell stuff in the UK for the same number that it sells for in the US. I noticed the same thing in Australia too... the number always remains the same, it just costs you a whole lot more in reality. |
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