Photography - 8Mp Digital The Theoretical 35mm Quality Equivelant

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Harvey wrote:

Trying to be funny when it obviously isn't your forté if that post is
anything to go by.

OTOH Martin is pretty accomplished photog which counts more around here...

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From my experience it depends on *whose* 8MP are you referring to. A 8MP
JPEG (not talking about RAW) produces by 1DM2 far far far better result than
a 8MP output from those "prosumer" DC like even Olympus 8080 or Canon Pro 1.
Take a few pictures with both sides and you'll know what I'm talking about.

And I don't think those "prosumer" produced better image than my Nikkor +
Fuji.

"Matt" .. .
I heard someone say that 8Mp digital cameras were the equivalent to 35mm
film quality?

Does this mean they have the theoretical equivalent resolution? Are they
the equivalent to 35mm?

"PhotoMan" wrote:
Are they the equivalent to 35mm?

Download some Mark II sample images from the Canon site and resize
them carefully and print them to see for yourself, though these jpegs
aren't as smooth as RAW file conversions.

Where does the 16.7MP full frame Canon EOS1Ds Mk II fit into this
discussion?

Here's a _simulation_. Both images are taken with 35mm lenses.

Film: Mamiya 645ProTL, 35/3.5, tripod, mirror lock up, f/8, Tech Pan scanned
at 4000 dpi on a Nikon 8000.
Digital: 300D, 17-40/4.0 at 35mm, f/8.0, hand held, upsampled to match the
magnification of the film scan.

http://www.pbase.com/davidjl/image/34473670/original

David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan

Bill Hilton wrote:

From: "Matt"

I heard someone say that 8Mp digital cameras were the equivalent to 35mm
film quality?

A dSLR like the Canon 1D Mark II with 8 Mpixels and a large sensor seems to
produce better large prints for me than ASA 100 speed Provia 100 F or Velvia
scanned with a 4,000 dpi scanner. I'm getting 16x20" prints from the 1D that
are better than any prints that size I've gotten with even Velvia 50.

But 8 Mpix from a smaller sensor camera might give different results, so "it
depends" on where the 8 Mpixels came from and what kind of film you are using
for your comparison.

Does this mean they have the theoretical equivalent resolution?

No, fine grained film still does better at resolving lines on test targets, yet
the digital prints look better ... how? Because of the lack of apparent grain.
Digital simply blows up better than film.

Are they the equivalent to 35mm?

Download some Mark II sample images from the Canon site and resize them
carefully and print them to see for yourself, though these jpegs aren't as
smooth as RAW file conversions.

Here's a good summary by Roger Clark of the film vs digital debate. Others
give digital a wider edge, still others feel film is much better, but what he
describes is close to the majority viewpoint.

http://www.clarkvision.com/imagedeta....summary1.html

While most who have worked with digital camera images agree that
because of the "smoothness" of digital images, they can be enlarged
more than film images. My testing, summarized on the above page,
shows that fine grained film has higher spatial resolution
than 8-mpixel digital camera images, but the digital camera images
have several times higher signal-to-noise. People infer
image quality as a function of both spatial resolution and
signal-to-noise. While this is a subjective concept, I've
started some experiments to test this "apparent image
quality," or AIQ. My initial results are showing to first order
that there is an approximate equal trade for signal-to-
noise versus spatial resolution. Thus, if you had a digital
camera that produced 8 megapixels and twice the signal
to noise as fine grained film, the apparent digital camera
megapixels could be doubled when comparing to film. So that
8-megapixel image would have the "apparent image quality"
of 16 megapixels if compared to the lower signal-to-noise
film. Since my tests show the spatial resolution of fine
grained 35mm film like Fuji Velvia is around 16 mpixels
digital equivalent, then that 8-mpixel digital camera
produces similar apparent image quality to 35mm fine-grained film.

But high end DSLrs, like the Canon 1D Mark II have several times
the signal to noise of film, so this boosts the apparent image
quality by the same factor as the ratio in the signal-to-noise
values, propelling the 1D Mark II images higher than fine grained
35mm film. While my research is preliminary, it does seem to
agree with what people are saying, and because people look at
different things (image smoothness versus spatial detail),
it shows there is a lot of room for interpretation.

Finally, many responses in this group say "film" but not what
kind of film. Fast film has lower spatial resolution and
noise (grain) then fine-grained film. One must specify what
kind of film, as well as film format (35mm versus 4x5) for
these discussions to have any meaning.

It will be a while before I complete my testing on AIQ and get
web pages up. If my research trend holds, then the ~16 megapixel
cameras will have ~64 AIQ mpixel film equivalent, which is well
into the higher medium format size range. Impressive!

Roger
http://www.clarkvision.com

"Alan Browne" wrote in message
.. .
Harvey wrote:

Trying to be funny when it obviously isn't your forté if that post is
anything to go by.

OTOH Martin is pretty accomplished photog which counts more around here...

http://www.btinternet.com/~mcsalty//...c/disabled.jpg ...
amazing.

I got a Nikon d70 digital SLR 6MP on the basis that the sensor is larger
than the 8mp models even if it's fewer pixels. I'm not really qualified
to judge but it seems to me the pics are a bit fuzzy and do not compare
to the amazing detail of the 8MP digicams I saw. Another thing I was
told is that the metering sensors was way more advanced than the 8MP
prosumer cams and I guess I'm hoping it has a better dynamic range and
is basically more sensitive and responsive to difficult situations due
to the larger sensor. It cost $1000 for the body but then with a lense &
extra batteries, a 2g Microdrive that more than doubled the cost. I
think I was told that the raw files are more capable of being enlarged
than an 8MP though I don't know about that. Another consideration is
that the 8MP models are pushing the limit and they have some problems
like purple fringing on high contrast edges which is really very
annoying and noise level for night shots can be pretty bad for the 8MP
prosumer models. I've found that if I just barely get a bad picture in
tough lighting with this camera I can process it is photoshop to an
amazing degree because there is a lot less noise & the quality is there
to work with. This guy has a decent optical viewfinder like a 35mm &
it's super fast and light on battery usage so it's no problem to shoot
400 pics in a day-long excusion with room for another couple hundred
pics if something else came up.

¤T¸}¤j«L wrote:
From my experience it depends on *whose* 8MP are you referring to. A 8MP
JPEG (not talking about RAW) produces by 1DM2 far far far better result than
a 8MP output from those "prosumer" DC like even Olympus 8080 or Canon Pro 1.
Take a few pictures with both sides and you'll know what I'm talking about.

And I don't think those "prosumer" produced better image than my Nikkor +
Fuji.

"Matt" .. .

I heard someone say that 8Mp digital cameras were the equivalent to 35mm
film quality?

Does this mean they have the theoretical equivalent resolution? Are they
the equivalent to 35mm?