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Sony Shoots For 4-Filter CCD, 8 Megapixel Camera
Artifex writes "If you're looking to spend about $1200 on a new digital camera, check out this Digital Photography Review look at Sony's upcoming 8 MegaPixel Cyber-shot DSC-F828. The most interesting thing isn't the number of pixels in this prosumer-grade camera, but its 4-color filter CCD system. ['Instead of the traditional RGB color filter array, the new CFA is made up of Red, Green, Blue and Emerald (like Cyan) color filters.'] I've always been a strict Canon fan, but this is making me think twice."
is this like in response to the article about those people born with extra cones and see that odd shade of green that no one else can see?
So, my first question is.....How is color management done with this thing given color profile usage in Colorsync and other approaches in say Adobe software? Are there going to be color profile matching algorithms included so I can manage color with this camera?
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
The camera (as almost all other) feature a single CCD. It does however have a 4 color fileter in front of it. BTW, Nikon had that for about 4-5 years now.
Code poet, espresso fiend, starter upper.
Decisions, decisions.
Forgive my ignorance when it comes to photography, but what resolution do we need to reach to achieve 35mm quality pictures. I know my 2.1 megapixel camera can take pictures at 1600x1200 and when those are printed using my HP Photosmart printer they look 'near' perfect.
I'm assuming we're passed 35mm now then, and that these cameras are just going above and beyond what anyone has seen?
If thats 8 mega pixel at 24 bit color thats gonna be 22.8 mb per picture (non compressed)! I don't think I need my pictures to be THAT high quality (or large)
Everyone that disagrees with me is a paid shill
It has only one CCD, but instead of having the regular RGB pattern on it, it has a four color pattern.
e ccd.asp
http://www.dpreview.com/news/0307/03071601sonyrgb
I thought Emerald was green?
Anyways,
I heard somewhere (probably the discovery channel) that out of all the colors humans can percieve, green was the color we could detect the most amount of shades from.
http://www.foveon.com
'nuff said.
Color filters and staggered pixels? Ringing, moire patterns and color bleeding. No thank you.
Now that there is a proper color CCD technology, why is anybody using the old system (at least, on a $1200 'professional' camera).
j
I personally love my Canon EOS 10D. Pictures from it require the use of profanity to describe their amazing clarity, i.e., fucking great. It uses the EOS lens system and is a true SLR. However, if I had the money, I would get a Canon EOS 1D.(DROOL) It has a full size 35mm sensor where the 10D is about 80% the size of a 35mm sensor.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
I avoid Sony products because of their constant attempts to force consumers into proprietary technology. See the Memory Stick and InfoLithium and Beta and Hi8, all of which are proprietary and require expensive licensing for any third party to make.
When I went looking for a digicam a couple of years ago, it came down to Olympus C3000 an some Sony (DCS-550?). The deciding factor was the Olympus uses readily-available, open-standard AA batteries and Multimedia cards, while the Sony uses proprietary, closed-standard Memory Sticks and InfoLithum batteries.
You mileage may violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics...
Because the whole point of photography is to print the pictures. What good is a high end digital camera if the pics can't be printed in a newspaper or magazine?
Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
Fuji color film essentially has this. 4th color layer that renders tones better, especially in non-optimal light. I think Agfa has this as well.
Would be interesting to find out if this becomes widespread enough, if PhotoShop would allow manipulation of this layer someday. Would be interesting.
I also don't like Sony products for your reasons, however I dont like FUD even more.
This Sony model features a compact flash slot (as well as memory bubble gum slot). This is a truly interesting development, as sony memstick have traditionally cost about 4x as much as the same size CF. And even nowadays you can barely find it bigger size than 128MB (sony has vapored out some PR about memstick up to 1GB, however I have never seen one in any store).
Code poet, espresso fiend, starter upper.
Ars had this story on 8-15. You guys are falling behind.
--jdan
I refuse to purchase any of Sony's still cameras. I am protesting their annoying practice of crippling their equipment's capabilities in order to introduce a plethora of different versions. Specifically, I can't stand how they take a great video camera, the DCR PC100-120 and cripple its still image capability in order to force consumers to purchase two pieces of equipment instead of one. Just say NO!
For the same $1200, you can get corrective eye surgery so you can see something close to half the resolution offered....
Emerald (like Cyan)
Isn't cyan blue? Reminds me of an old sketch by the Frantics:
"I remember her eyes over the yawning abyss of a week and a half. I remember their brown glow lighting the room like a shock of azure sky...
Azure...
Blue. Right. They were blue. Blue as ocean water, in its deepest emerald hues....
Emerald.... Green.
Right. They were... they were green, kind of a greeny-blue... Sort of aquamarine, with browninsh flecks.....
OK, I remember her tits.
That's what I'd do with the extra money. See old Slashdot article below.
2 22 &mode=thread&tid=152
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/01/08/180
The center frequencies to which our green and blue cones are sensitive are rather far apart, spectrally -- at least, compared to the G/R cones. Looks like the E sensor on this CCD is between the G/B cones.
(RGB sensors and emitters are generally calibrated to the center frequencies of our cones.)
This is a good idea that I'd never considered. More color information is always good, and we can always just define a transform to reduce it to human optics. If nothing else, this makes more data available for image correction and whatnot. I wonder if you can actually get the RGBE data out of the camera, or if it stores three-channel JPEGs like everyone else?
Well, in any case, tetrachromats rejoice.
FYI, somewhat amazingly, this camera also supports type I/II compactflash in addition to memory stick/memory stick pro. Be chained to proprietary media no more
This has one CCD as someone else said. There are no 3 or 4 CCD regular cameras that I know of. The Foveon ones are like 3CCD except they do it with layers.
http://www.foveon.com/
8 megapixels how many megs is each picture, i mean will it take one 32meg memorystick for 2 picutres, i think 8 megapixels will only be useful when compactflash or other medias start making 1gb cards for 30 bucks
For The Best Jazz/Hip-hop fusion > COlD DUCK
CCD is getting kind of old... And the quality is not even close to the CMOS type pickups. A CCD camera has to correct the image using its software before it actually becomes half-ass tolerable, and you still end up with some artifacts when photographing certain textures.
Yes, CMOS cameras are a lot more expensive, but image quality is IMHO better than 35mm film.
Take Canon's EOS DS-1.. Take a look at some of the sample pictures - they are amazing.
http://www.canoneos.com
--- sig moved for great justice.
If you had bothered to look, you would have noticed that this particular sony camera uses standard compact flash cards, in addition to sony's normal memory stick.
There are three and four CCD digital cameras; this one isn't one of them. Instead, it uses four different color filters to get more information about the spectral composition of the incoming light. That lets it correct for color aberrations better than 3 color CCDs. This is an old trick, and you can actually get film that does the same thing.
Nice troll....
BTW, this camera can use compact flash cards. That's about as standard as it gets.
Hello? It still uses an InfoLithium battery.
The fact that is uses CF cards is an admission that Memory Sticks are inferior and will not meet the capacity needs of this camera.
Sony technology is great. Really, it is. But their computer products are at least as restrictive as Apple's, if not more so. I've read too many reports on Memory Sticks being unreadable in Mac computers to even think about buying their cameras. Same with their CDRW and DVD drives. Their Clie handhelds run the Palm OS, but you need special shareware to sync it with a Mac. And from what I've heard, many non-Sony PCs have similar problems more often than they should.
If I owned a Vaio PC, I'm sure it'd be no contest. But there's no question that if Sony could sell those PCs with their own branded version of Linux or BSD, they would.
I, for one, welcome our new emerald overlords!
Yeah, but will it do squant?
Actually I like "Prosumer" it sums up the "Spending more money makes me smarter than 'regular people' but I'm not a professional!" market...MY market! Seriously though...amateur creative photographers have different requirements than pro's or consumers...Prosumer sounds irritating but it does do a good job of describing a certain segment of the market.
...that Sony have finally conceded that "Memory Sticks" are a hopeless piece of proprietary crap and have included a Compact Flash slot.
Well, my 2.4 megapixel Canon serves my purposes just fine. Frankly, I don't see how the human eye could even detect the enhanced quality of an 8-megapixel picture, unless it was very heavily blown up after it was taken. So, yeah, I'm not gonna be paying the money for this one.
There's an excellent source of information about what "three primary colors" actually means at of Dave Trapp's Sequim (WA) Schools science department site. There's a relatively simple explanation of how color vision works, then a facinating and highly detailed in-depth discussion of the issue.
Some interesting notes from Mr. Trapp:
* "All three [signals] are equally sensitive to blue light, two have expanded ranges that include green and yellow light, and the third signal includes sensitivity to red light."
* "While these paradigms of primary colors have worked well for human printing and light uses for over a century, it is likely that the three primary colors are not descriptive of the world, but rather an artifact of our eyes, the tools we use to perceive the world."
* "The real world does not have primary colors!"
He also discusses how the world would be perceived differently if we evolved a fourth cone, sensitive in the UV region. Very cool stuff!
Interestingly, though, he's no longer teaching science, and details the reasons on his site. Anyone who's ever been driven crazy in a class taught by a guy named simply "Coach" (and who on this site hasn't?) will sympathize with this good teacher's plight.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
All right! I've been waiting for a Squant-sensitive camera for a while now. Now I can start creating my web pages using the Negativland Squant Plugin!
Now that people can buy cheap (~$30US) 6 or 7-in-1 readers that include 'plain' memory stick functionality, consumers need some real reason to cough up the extra dough for a memory stick pro reader.
When my parents bought their Sony recently, I talked them out of buying the pro sticks and reader, and getting the cheaper plain ones. I still prefer CF, which my Canon digital camera uses, but I haven't compared speeds between these types, or to SD, which my Canon camcorder uses.
Get off my launchpad!
I don't know if Nikon has a patent protecting that, but to just make up a plausible reason, I'd guess that the Emerald is close to, but not the same, wavelength as the standard Cyan in a CMY (or CMYK) setup.
I really hope someone does a followup paper (even white papers from one company touting the superiority of its approach to the other's) comparing these. Also, if they could explain whether RGB or CMY is better for sensing light, anyway. My gut instinct is that RGB should be better, because my junior high art teacher and high school physics texts say that light uses RGB and pigments use CMY, but surely Nikon must know something more.
Get off my launchpad!
Sorry.
Fight hunger. Filet a politician and send him to a 3rd world country of your choice.
RGB sensors and emitters are generally calibrated to the center frequencies of our cones.
:-)
Tetrachromat humans occur VERY rarely, and only as females.
For the rest of us, RGB centered at our own visual peaks makes the most sense of any encoding scheme possible. Not only can we not see another color, but it wastes space in the image (ie, some optimal conversion function can, by physical necessity, reduce those four colors to an RGB triad indistinguishable from the original quartet by a normal human.
Now, if you want to get into machine vision, that counts as another category entirely. But wasting pixels (remember, this uses a mask, reducing the effective resolution by 25% for the sake of having an effectively redundant pixel) for something indended for human viewing just doesn't make sense.
More color information is always good
More information does seem better, agreed. However, due to the physiological limitations of human vision, this scheme does not convey any more information, thus my biggest complaint. It seems everyone else missed this as nothing more than a meaningless marketing ploy. So you all go out and buy this toy so you can brag about having "better" color, and I'll continue taking perceptually identical pics with my boring 'ol RGB cam that cost $800 less.
I suppose, then, that the inverse would have to hold as well - that any man with this sort of colorblindness had a tetrachromatic mother?
What's that like, anyway? Do oranges just appear more brilliant?
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
I'm sure there are photography magazines that use some higher quality images, but the ones at the checkout lane at the grocery store sure don't.
CMOS is still an inferior imaging technology. CCDs are used in most of the more expensive cameras, including teh EOS-1D (but the 1DS does use CMOS). CMOS cameras still suffer from most of the same image artifacts that CCDs suffer from (except for trailing), as they also use color filter arrays. Foveon is the only technology out there that has all three colors for every pixel.
For the first time Sony is adding support for compact flash cards. A lot of people (including me) did not consider Sony as a possible purchase because no other digital camera manufacturer uses memory sticks.
The DSC F828 has support for 640x480 movies at 30 fps and the size of the movie is only limited by the available memory in your card. For the first time, you have a product that is good as both a digital still and a movie camera.
Wait, you mean that people who actually work hard make that kind of money? HAHA! Good one! ;-)
Well, I used to be summed up quite nicely by the equally meaningless "Semi-pro". (Meaningless because [a] you're either professional or not - semi-pro is like having half a hole, and [b] Most of the people in that market would be more accurately described as "keen and very wealthy ameteur"). That sounds a lot nicer, and summed up pretty much the same people. "Prosumer" makes me sound like a target market segment, because it is one. I don't want to be a target market segment though. I want to be a valued discerning customer with my own special needs.
- and I'd rather they used the extra pixels for more resolution rather than an additional color channel. Foveon has a much better way.
I can't believe I'm replying to this, but it needs to all be layed out straight. This was supposed to be informative, not argumentative. SO..... here's the whole deal:
1. In a welcome break from their normal policy, Sony is actually including a CF slot. There are some features limited-- you can't record 32fps video at 640x480 on a Memory Stick or a CF card. For that, you need the faster "Memory Stick Pro". I'm having a hard time finding a CF card that will match the MS Pro spec of 15Mbps minimum write speed/160Mbps read speed, so it may simply be an innocent "CF cards aren't fast enough" problem. On the other hand, it very well could be Sony dicking us over, and it would be par for the course. As to meeting the capacity needs, there are 1GB memory sticks available. Pricey, but available.
2. The camera requires infoLithium batteries. The "infoLithium" brand belongs to sony, but a battery is a battery is a battery-- it's not like Sony has some sort of proprietary standard for moving electrons in and out of the camera. Generic replacements for infoLithium batteries are widely available (here for example, right off the top of google). You can get some big-assed NiMH AAs (2200mAh, from what I could dig up) but they will be larger, and they will not last as many charge cycles or perform as well as a Li-Ion battery. Is there a non-proprietary Li-Ion battery for consumer stuff?
Ah well. All i intended to do was point out that Sony had actually taken a step in the right direction for a change. I have a Canon, and no particular interest in Sony gear.
Forgot it was recessive - wasn't the logic, just a brain cramp. ;)
I suppose trying to describe it to us with only three colors would be much like trying to describe any kind of color to somebody completely color blind. It's a futile exercise. Try explaining vision to somebody who was born blind.
Not quite that bad - we do at least have vision. Particularly, what I was wondering is if Orange-Red,O-G,and O-B combos produce hideous glaring colors like cyan (B-G), magenta (B-R), and yellow (R-G). I'm sure the O-X combos look fine to us, but I was wondering if it behaved in a similar way as cyan etc do for a tetrachromatic. That would certainly be explainable, and I think interesting.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
Maybe eventually somebody will come out with a pro camera that uses the same technology, like Sigma with the Foveon sensor in their SD-9, but no pro would use this Sony camera...it's not even an SLR (single-lens reflex). That is, it doesn't have interchangable lenses, and no professional photographer would be caught dead with a camera that doesn't use interchangable lenses.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
It's the sensitivity of the CCD and the translation of that information to a useable image. And, all of this hinges on rendition on the output device.
If your printer is RGB, emerald does no good, but since the image file is not a RGB+emerald color scheme, it may not matter. It is all in the translation. It is kind of like three axis defining a point in geometry - you are defining how the eye sees it by describing the amount of each constituent needed for reproduction.
If you were using a CCD array calibrated to capture six colors, the real benefit comes if the printer/display uses those six colors. That said, more data is better, if it is used to create a better image description file. And lest we forget, even full size image files are lossy, since you always lose information about how the thing really looks unless we use individual filters for each of millions (read infinite spectrum) of colors.
Emerald is not cyan, not even close, but that is irrelevant.
Faith is the very antithesis of reason, injudiciousness a critical component of spiritual devotion. Jon Krakauer
You claim that film is so superior, and that digital can't touch it. The problem is, you are just repeating an old catchphrase. While the statement may have been true in the early 90s, it is not true anymore.
Many magazines, newspapers, publications, etc use digital and I dare you all to open up your favorite magazine and distinguish digital from film.
Witold
Fuji S2 Pro. (6MP)
witold.org
For their first experiment, they want to give a third color receptor to monkeys. Then, it's our turn:
There aren't any guarantees of what will happen, or if our brains will even accept the presence of another color, but a quick Google found that tetrachromatic vision is not at all uncommon in the animal kingdom... there's no reason to think we can't adapt.
I wonder if I'd have the guts to try it. I think so, especially after I'm retired and don't have to worry about it affecting my income-generating potential. But why stop at four colors? Give me IR, UV... heck, give me the real high-end and I'll contract myself out to NASA!
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
WTF? $1200 and no interchangable lenses.... riiiiight.
moox. for a new generation.
From What is the difference between CCD and CMOS image sensors in a digital camera?:
I have been shooting digital and slide for years now. I have owned Canon (S20, 10D), Olympus (D-610), Minolta (Dimage7) and Sony (DSC-F717). All of these cameras had little quirks Olympus/Minolta had slow focus issues (though minolta resolved theirs via a wonderful firmware upgrade) none of these cameras made me more upset than waiting for the sony to write images to it's crap memory stick. With the Minolta (my last camera) I could run circles around it at 5mp high qual jpg shooting a full 1.5-2 frames per second. The F717 took a full 4 to 5 seconds to write the same sized image. At first I thought it was just mine but a friend owned the same camera and had exactly the same results. This spring I went full circle back to canon with the 10D. Of all of these cameras none produced the same quality image that the little S20 Point and shoot did.
At that price point, why not invest in superior technology?
/ page14.as pe s/Q ualityRes/IMG01248.jpg
g masd9/page24.as p
http://www.foveon.com/
The Sigma SD 9 uses the Foveon chip.
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sigmasd9/
Sample photos:
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sigmasd9
http://img.dpreview.com/reviews/SigmaSD9/Sampl
Conclusion:
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/si
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
A long damn time ago. Sadly, I read for quite a while before bothering with registering-- I had that stereotypical slashdot fear of actually signing up for things. Oh, to have a 4-digit account.
I'd guess '97 or '98-- I'm not entirely sure.
I went on a trip to with a buddy a year ago, I had a $300 1-year old 2.1 MP Canon Powershot s110, he brought a brand-new $1200 5MP Sony.
Every picture I took was better than his. We even swapped cameras and matched the settings after the first day reviewing the pictures to eliminate those variables, and the little Canon Elph outperformed in every shot - most noticeably in color quality. In fact, the only advantages the Sony had was a faster shutter response and better optical zoom.
I've now taken over 1300 pictures with the Canon s110, and it's tip-top. Every time I go to pick up some prints at Wolf / Ritz, the guys behind the counter ask me what camera I use.
As far as the friend's Sony? He sold it on eBay and bought a Canon s400.
If it does use an IR filter, then it just whacks a plain IR filter infront of the CCD. it doesn't change the small colour filters on each pixel on the CCD. It's completely different. Infact, I'm wondering why Sony would bother to add an IR filter. Sure, remove the IR blocking filter, but the idea here is to let in the most light, not take IR shots.
Many system integrators have evaluated the Foveon CMOS sensor and they are all still using CCDs. Dynamic range is as important as resolution in producing film like qually. CMOS sensors are still too noisy in general to be used in systems that are expected to make very good images. Although many of the leaders are actively developing the technology, especially Canon.
Penguins are so sensitive to my needs - Lyle Lovett
More samples.
s /
http://www.dpreview.com/gallery/sigmasd9_sample
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
I have the Sigma SD-9, and I've seen no evidence so far that the dynamic range differs much from other CCD SLR's. In fact, I seem to recall one study that suggested it was a bit higher...
Do you have links to anything showing limitations of dynamic range in X3 chips?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I have the SD9, and it really is a great camera. It does have limitations with ISO (only going to 400) but some of the problems (like noise) have been reduced with software and firmware upgrades. The review is starting to look a bit dated.
The color clipping occurs on other cameras too (just not quite as soon), just look at the example images from other cameras in the same review (like the D60) - they have the same issue! I have not seen that come up much in practice, as some others have noted on the Sigma forum the key is to shoot the SD9 like you would slide film - expose for the highlights, and develop for the shadows. In other words, try and set exposure so that highlight do not go out of range. The software itself gives you enough leeway in increasing/reducing exposure that you can bring the exposure back up again.
People have done some great things with the camera, take a look at the Sigma SD9 gallery on PBase. The nice thing is, most people post full size images instead of crops so you can really see the details.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The 11 megapixel Canon 1Ds seem to be much better than 35mm and almost as good as medium-format; here's a review. I don't think Nikon has an equivalent camera out yet, but I have all Canon gear (a D60 at the moment) so I haven't been paying much attention.
That for once, Sony will make a digital camera with colour balance that doesn't look like it was calibrated by a colour blind monkey with a penchant for blue?
Actually, instead the 3.5MP camera basically equals the output from a 6MP CCD, and in fact even appears a bit sharper... it really shows when you are printing images (which is pretty much just what the review says, not sure where you got the idea the real res was 1/3 less!!). Plus you have Zero (as in no) color moire with the X3 sensor, the thing I hated most about the CCD cameras and what led me to purchase an SD-9.
The only real limitation of the SD9 is a lack of ISO above 400 and more noise there than in other cameras. But they have addressed that with firmware and software upgrades, and also people have learned how to use the camera effectively even in low light. I've shot indoor skating before and gotten come good shots.
Take a look at the sample images at the SD-9 user gallery on PBase. Note that just about everyone there posts full size images, unlike the cropped images you usually get from other cameras so you can't quite make out how blurry they really are. With a good lens and good light, almost nothing can come close to the sharpness you get with an SD-9.
Canon does have some nice sensors and good cameras (like the 1Ds) but I greatly prefer the images from my SD-9 over the 10-D (which I was also considering along with the Fuji S2).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
That's like saying what's the point of sampling images/sound/video at higher than 8bit/component because that's all monitors can display. By sampling at a higher frequency than the output, you have better precision data to work with... of course, since this is a Bayer pattern CCD it's still only sampling one component per pixel, but presumably the emerald filter helps produce better interpolated color across a wider (or smoother) spectrum.
are here.
Note that really the best thing about the camera is that you can try out the software for free (see Sigma web site for download)!! The software is about the best software around for working with Raw images, and really shows what the camera can do. The smartest thing Sigma did was make the user work with raw images, as you have a lot more felxibility than if you were just shooting JPG and throwing away a lot of image detail.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It depends how you define pro... no pro (in your definition) would be caught dead with a Sigma SD9 right now either, it's got far too many imaging issues (regardless of the theoretically preferable sensor configuration).
The Sony will appeal to folks straddling the line, who might have considered an E-20 in the past, or who are looking at the low-end SLRs, don't have an existing investment in compatible lenses, and need a good performer at a reasonable price. I use a variety of cameras all the time, and I am very seriously considering the F828 while I wait on the 6MP+ DSLR market to mature and come down to reality.
If I had my druthers, I'd buy an EOS-1Ds for myself right now - but short of that, this is the most thrilling camera for me when you balance the price, performance, and other factors. If you simply MUST have a standard lens mount, then you can't go too wrong with the EOS-10D right now.
Unlimited growth == Cancer.
Several of the Nikon Coolpix cameras, like my 995, have been using CCDs with 4-color CYGM filter mosaics for some time now. In fact, the CP995 uses a Sony chip, the ICX252AK (pdf). This is a 3-year old chip design.
So what's the big deal?
Edith Keeler Must Die
Resolution is hardly everything... many folks will take a 3-5 megapixel DSLR over a 5-6 megapixel prosumer model any day.
Relevant factors:
Lens systems - most low-end digicams come with shit for lenses, little more than a transparent glob of plastic... chromatic abberations are common, spherical focus problems, color fringing, etc.
Chip - the size, filter configuration (3-color Bayer, 4-color Bayer, Foveon X3, etc), presence of microlenses or not, mfg process (CCD vs CMOS), and other concerns all impact imaging quality (subjective), depth of field, sample depth (8, 10, 12bit/component), noise (or lack thereof), pixel blooming, speed/sensitivity, etc
Camera - just like pro's don't say "Hell, that little point and click does 35mm too, why do I need my 10k worth of Canon gear to do the same", there's no comparing the qualities of a pro camera - the body, controls, post-processing (white balance controls, noise suppression, compression, etc), AF system, with that of a cheap consumer camera.
In other words, in many cases a 3MP image shot by a pro on a quality DSLR of a year or two ago will still surpass anything you can do with that 5-6MP Minolta you just got.
Yes, consumer magazines and newsprint typically have terrible resolution... but still, garbage in = garbage out (it's all relative). Besides, a pro shooting for a major magazine will use pro equipment - that's why it exists... it gives them the fine control they need to get a shot that will pass the photo editors muster. Snap shots on his wife's camera might suit in a pinch, but it won't go over well. I think you underestimate the challenges of professional photography...
So will Geeks needs this camera to see how horribly color uncoordinated they're dressed?
Or the Geeks will just be color-blind to the horrible colors of the resulting pictures too?
I do a lot of photography without ever having published in a magazine - there is often a point besides just that, though I don't get where you're trying to go with that... are you implyiing that because Sony is using a 4-color filter in a Bayer pattern that the images won't work in normal outputs? That's just silly.
FWIW, I once, in a pinch, did a shoot for Aviation Week on a Sony DSC-F1 (640x480)... after an enormous amount of cleanup (off the best shots) it was passable, but even in a dry trade magazine wasn't nearly the best results of the issue (the images looked good, just didn't hold enough for even a 4x2.5" placement).
You've nearly got me convinced to switch from Nikon. The specs look really good and the price is not too bad.
Now let's see the photographs.
$1200 is the amount I've spent on batteries for my sony cybershot. 2-AA Last about 8 minutes.
Anyone know what's going on with affordable cameras using the Foveon chip? I heard (from seriously reliable sources) about a year and a half ago that it was stupid to buy any traditional one-color-per-pixel camera because the coming Foveon was going to be a million times better and would render everything else obsolete. The technology does seriously look awesome and legitimate. I know there's a $3000 camera which is supposed to be awesome that uses the Foveon X3, but anyone know when something more like $1000 will be available?
I've seen the 1GB sticks in Best Buy, and I've seen 256 sticks in Staples. That would idicate a fairly common supply of them. The cost of the sticks is very high, so maybe you would find the larger sizes locked away behind the counter.
I decided on buying a returned sony camera for the price. Good enough to use, cheap enough to lose.
I don't understand the need for a 1GB stick myself as I'm not often that far away from a computer with cheap storage.
Cheers Andrew
A. From DealRAM.com:
128MB 256MB
CF $33 $46
MS $46 $70
MSPro - $93
B. On a recent vacation (7 days) I have used up about 0.9 GB with my 3Mpx Nikon 995. With 8 Mpx, it would baloon to 2.4 GB. Yes, I do take a lot of pics, but not Japanese lot. I use HQ JPG with highest res.
Code poet, espresso fiend, starter upper.
Beware of Geeks bearing .gif's.
Is that people become better photographers without really realiizing it.
The instant feedback you get causes you to automatically start taking better pictures, and you may not even realize it. With film, you have to wait for your photos to develop.. and then you ahve to think back about how you took the picture, settings, the lighting, etc... with instant feedback, you make those associations automatically.
so what if digital can equal 35mm film? when I want to take a good picture, I use 120 film with a 6x6 camera (that's medium format for those who don't know). and if digital manages to equal 120 film one day, I'll use an 8x10 large format camera. who needs an enlarger with that, huh? just need a dark room, and voila, 1:1 8x10 contact prints! (and for those interested, I remember that it is possible to rent a darkroom with an 8x10 enlarger at Toronto Image Works. I used to rent darkrooms there all the time when I lived in T.O. Great business.)
The blurb mentions the camera will supply a Sony RAW format, with software to manipulate it. Will this format be the data straight from the four types of pixels, or will it be preprocessed into RGB?
The blurb also says a linear transformation is used to transform the four input colors into RGB. I believe you can get a lot of gain in accuracy from doing a nonlinear transformation, possibly more than you can get from having a fourth color. The camera's sensors will just have different sensitivities than human eyes, and a curve is likely to describe the mapping from camera sensor to eye better than a straight line. If Sony's RAW format gives you the original four colors, you could do the nonlinear transform yourself. Otherwise you can't.
Doing things their own way, while ignoring a previously created technology. My analogy: Memory Sticks vs. CF, and now this 4-color layered process vs. Foveon.
The end result is each pixel on the Sony is only 1/8 the area of the pixel on one of the $1500 advanced amateur digital cameras (Canon EOS 10D, Nikon D100, Fuji S2, Pentax *ist D).
This means each pixel will receive very little light (and thus a low signal to noise ratio) and have images with a lot of electronic noise even at ISO 100. Noise manifests itself as colored dots that pepper smooth areas like skies.
If this camera had used one of the ICX413AQ 6MP APS-size sensors Sony sells Nikon and Pentax rather than the ICX456 used on this camera, it could have been a winner.
Be prepared to spend cash on lenses. I've tried quite a few, and all I can say crop factor really makes very good lenses mandatory with this camera. I've bought 24-70L and I'm going to buy 70-200L f/2.8 IS. That makes it about $2600 for the lenses alone. The body cost me $1500. Nice big chunk of cash.
I love the Foveon idea and the much better resolution it provides. What keeps me from buying a camera with the Foveon sensor is the review I saw that showed it providing poor color reproduction: pure green is reproduced as olive drab.
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1. Jack off more; use escort services less.
2. Save the money under your mattress til november, buy the camera.
3. Post nude pix of the girls from the escort service on your XXX website.
4. profit.
Sounds like the perfect plan.
::.. check out some Cell Phone Reviews
I wish I hadn't lurked so long without getting an account.
Likely true, but in the case of this particular Sony camera they're using a Carl Zeiss T* lens, which any photographer knows is going to be a very high end lens. Who knows what that means for the quality of the rest of the camera, but it's certainly a good sign.
You would still need a tetrachromatic monitor and printer in order to see the extra color anyway. The only place you'd be able to 'enjoy' sony's camera is right on it's own display screen (assuming they put orange lights on it). Otherwise you would need a special monitor/printer combo.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Maybe emerald is the pantone name for the color?
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Isn't it something like... Cyan would (500nm) light gets detected by both the blue and green sensors in your eye? I suppose the ideal 'filter' for a digital camera would be three filters that approximate the frequency response of the cones and rods in your eyes.
Maybe what this filter lets the camera do is pickup extra 'emerald' light that would otherwise be dropped by standard Blue and green filters.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I've heard that 11 megapixles is the maximum that you can have with a 35mm sensor, after that the individual pixels would be smaller then the wavelength of light hitting the filter, and so each wave would end up hitting more then one sensor anyway.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
--Cuz, you see, scanners suck for color. (That blue-white neon bulb plays HELL with all color. Images which may have been, say, painted beneath nice warm yellow incadescent bulbs turn into entirely different images when subjected to Borg lighting.)
With this in mind, I dragged a painting down with me and waited around for half an hour for one of the sales people to get free. Business is booming in the digital camera trade. I watched two stalwart pro-camera guys barter on the edge of $10,000 each, all in order to get themselves out of film and finally into the new digital technology. The change-over is hot on, and there aren't enough sales guys to go around! So I waited my turn.
When I was finally able to get some face time with one of the guys, I slapped the illustration down on the counter and told him what I was all about. So ten minutes later, there were three cameras set up for me to try out. I'd brought my own flash card with me so I could take the results home to test. That was my brilliant plan.
Here's where it all went awry. .
First off, the Sigma camera, the Fovon chip notwithstanding, is a poorly designed piece of junk. It wouldn't work. The guy complained that it burned through its batteries like wildfire, (it took at least two different sets of batteries; one for the camera body and one for something else. And still another set for the flash. If one set wasn't up to snuff, the whole thing would do nothing. He said it was a piece of shit. So I never actually got try out the thing.
Furthermore, when you go to buy one of these high-end jobs, the $2000 bucks quoted in the add does not include a lens. Just the camera body. Yikes! --For my needs, I was looking at blowing, at least another $1-2000; probably more. If you are shooting artwork, you can't be screwing around with curving lines and such at the top and bottom of an illustration. Plus, if you want something which is can achieve a 300dpi print quality at a reasonable size. . , well 6 megapixels in the hardware just won't do. --Especially since you can't use all of the image area sighted by the camera. Straight lines go curvey the closer to the edge of the lense you get.
Now I did test a Canon, and an Olympus. Both worked and were designed much more effectively. Plus, both Canon and Olympus offered slightly more affordable lens solutions. The color problem, of course, was gone. The camera would take in whatever color light you bounced off the subject. That wasn't even an issue; color correctors would be looking for new jobs when these kinds of cameras became workable. But this particular camera store didn't have anything which shot in the kind of size range a print illustrator would need.
Now, this problem might go away with the Fovon technology. Supposedly, you get higher resolution for your buck, simply because of how it understands color. But I've yet to test a camera which has the chip.
One way or another, I went home again, convinced that color correction was a task I could handle with a smile simply because of all the money I wouldn't have to spend on a half-assed answer.
-FL
Color Physics FAQ - good read, I havent figured out why a fourth filter yet, but it does a good job describing how color works in general.
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
Memory Sticks don't exist over 128MB. The cameras were never designed to address more than that. (This is also why SmartMedia is on its way out in favor of xD.) Sony has come out with "Memory Stick Pro" which is up to 2 or 4 GB now, but only the newest cameras with the "Pro" logo can use them.
Actually, my wife and I are professional photographers. We do mostly weddings and portraits, and we use the Canon 10D. It's an absolutely fantastic camera, for only $1500 (body only). And, yes, you're right, I don't much care for the sigma, either. They make good lenses, which are almost indistinguisable from the Canon L glass, but a camera body? I think not.
The 1Ds is incredible, but it costs $8,000. You've really gotta have a reason for it... I mean, they market it as a sports and news camera, but that's about it. I can understand sports, because you want those two-page spanning Sport Illustrated photos, but newsprint is terrible in terms of resolution...you could probably do as well with this sony thing (except for the zoom you can get from a decent telephoto lens). However, as a wedding photographer, the only thing about the 1Ds I really like is the 8 frames/sec shooting speed. Other than that, I'd never want to bother with 4MB JPEGs of wedding candids...they'll take so long to process, eat up flash cards for lunch, and nobody's going to buy a print in anything larger than a 5x7 or an 8x10 anyway. On the other hand, I've made 20x30 prints from my 10D without rasterization and they look fantastic. I think I'll be sticking with the 10D for quite some time...
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
One of the problem when talking about this is that a 35mm camera is using an analog technology so it's really apples and oranges. In ideal circumstances with good lighting, good focus, the camera on a tripod, etc. the resolution of a 35mm camera can be spectacularly high which is why you always hear photo people lamenting the low resolutions of digital and how they haven't "caught up" with the lowly 35mm (never mind 4x5 or better). But for most uses, for anyone other than professionals, the practical resolution of the 35mm isn't anything near it's theoretical maximum, the lighting isn't that great, the focus isn't that great, your hand was shaking and the resulting loss of detail brings the 35mm picture way back down to where the digital camera's are. Even among professionals the 35mm photo is usually going to end up digitized to a resolution that could have been produced by a digital camera.
The key is that people take a whole lot more pictures with digital cameras, thus taking pictures they never would with a film camera, and any picture you take is MUCH better than the picture you didn't. And, the more pictures you take, the higher your chances of snapping a gem by sheer luck (I know skill plays no part in my photography).
This is so true and to some extant simply taking A LOT of pictures is one of the essential "secrets" of professional photographers. When I took photography courses at art school I would use one or maybe two shots per roll, sure I'd be paying attention to things like composition in every shot I took but simply taking a LOT of pictures is how you get that ONE picture that is really good. Using digital cameras gets any consumer to take pictures with that same attitude since there is no film cost, the camera can take hundreds of pictures per "roll" and you can delete the obvious duds right then and there.
Newsweek, Time, etc usually ask for 300 DPI.
Newspapers, at least the ones I work with, usually have a higher tolerance, the one i shoot for asks for 150-200 DPI...which my 6.3 MP Canon 10D does with ease up to 11" x 17".
The 1Ds shoots at 3 fps, the 1D at 8. The 1Ds is slower due to the large file size.
You are basing the quality of the entire line of Sony products on a TV you got in the mail? Perhaps you should have talked to the SHIPPER? INSURANCE?
:)
Sony doesn't get everything right, but they have a ton of experience with CCD sensors and I've had a great time with my DSC F707 camera.
I also really liked the BVP-5 with the BVV-5 dockable recorder. A fine professional BetacamSP recorder.
It's mandatory to wash your hands before returning to the land of Dairy Queen.
If you add up all the Red, Blue and Green elements in a digital camera's CCD, you end up with the number advertised... 5 or 6 megapixels or whatever. (In this example I will refer to a 5 megapixel camera.)
However this does not REALLY equate to that many pixels as we would normally think of pixels with other devices.
If your LCD monitor can support a maximum of 1280 x 1024 resolution, that multiplies out to be 1.31 megapixels.
But if we were to do the math the way digital camera manufacturers' marketing departments do their math, that same screen would be 3.93 megapixels... which is basically a lie.
What happens inside digital cameras is a certain bit of deception. They use the luminance factor from each of the 5+ million CCD sensors to achieve a semblance of the resolution advertised. However the color value for each of those so-called "pixels" is not independant, but rather is derived from the values of the surrounding pixels.
Therefore we have the baffling paradox of saving a RAW file at full resolution on a 5 MP camera and getting a 7.5 megabyte file; but strangely a TIFF file of the same resolution saves out at 15 megabytes in size. How can this be possible, you rightly ask? Just what is the camera adding to the raw sensor data to create a full resolution file which is somehow twice the size of the raw data? Here's what happens...
In the RAW file there may be 5 million 12-bit samples, half of which are green elements, with the other half evenly split between red and blue elements. Or, there may be 2.5 million 8-bit red, blue and green values each, with not all of them corrresponding to actual CCD elements.
In producing a 15 megabyte TIFF file from 7.5 megabytes of RAW sensor data, the camera's firmware defines a virtual 5 million simulated pixels, each of which has its 24-bit color values derived from the other adjacent physical "pixels." Then once 8 bits each of Red, Green and Blue data are derived for each virtual pixel om the memory array, the whole simulated thing saves out at 15 megabytes.
The ONLY cameras available which do not deceive you in this way are those new ones incorporating the Foveon CCD sensors, which are novel 3D arrays of elements, each element of which produces its own true RGB color values. With the Foveon CCD, each pixel is a true pixel, and the color definition is superior.
To be fair... the color interpolation firmware in standard CCD cameras has gotten so good, that it probably is worth putting up with the marketing deceptions and these artificially puffed up file sizes (200% of what they should be), at least for now.
...no professional photographer would be caught dead with a camera that doesn't use interchangable lenses.
Lots of pros are opting for single, multi-purpose lenses like a 28-300 zoom so that they don't have to lug around a bag full of lenses. There is some resistance to this among purists (or those who need specialized lenses like fast teles for sports or really long lenses for nature), but they'd reject this camera because it doesn't shoot film.
You might as well say that 'no professional photographer would be caught dead with a 35mm SLR because it doesn't shoot medium format.' It's certainly true for some, but not all.
--
As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
Oh really? Your opinion differs from both mine and the dozens of professionals I've worked with and employed in the print graphics industry over the years. Correct shades of Blue are particularly hard to capture properly, because they occupy an unaccomodating end of the shitty scanner light spectrum. --The problem, quite simply, is that contract illustrators often work under incandescent lighting, which is known for its warm and slightly yellow hues, but have their work scanned with light which doesn't bring out these same qualities in their work. So, 'Shitty' is indeed a subjective term, but the fact of the matter is that scanners do not allow for any play in this area. Digital photography, however, allows for whatever lighting best suits the subject.
And perhaps 'neon' was a bit presumptuous. Perhaps I should have said, 'flourescent'. But seeing as the two are virtually the same, I didn't think it would matter. My sincere, appologies.
Foveon's claim is not "higher resolution for your buck."
Yes, thank you for intentionally mis-reading my paraphrasing. I believe the claim was that because Fovon uses one pixel instead of 3 to capture color, they can do the same job with one third the pixels another camera would require. Again, I'm terribly sorry for not being more clear.
Quality lenses don't get curvy when you get close to the edges.
Yes. I KNOW that. That's why I was commenting on the price of lenses as being a big consideration during the buying process.
6MP can deliver 300dpi at a reasonable size as long as the size is "reasonable". Their performance in some ways exceeds 35mm film.
Uh huh. And in my line of work, finished products which press at 8.5" x 11" are considered reasonable. And guess what? Unless one is dealing with live shoots, even 35mm film is not good enough for that. Illustration reproduction requires 3" x 5" film cameras or high-res scanning. But thanks for your insight.
Half-assed research produces half-assed answers.
Ah. At last we agree. --Though given this, I don't quite understand your commenting in the first place.
-FL
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I hope I didn't sound too critical, everthing else was right. CIE xy just uses a restricted definition of color to trim it down to 2D.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
You are right, of course - this is strictly true only only for identical processes. The pixels on the Canon 10D are half the size of those on the Canon D30 (two generations older), yet it still manages to have slightly lower noise. We will only know for sure when the camera is out and reviewed.
That said, Sony makes both CCD chips mentioned, and I find it hard to believe they can manage even a 2x improvement in a consumer-oriented chip over a semi-pro chip that came out a mere 6 months ago.
The 14-bit ADC seems more like specmanship for marketing purposes than anything else, just like the 8MP. This is reminiscent of the HiFi market, where some cheap audio amplifiers have high watt output ratings to lure naive shoppers, but terrible distortion.
I hope I am wrong, and that Sony turns out a great product, but I wouldn't bet on it.
Damn, you're right. My bad.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.