Curiousā¦ I would have thought itād be pretty popular, especially at concerts and the like (low light performance not withstanding).
I had a little Sony compact with a periscopic lens years ago, a TX10 or similar if IIRC. Awesome little camera, smaller than a phone with a 25-100mm zoom I think, shockproof and waterproof. Went everywhere with me until one day I switched it on (with the slick sliding front cover) and it vibrated like crazy. And it just kept vibrating til I turned it off again. It still took photos, but completely blurry.
As far as I could tell the IBIS somehow went wrongā¦ destabilization anyone?
I still have itā¦ would be nice to fix it but I fear far too hard.
Only if youāre looking at a single pixel. The average of four smaller sensels are no worse than one big sensel that covers the same area.
With modern sensor tech, more pixels no longer have a disadvantage in noise. Once again, thatās image noise, not pixel noise. Theoretically, read noise is higher for more pixels, which used to dominate in older tech, but these days read noise is so far below shot noise that it no longer matters. Shot noise is caused by the light, not the sensor, and thus doesnāt care about the size of the sensels. The exception to this is long-exposure astro photography, which is still dominated by read noise.
What I try to do on my R7 is to set the exposure to get as much light onto the sensor as the subject allows and then adjust the ISO so I get at least some data in the right most histogram box. That delivers a clean photo without a lot of objectionable noise. I havenāt seen much value in cranking up the ISO much further just to push the EVF histogram all the way to right side edge, even if I know that Iām not clipping highlights.
True, but thatās comparing two cameras with same-size sensors, differing only in the number of sensels. I was addressing a different comparison.
Suppose we have two camera bodies each with (say) 50 million pixels. One camera has all those pixels in a large sensor (thus large sensels). The other camera body has a small sensor (small sensels).
For a constant illumination of the sensor, we will get less photon shot noise in the large sensor camera. This is true of individual pixels, and the entire image. I agree that, for non-astro photography, the dominant noise is photon-shot.
To me, this explains āwhy some manufacturers are going all-in on full frameā, as opposed to smaller formats.
Of course, small formats have other advantages. Here is a highly pocketable (film) camera which, like some camera phones, incorporates a 45 degree mirror in the optical path.
In that case youāre right, the camera with the smaller sensor will capture more shot noise. My apologies for the misunderstanding. Although Iād argue, the number of sensels is not relevant to that statement.
To clarify I am not suggesting pushing to the extreme of the EVF histogram but instead towards right . I usually shoot bracketed exposures as standard practice and what I have clearly seen is that the ISO number itself is less important to noise with my Canon R7 but the brightest image without clipping has either the best or at least equal image quality for noise and subsequent detail. An under exposed image creates the most noise problems with my R7 despite the ISO number.
We have mainly focused on noise in this discussion, but I wonder how pixel size and optical resolution of a lens work to the best advantage. I presume it would take a very sharp lens to benefit from post shooting crop of a pixel dense sensor such as the Canon R7 crop sensor. With a full frame sensor and larger pixels maybe optical sharpness is less of a big deal. I am not sure. Just wondering.
Although thereās nothing stopping you from shooting in crop mode with full-frame lenses, my initial thought behind this discussion was about aiming for a compact kit, and specifically using lenses built for APS-C sensors on full frame bodies. Fujifilm has proven that they can make very sharp lenses for APS-C sensors, including pixel dense ones like those on the X-T5 and X-H2. I donāt have much experience with the big 3 and their APS-C lenses, but Iām assuming they also make some very good ones.
Yes, absolutely. A crop sensor (or cropped sensor) produces more noise per image.
In terms of sharpness, more pixels are always better. Resolution is multiplicative between lens resolution and sensor resolution. More is always better.
To a good approximation, all modern lenses are sharp in the center of the frame, stopped down, in the middle of the zoom range. Thatās where theyāll benefit most from more sensor resolution, while soft corners are merely oversampled. Thankfully, thatās also where crop modes are looking.
But even oversampling has benefits: demosaicing artifacts are smaller, noise reduction is easier, moire is reduced, (physical) bloom is reduced. Which is why smartphones capture 200 MP images, and then crunch them down to 12 MP.
Iām not sure I understand this rightā¦
If I take a 6mp Nikon D40 (to take an extreme example) surely replacing a high resolution lens with a very high resolution lens isnāt really going to help?
Not really, each is a limiting factor on its own. More pixels are useless when the lens cannot resolve the relevant information optically, and similarly putting a very good lens in front of a low-resolution sensor will still be limited by the sensor.
That said, in practice, for most cameras the optics are much, much more limiting than the sensor. I would rather have a 16MP sensor with a good lens than a 50MP sensor with a mediocre lens. The caveat is that the optical qualities of a lens are much harder to quantify and understand than counting megapixels, so most discussions center on megapixels.
Also, it is very important to keep in mind that linear pixel density is the square root of area pixel density. Double the total number of pixels for the same sensor, and get an extra 41% of linear resolution.
Thatās a silly straw man. It wonāt help resolution, obviously. But equally obviously, you wouldnāt use a D40 if high resolution was your main concern. So perhaps you like the ergonomics, or like the rendering? In which case a better lens could certainly improve in those regards.
In fact, most high price lenses these days distinguish themselves much more on rendering characteristics than resolution. There are easy solutions for high resolution pictures. Panos for example, or these new fangled sensor-shift highres modes, to say nothing of tripods and stopping down.
To the point of the original question, a higher resolution sensor does bring benefits to cropped shooting. But really not as much as youād think, in my experience. So long as you still have enough pixels to print, you can crop astonishingly far without ruining a picture.
I have a 1x2m print right behind me on the wall, from a 16MP D7000. If you know, you can find evidence of that fact; itās not the most detailed print in the world. But from a normal viewing distance, you really canāt tell. In general, 12ish MP is plenty for most reproductions at normal viewing distances.
Still, resolution is multiplicative. In any reasonable (!) camera system, improving either the lens or the sensor will improve the image.
This is an often overlooked point by photographers. How many pixels do we really need. On my setup of darktable I include displaying the pixel count after cropping. Then simple math is 300 pixels per inch is photographic quality print that will withstand inspection with a magnifying glass. With your 1 x 2 meter print you donāt need 300 pixels per inch as you you stand back and appreciate it. Still upscaling is probably a good idea. I never get into that because I donāt print 1x2 M.
