7 ms·

A lot of cameras are sticking at 24MP because that's where a lot of lenses start to reach a weak point. Also, file size to utility becomes a consideration becau

by galago 9y ago

A lot of cameras are sticking at 24MP because that's where a lot of lenses start to reach a weak point. Also, file size to utility becomes a consideration because most people expect cloud/sharing. I feel like 100+MP is going to be an enthusiast thing for a long time. It seems a lot like car speeds. Every car sold today can go over 100 miles per hour. Some people still care about how fast their car can go, but most don't really think about it or even know their car's top speed.

copperx 9y ago
That's true if you're using 35MM equivalent lenses. One must switch to medium format sizes.
- lllr_finger 9y ago
  Unless you're looking at the Mamiya or Hasselblad MF lenses, good 35mm lenses tend to out-resolve MF and definitely LF. Projection circle is only part of the effective resolution.
slantyyz 9y ago
I tend to think this 120MP sensor is probably going to be sold commercially as a surveillance product first. There's a lot of need for products like this in stadiums, arenas, large public areas etc.
- komali2 9y ago
  That marketing video seemed to be highlighting specifically that. They even had the shot of the security woman at the very end.
- coolspot 9y ago
  See also WAAS [11] and ARGUS [22] [11] https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/how-one-new-drone-tech-finally-allows-all-seeing-survei-1553272901 https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/how-one-new-drone-tech-fin... [22] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p4BQ1XzwDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p4BQ1XzwDg
- BillinghamJ 9y ago
  The file size is insane though - imagine having to store hours of video from hundreds of 120MP cameras. Even the bandwidth required to continuously stream hundreds of those cameras to a central location would be enormous.
  - visarga 9y ago
    If it's for surveillance, you connect them to gigabit fiber.
- sitkack 9y ago
  Sony had an ad for a eye-of-sauron type application for a gigapixel imager array that could track someone across an entire city from one location. Surveillance will be the major consumer of >100MP sensors.
DanCarvajal 9y ago
To Canon's credit starting with the 35mm f1.4L II a few years ago, they've started releasing pro grade lenses with the optical performance to handle extreme resolution sensors. Still though 24MP is more than enough for me.
dingaling 9y ago
I have a couple of photography colleagues who use the 50MP Canon 5Ds. The detail they gather is astounding, more than my 21.1MP can grab even with a teleconvertor on the lens. So they can shoot with shorter focal lengths, which means less weight and better stabilisation. They can then go into post-processing and "crop the hell outta it" and still end up with more detail than my image. It is a cliché but high-density sensors really are a "game changer". They give so much potential to reframe the photo after shooting, selecting the most relevant area of the frame and still having enough detail to blow-up to prints.
- azhenley 9y ago
  Exactly this. Being able to crop is why I use a 42MP camera.
- antisthenes 9y ago
  Top of the line tools really make a difference in photography. Back in 2007 when taking a photography class, you could see the difference in quality between a top of the line DSLR that some senior students had and point-and-shoot cameras without interchangeable lenses. Even though the composition was good from both, the difference in quality really made you biased towards photos produced by the higher end gear. Depth of field, sharpness, noise, all those things. And everything you mentioned as well - not having to take multiple shots, because you can always crop later, not having to get as close to the subject for people photography, so perhaps getting more shots.
- qume 9y ago
  A good quality 2x teleconverter will make your sensor the equivalent of 80mp in this context. Ie with the same lens, a 20mp camera with 2x teleconverter will resolve more detail than a 50mp sensor.
  - dingaling 9y ago
    But it's a losing race; adding a 2x teleconvertor halves the amount of light received, so I have to drop my shutter speed and / or raise the ISO to compensate. Both of which are disruptive to image detail. Plus the distorting effect of the extra glass in the lightpath.
bhouston 9y ago
We need a better file format that JPG for sharing these large images.
- caymanjim 9y ago
  JPEG is a compressed format; it intentionally sacrifices quality for smaller size. It still has its uses, but it should never be used where image quality is the primary concern. There are many widely-adopted alternatives that suit other purposes and have no data loss. One alternative, PNG, is supported everywhere that matters, but there are plenty of others.
  - bhouston 9y ago
    We need lossy state of the art codecs, PNG sucks for large images. TIFF and EXR are also great. But I think we need a lossy large image format, probably based on AV1 and similar technology.
- e12e 9y ago
  We have jpeg2000 and dng.
- wongarsu 9y ago
  JPEG is still used because of ubiquity and because it always was good enough, we have over two decades of better replacements lined up if we need them.
bigdubs 9y ago
The lens quality barrier at 24MP isn't arbitrary; that's basically the equivalent digital resolution you get from 35mm film.
- abritinthebay 9y ago
  Not true - obviously it slightly depends on the grain of the film but the theoretical resolution of high quality 35mm film is ~87MP Full frame, obviously.
  - ams6110 9y ago
    Much higher brightness range on film too (potentially -- depends on the film of course).
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  - stan_rogers 9y ago
    You'd need to be using Kodak Technical Pan at a rated speed of 12 to 16 (before filter factors, for continuous-tone images with smooth gradients) in order to get there, though. Kodachrome 25 (in the K14 process version) and Ektar 25 weren't terribly far behind, but neither had a great deal of latitude. And you'd also need something a little flatter than the typical film aperture and pressure plate to really use it. More typical 35mm films - those with usable sensitivities for general photography - wouldn't get you anywhere near there.
    - abritinthebay 9y ago
      Sure, there’s tons of variation of course and 87 is the upper limit, but from what I’ve read it’s still the 40-50MP range before you hit the limits of a decent typical 35mm film. Lens quality does start to become a factor a bit earlier than that too.
      - 9y ago
bufferoverflow 9y ago
Only really cheap zoom lenses would max out at 24MP. Most lenses will have no problem with 100MP. I'd say even 24MP is an enthusiast resolution. Most people are now fine with their smartphones, and the most they do is share their photos on social media sites in very low resolution.
Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
The lens 'weak point' depends on the aperture you're using. Even relatively inexpensive lenses will resolve a hell of a lot of detail at f/8. I do agree that it's an enthusiast thing, and will remain so for a long time, but it's not that hard to utilize that resolution.
- vardump 9y ago
  I think most lenses, cheap or not, already lose resolution at f/8 due to diffraction. Most of my lenses have resolving peaks somewhere between f/4 and f/5.6.
r00fus 9y ago
> I feel like 100+MP is going to be an enthusiast thing for a long time. It seems a lot like car speeds. Is there anything in photography analogous to speed limit? Because that's often a reason why folks don't go over say 80mph not to mention well over 100. If tomorrow 100MP cameras appeared and were cheap enough I don't think people would think twice about getting them.
- SourPatch 9y ago
  Yes, people would buy them, but they do require very disciplined shooting. That kind of resolution is very unforgiving of even slight movement or mis-focus.
- visarga 9y ago
  > Is there anything in photography analogous to speed limit? Maybe price, weight and the size of the RAW files they generate? At some point it's not worth to invest more.
mncharity 9y ago
> I feel like 100+MP is going to be an enthusiast thing for a long time. Or maybe not? Optical system design often allows you to trade one thing for another. So for instance, years ago, light field capture (each "pixel" is a little lens in front of several real pixels) was bottlenecked on image size. You're spending resolution to buy angle information. An order-of-magnitude or two of resolution. There's also exposure (HDR), and time (anti-blur), and so on. 100 MP sounds like a lot... until you start spending it in order-of-magnitude chunks to obtain other system features.

by galago 9y ago

copperx 9y ago

That's true if you're using 35MM equivalent lenses. One must switch to medium format sizes.

lllr_finger 9y ago
Unless you're looking at the Mamiya or Hasselblad MF lenses, good 35mm lenses tend to out-resolve MF and definitely LF. Projection circle is only part of the effective resolution.

slantyyz 9y ago

I tend to think this 120MP sensor is probably going to be sold commercially as a surveillance product first. There's a lot of need for products like this in stadiums, arenas, large public areas etc.

komali2 9y ago
That marketing video seemed to be highlighting specifically that. They even had the shot of the security woman at the very end.
coolspot 9y ago
See also WAAS [11] and ARGUS [22] [11] https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/how-one-new-drone-tech-finally-allows-all-seeing-survei-1553272901 https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/how-one-new-drone-tech-fin... [22] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p4BQ1XzwDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p4BQ1XzwDg
BillinghamJ 9y ago
The file size is insane though - imagine having to store hours of video from hundreds of 120MP cameras. Even the bandwidth required to continuously stream hundreds of those cameras to a central location would be enormous.
- visarga 9y ago
  If it's for surveillance, you connect them to gigabit fiber.
sitkack 9y ago
Sony had an ad for a eye-of-sauron type application for a gigapixel imager array that could track someone across an entire city from one location. Surveillance will be the major consumer of >100MP sensors.

DanCarvajal 9y ago

To Canon's credit starting with the 35mm f1.4L II a few years ago, they've started releasing pro grade lenses with the optical performance to handle extreme resolution sensors. Still though 24MP is more than enough for me.

dingaling 9y ago

I have a couple of photography colleagues who use the 50MP Canon 5Ds. The detail they gather is astounding, more than my 21.1MP can grab even with a teleconvertor on the lens. So they can shoot with shorter focal lengths, which means less weight and better stabilisation. They can then go into post-processing and "crop the hell outta it" and still end up with more detail than my image. It is a cliché but high-density sensors really are a "game changer". They give so much potential to reframe the photo after shooting, selecting the most relevant area of the frame and still having enough detail to blow-up to prints.

azhenley 9y ago
Exactly this. Being able to crop is why I use a 42MP camera.
antisthenes 9y ago
Top of the line tools really make a difference in photography. Back in 2007 when taking a photography class, you could see the difference in quality between a top of the line DSLR that some senior students had and point-and-shoot cameras without interchangeable lenses. Even though the composition was good from both, the difference in quality really made you biased towards photos produced by the higher end gear. Depth of field, sharpness, noise, all those things. And everything you mentioned as well - not having to take multiple shots, because you can always crop later, not having to get as close to the subject for people photography, so perhaps getting more shots.
qume 9y ago
A good quality 2x teleconverter will make your sensor the equivalent of 80mp in this context. Ie with the same lens, a 20mp camera with 2x teleconverter will resolve more detail than a 50mp sensor.
- dingaling 9y ago
  But it's a losing race; adding a 2x teleconvertor halves the amount of light received, so I have to drop my shutter speed and / or raise the ISO to compensate. Both of which are disruptive to image detail. Plus the distorting effect of the extra glass in the lightpath.

bhouston 9y ago

We need a better file format that JPG for sharing these large images.

caymanjim 9y ago
JPEG is a compressed format; it intentionally sacrifices quality for smaller size. It still has its uses, but it should never be used where image quality is the primary concern. There are many widely-adopted alternatives that suit other purposes and have no data loss. One alternative, PNG, is supported everywhere that matters, but there are plenty of others.
- bhouston 9y ago
  We need lossy state of the art codecs, PNG sucks for large images. TIFF and EXR are also great. But I think we need a lossy large image format, probably based on AV1 and similar technology.
e12e 9y ago
We have jpeg2000 and dng.
wongarsu 9y ago
JPEG is still used because of ubiquity and because it always was good enough, we have over two decades of better replacements lined up if we need them.

bigdubs 9y ago

The lens quality barrier at 24MP isn't arbitrary; that's basically the equivalent digital resolution you get from 35mm film.

abritinthebay 9y ago
Not true - obviously it slightly depends on the grain of the film but the theoretical resolution of high quality 35mm film is ~87MP Full frame, obviously.
- ams6110 9y ago
  Much higher brightness range on film too (potentially -- depends on the film of course).
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- stan_rogers 9y ago
  You'd need to be using Kodak Technical Pan at a rated speed of 12 to 16 (before filter factors, for continuous-tone images with smooth gradients) in order to get there, though. Kodachrome 25 (in the K14 process version) and Ektar 25 weren't terribly far behind, but neither had a great deal of latitude. And you'd also need something a little flatter than the typical film aperture and pressure plate to really use it. More typical 35mm films - those with usable sensitivities for general photography - wouldn't get you anywhere near there.
  - abritinthebay 9y ago
    Sure, there’s tons of variation of course and 87 is the upper limit, but from what I’ve read it’s still the 40-50MP range before you hit the limits of a decent typical 35mm film. Lens quality does start to become a factor a bit earlier than that too.
    - 9y ago

bufferoverflow 9y ago

Only really cheap zoom lenses would max out at 24MP. Most lenses will have no problem with 100MP. I'd say even 24MP is an enthusiast resolution. Most people are now fine with their smartphones, and the most they do is share their photos on social media sites in very low resolution.

Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago

The lens 'weak point' depends on the aperture you're using. Even relatively inexpensive lenses will resolve a hell of a lot of detail at f/8. I do agree that it's an enthusiast thing, and will remain so for a long time, but it's not that hard to utilize that resolution.

vardump 9y ago
I think most lenses, cheap or not, already lose resolution at f/8 due to diffraction. Most of my lenses have resolving peaks somewhere between f/4 and f/5.6.

r00fus 9y ago

> I feel like 100+MP is going to be an enthusiast thing for a long time. It seems a lot like car speeds. Is there anything in photography analogous to speed limit? Because that's often a reason why folks don't go over say 80mph not to mention well over 100. If tomorrow 100MP cameras appeared and were cheap enough I don't think people would think twice about getting them.

SourPatch 9y ago
Yes, people would buy them, but they do require very disciplined shooting. That kind of resolution is very unforgiving of even slight movement or mis-focus.
visarga 9y ago
> Is there anything in photography analogous to speed limit? Maybe price, weight and the size of the RAW files they generate? At some point it's not worth to invest more.

mncharity 9y ago

> I feel like 100+MP is going to be an enthusiast thing for a long time. Or maybe not? Optical system design often allows you to trade one thing for another. So for instance, years ago, light field capture (each "pixel" is a little lens in front of several real pixels) was bottlenecked on image size. You're spending resolution to buy angle information. An order-of-magnitude or two of resolution. There's also exposure (HDR), and time (anti-blur), and so on. 100 MP sounds like a lot... until you start spending it in order-of-magnitude chunks to obtain other system features.