13.8MP Kodak Tops Previously Leaked Canon 342
MadCow42 writes "With the professional imaging trade show Photokina opening this week in Koln Germany, digital camera manufacturers are announcing a stunning new lineup of professional digital cameras. These include a 13.8 megapixel monster from Kodak, and a 11.1 megapixel camera from Canon. I'm sure Nikon isn't too far behind, but no news yet on their offerings. These cameras are positioned for the professional photographer, but with list prices from under $4k to $6k, they're not out of reach for the 'pro-sumer' market either. The best news is that new products like this will push prices down on the 4-6MP cameras at the high end of the consumer level." We mentioned the premature release giving Canon's hand away; like MadCow42, I want to see what Nikon has to say.
Re:Photo-Quality (Score:1, Informative)
Re:How many MPs do I really need? (Score:4, Informative)
Let's say you ignore that and print at 300 dpi. That's 2400 by 3000 pixels. There's 7.2 MP.
MP not everything (Score:4, Informative)
As an aside, the new D1s is also full frame, meaning you do not have to multiply your lenses by a certain factor in order to get correct results.
Re:How many MPs do I really need? (Score:2, Informative)
I could be wrong on this, but I Know that 300dpi is Way too low to make an 8x10 print, the inkjet might spit it out fast, but it ends up looking horrible.
pictures of the camera (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.dpreview.com/news/0209/02092304kodakdc
Pixels and Megapixels (Score:5, Informative)
This might be better than some 35mm films, especially at the higher ISO ratings.
Of course, it may be easier to get larger film than a larger sensor...
Extreme Resolution (Score:3, Informative)
Anyway, going with the assumption of a 4x3 aspect ratio in the new camera, 13.8MP would yield a resolution of roughly 4300x3225 (13,867,500 pixels). Doing simple division to fit that roughly into an 8x10 photo would give you about 410dpi. A far cry better than the 150dpi that my camera is capable of. And while it is still not in the ballpark of 720dpi (7488x5616 or 41.8MP), it's surely a lot better than this amature photographer is ever going to need.
When the 20MP cameras are available, we will be looking at 5168x3876 (20,031,168 pixels) which yields 495dpi for an 8x10 photo.
check out the pix @ dpreview.com (Score:4, Informative)
Check out some pictures of the new Kodak at dpreview [dpreview.com]. It looks pretty nice. I like big cameras that fill my hands, have a nice solid feel, and weigh a few pounds.
Of course my dream camera is 4-6 megapixel SLR that has a full-35mm-size *interchangeable* sensor (in case I want to upgrade to more pixels), low noise, good color, and takes EOS lenses. All for $500 or less. Just a few more years....
"Film dominated" pro market? (Score:3, Informative)
This includes freelance AP stringers, Washington Post pool reporters, and basically all of the pros that aren't making ''art''. And the latter are growing fewer and fewer due to the superior workflow from digital cameras. Curiously (to me), the guys who have stuck it out with film are Nat'l Geographic contract heavies (McCurry, Doubillet) and climbing photography pros. At least one guy I know who is a professional freelance photojournalist (don't laugh, he makes plenty of money doing it) and avid climber, still uses a film back for his climbing shots.
All this could change (a LOT) with the advent of affordable full-frame DSLRs. I know it's tempting me... and I'm just an amateur with a lot of lab fees to nudge me in that direction.
Just an FYI (Score:5, Informative)
Ask yourself this. How many 8x10 photos have you made and kept in the past few years? If your like the average consumer and do 4x6's and 5x8 's a good 2.1MP will do you well.
Plus keep in mind that A) you will need a high speed connection if you want to upload your photos to an online printer. My father realized that after buying a 3MP and trying to upload a roll of 30 via a 56k line which as we all know only does 33.6 up. Also realize that B) printing your own photos is very expensive and between the ink and paper really burn money.
So while its all good and well that these higher MP camera are coming out, the cost of the camera can really sometime be minimal over the other expenses you may incur.
Re:What will happen after the Megapixel race? (Score:1, Informative)
mind you that's not a reasonable facsimile, that is supposed to be a genuine reproduction of the amount of data in a silver chrystals on the film
on a side note -- this [8k.com] is a very interesting article all about digital photography and its limits.
Re:MP not everything (Score:3, Informative)
wrong on some points, right about AI: 25 years ago (Score:4, Informative)
My F100 will also do this. You have to use spot metering, but what else would a Real Man use, anyhow?
Anyways, the point is that you don't know (enough about) what you're talking about.
AI lenses were first produced about 25 years ago, so at least on that count, you're quite right that an unmodified 30-year-old Nikkor won't be real useful. Of course, if it's a long telephoto, it might be worth converting anyways. Not everyone is a staff photographer for a newspaper with a good lens pool.
Re:End The Megapixel Race (Score:4, Informative)
Digital backs like this [sinarbron.com], this [kodak.com] and this [simius.de] have been available for medium and large format cameras for quite a while, although at that sort of price they're out of the range of your average amateur photographer. SiliconFilm [siliconfilm.com] has been promising digital backs for 35mm cameras for as long as I can remember, but they're still "under development" - read vapourware. They are showing two new models on the website (4.2 and 10 megapixels), although the product "photos" on their website leave a lot to be desired.
For those who are wondering what a digital back is and why you'd want one - it's a device which is attached to the back of the camera and provides an imaging surface in place of a roll or sheet of film. They can also have onboard flash storage or they can be wired to a computer. Pros may add digital backs to their kits because they already have thousands of dollars worth of camera bodies, lenses, filters and other accessories. Rather than buying a whole new camera system and associated accessories, they can get a digital back to fit on their cameras and keep their existing kit.
Perfect Film Grain/Resolution/Megapixel squareoff (Score:5, Informative)
Many pundits here have been instantly shouting that 16+megapixels are unnecessary. They are very wrong. 16 megapixels only approxomate 35mm-- and don't even come close to large-format film.
The comparison is educational & eye opening and EXTREMELY well documented, with pictures.
The readers digest version is that "From these tests, it is my opinion that digital cameras will match Fujichrome Velvi 35mm film when they reach more than about 10 megapixels. Somewhere in the 12-16 megapixels will produce color image quality comparable to 35 mm film (this is a compromise of more intensity detail and less color detail than film). Somewhat fewer megapixels, approximately 7-8 Mpixels will match 35mm film intensity detail but at below 35mm film color detail.
Medium format film: about 50 digital camera megapixels are need to match Fujichrome Velvia in 6 x 4.5 cm.
Large format: more than 200 digital camera megapixels are need to match 4x5 Fujichrome Velvia film. How much more needs futher testing. "
Thanks Roger N. Clark.
ö? o:? colon? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:why is this for pros? (Score:5, Informative)
Canon's CMOS-based sensors, which will be used in the D1s, have proven excellent color stability and tonality when used correctly as shown by folks like Michael Reichmann of the Luminous Landscape. Previous digital-SLRs that used those sensors (D30, D60) demonstrated excellent low-light performance and had smaller than "full-frame" sensors, the size of the individual pixels on the D1s won't be very dissimilar IIRC to those on the Canon D60.
Larger than 3-4 megapixel resolution does matter to me, but only because I want to make 24x16 prints. If you're happy with 8x10s, there's nothing wrong with 3-4 megapixels in and of itself (although not all 3MP cameras are created equal by any means.) Still, for regular prints there should be no reduced quality at all with proper data handling.
I do landscacpe photography, 8fps is overkill.
who's ever heard of a professional photographer printing a digital image in large format?
Moving images through a digital stage is already standard procedure for many fine art photographers who do image capture on film, folks like the late Galen Rowell [mountainlight.com] already use this process (a workflow that was, interestingly enough, improved a lot with the work of former Mac Ghod Bill Atkinson. [billatkinson.com] (Interestingly enough, these processes end up again back on silver nitrate paper, but I digress.)
Starting off with digital images would actually remove layers of "stuff" happening to the image reducing quality--so long as the orignial image is detailed enough (in spacial resolution, in contrast range, and in color resolution.) Existing sensors can achieve this, the missing link really was resolution.
The new Canon D1s (not to mention the Sigma SD9, the Kodak 14MP SLR, and the Kodak 16MP digital back for the to-be-announced-in-the-next-day Hasselblad H1) are going to take serious bites into the serious film photography market.
Nikon camera-- Missing from Slashdot story (Score:1, Informative)
More rumors: Canon is developing (maybe they will announce it) a consumer priced ($1000) DSLR. Nikon will add 2 DSLRs: 11MP D2X and 5MP (high speed) D2H.
Also of interest is an announcement from vaporware company Silicon Film that they will be selling a $600 Wireless Full-Frame 11MP Color digital sensor for "most" consumer SLR cameras. If true, this would mean 2 things. 1) Silicon Film actually has a product, and 2) Silicon Film will be the sensor for my next camera.
Also, the Medium format cameras have digital backs from Kodak (16MP) and new this year is a 22MP Sinar digital back. 22MP beats 11MP by a factor of 2, and it is a hell of a lot larger (medium format being much larger than 35mm) so it has much better light gathering capability. Of course, what makes news is the price of the Kodak 14MP camera. At $4000, compared to the $6000 11MP Canon or rumored $6000 11MP Nikon, it's quite the price leader.
Mind you that I'm looking at various rumors, some interesting press, and some old, but really expensive stuff, but to appreciate the Digital aspect of photography, you really should look at the whole picture.
--Mike Fried
Digital photography enthusiast since 2000
Not quite the right math (Re:Extreme Resolution) (Score:2, Informative)
For example a 2.1MP camera only produces pictures @ 1600x1200 which contains 1,920,000 pixels. This is a ratio of about 10:11. This means that the 13.8MP camera gives pictures with approx. 12.5 Mpixels You do the math of figuring out the res.
[disclaimer]I am not into digital cameras, and all I know, I learned from this article, so don't fry me OK!!![/disclaimer]
Re:What will happen after the Megapixel race? (Score:2, Informative)
At 30,000 lpi, that would put 35mm film at something in the order of 500 megapixels.
my experiences (Score:3, Informative)
So how much saving over film & developing charges? Well, 16000 pix / 24 pix = 666 (!) rolls of film. 666*$10 film & develop charges = $6,600. Thats the minimum it would have cost! And I probably shot at least two to three times that and tossed out the crap.
Foveon (Score:3, Informative)
I have to think that buying a really high end diigtal camera in the next few years is only practical for a company with a lot of money - otherwise the imaging and storage technologies being developed and refined really make waiting worth while.
At the moment a good film scanner and camera are as appealing to me a digital system, and cheaper too. Plus film is a lot easier to deal with at the moment when travelling if you take more than a few hundred pictures.
Re:Hmmm... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:How many MPs do I really need? (Score:1, Informative)
DPI = dots per inch
PPI = pixels per inch
when you say "i am going to print my photo at 300 DPI from Photoshop" you are REALLY saying 300 PPI. Each individual pixel WILL be made up of several dots from the printer. the actual DPI rating of most modern printers are fairly good - epsons, and canons, and hps.
many photographers use the Epson 12xx or 2xxx series to print their photos.
Re:ö? o:? colon? (Score:2, Informative)
The same rule applies to my name.
Re:Depends on what you want. (Score:1, Informative)
A typical slashdotter! You really don't have a clue about the subject and yet you feel the need to elighten us with your wisdom.
For your edification, 35mm *is* a professional standard, along with 120 roll film, 6x4cm, 5x4" 10x8" and a bunch of other more obscure formats.
I have never heard of '50mm' film though.
The final print from a digital camera can be more than just a 1:1 pixel mapping due to a technique called interpolation were 'extra' pixels are added using a cunning algorythm that deduces the pixel color value and brighness from the surrounding pixels.
That means you can have a wall sized print from a 6MP camera - like film it will be grainy up close but acceptable from a typical viewing distance.
As for 10x8 prints from a 6MP camera, you *cannot* tell the difference if you use a professional dye sublimation printer and high quality, glossy paper stock.
The quality difference between film and digital media (when using the best pro cameras and printers) is getting small now and many professional photographers are moving over to digital exclusively - no film costs, no processing costs, no hours messing around with stinky chemicals in a hot dark room.
Re:MP not everything (Score:1, Informative)
http://www.dpreview.com/news/0209/02092404canon
Sample images here... (Score:2, Informative)
Get 'em while they're hot! (note - Flash required)
Canon Japan's EOS-1Ds page [canon.co.jp]
I wouldn't download the raw TIFFs though unless you have a use for them, and like 38MB images :) Sample 1 has brown splodges all over the wall areas, which I don't think are artifacts from the camera but rather markings on the walls themselves. I'm quite surprised that Canon didn't use some proper studio settings here for 1 & 2. Sample 3 also appears to have artifacts though at first glance, notice all along the left-hand side on the wall, on the colour chart and below the fruit, hmmmm... strange... I'll have to inspect the full-res. versions and see what I can find. Image sharpness around the edges looks good though, I guess Canon must have found a way round the CCD falloff?
I've got to say I'm damn impressed by these, I was unsure how the newer SLRs would fare, especially given the teething-troubles of the new Contax, but Canon have come up with a winner here IMHO. Think I'll stick with my EOS-3 until these babies come down in price a bit though !!Re:Nikon's response... Who cares? (Score:2, Informative)
And the D100 doesn't meter with non-CPU (AF or AI-P) lenses, neither does the F55/N55,F65/N65 and F80/N80, all other Nikon AF bodies will work with AI or later lenses.
Note that Pentax is even better for this, with 3 mounts, K (MF), KAF (Will only work with KAF lenses, bodies are low-end) and KAF2(Will work with all K lenses, bodies are mid-high Amateur range), so with the exception of their cheapest current bodies, any K mount lens will work on their newest cameras without modification.
Minolta and Canon have changed their mount once, going to a larger mount when they moved to AF. A good choice, as they weren't in the position that Nikon was, with professionals still using cameras from 1959 with current production lenses.
The Crazy Finn