MegaPixels enough?

If I am not going to ever print anything > 8x10, does it make sense to get the highest # of megapixels I can?

rossjc:

If I am not going to ever print anything > 8x10, does it make sense to get the highest # of megapixels I can?

Click to expand...

You want the sharpest image you can get.

Oly jammed 8 megapixels onto the same size chip that used to have just 5. yowza. I've seen that cam. I've used that cam. it doesn't deliver images that are appreciably better than my 5 meg oly did. And my 6 meg Nikon N70 blasts it.

You can print your digital images from a 5 meg cam to larger than 8 X 10 - but if you crop it, or if its not razor sharp, its not gonna be the greatest. Depends on what you're expecting. If you're expecting jaw dropping gallery quality stuff, its never gonna happen.

You'll never get large gallery quality images from any digital camera. Honestly.... it just can't happen. But you can get stuff you'd be proud of out of any 5 meg cam. But you have to start with a sharp, well lit image.

Ken

Anything around 5 megapixel +/- a bit should be enough. More pixels are not always better because it can add more digital noise as well if not well executed so more pixels does not always mean better.

You're going to have to look at value for money. If you are happy with the inherent restrictions of a lower MP camera (and one company's 3MP may not offer the same quality as another company's 3MP so you'll have to do a bit of digging) then you can save some cash by getting a 3.2 or 4 instead of a 5 or more.

You will have more limitations on how much you can enlarge and also on how much you can crop then enlarge back to the normal size (lots of people forget about that!) Also on how much editing you can do.

So saying, I have a friend who was shooting a 2MP Canon A20 and had one image blown up to 11x13. It looks great. Does it look as great asit would have if from a larger MP camera? Don't know - don't have the same scene from one. Does it look as good as subsequent shots of other images from more MP cameras - for the most part you'd be hard pressed to pick which was which. This will not apply to all photos, but is merely an example of the fact that a great image is a great image and even small MP cameras can take them.

I wouldn't buy anything less than a 4MP at the moment. The price difference is just too small for me between 3.2 and 4. There is still quite a jump between 4 and 5 on a lot of cameras. There are tons of people out there with 3.2 and 4MP and they are getting great results.

You'll probably get lots of (often conflicting!) opinions to this question. Do some research and see what others are using. Have a look at cameras side by side Go with what you think will make YOU happy!

generally if you looking a camera that will give you a 8x10 no problems out of the camera with out a problem you need about a 7.2 million pixel sensor (as you need 300 DPI (dots per inch) to get photo quality preproduction as 8in is 2400 pixels by 10 inches = 3000 pixels thats if you want to base that purely on pixels. For me with all the tricks and talents of PS i could pull a 8x10 from a 2mp image (and there have been 5mp that couldnt hack a 4x6) but it really depends on the image and how it was taken but generally 3mp is the min i would go for a 8x10 (~200dpi is bare minimum for a quality print).

perfect example is some of the professors at my college shoots with a d70 and came in with some small prints a couple of weeks ago that were absolutly amazing as there was detail in the image with my face a couple of inches from the print, it was amazing. he even had some of the anti digital professors completely amazed.

oh btw small prints for this instructor are 16x20, these were 24x30's

FWIW

Tooth

In my experience (OK I may be rubbish at taking photos!!), the actual quality of image is not limited by the number of pixels in something like 95% of the pictures I take.

Most of the time there is not enough light, i.e I need to invest money in a bigger strobe.
A lot of the time either the camera or subject moved, blurring the photo. I.e. I need to hold it more still, or invest money in a bigger strobe so I can use a faster shutter.

On the rare occasions when I get absolutely right, I can zoom right in and see sharp changes between adjacent pixels (more often on the scale of two pixels). This is the limit of the camera resolution. These photos look great at A4 (American letter size I think??), from my Sony P9, 4 MP. I think though the (printed) image resolution is limited by the printer rather than the camera.

So in my experience, the final image quality is governed more by:

1. Luck
2. Practice
3. External strobe
4. Camera settings

Than by number of pixels. So I would not go overboard looking for a huge number of pixels. Get a decent point and shoot (preferably with a large-area sensor and manual controls), and get a strobe too.

Scubatooth:

perfect example is some of the professors at my college shoots with a d70 and came in with some small prints a couple of weeks ago that were absolutly amazing as there was detail in the image with my face a couple of inches from the print, it was amazing. he even had some of the anti digital professors completely amazed.
oh btw small prints for this instructor are 16x20, these were 24x30's

FWIW

Tooth

Click to expand...

Would it require anything special to print out a picture that size (assume that the picture itself is ok). I have a few shots from my D70 that I would love to get a large print like that but have not really tried anything bigger than 8x10 so far.

MacHeath:

In my experience (OK I may be rubbish at taking photos!!), the actual quality of image is not limited by the number of pixels in something like 95% of the pictures I take.

Most of the time there is not enough light, i.e I need to invest money in a bigger strobe.
A lot of the time either the camera or subject moved, blurring the photo. I.e. I need to hold it more still, or invest money in a bigger strobe so I can use a faster shutter.

Click to expand...

Well put! Unfortunately, my photos also rarely approach the camera resolution.

Low power strobe also leads to color balance problems, so IMHO, once you get to 3+ megapixels, what becomes more important than megapixels are features such as

manual white balance
raw format output (to allow better post processing)
lens options
low light level performance (noise/ISO rating, etc)

ssra30

it would depend on if you were going to print it out on a inkjet or through a commerical service like mpix.com or whcc.com.

for a inkjet you could go up to that size but there are two programs that i would reccomend and that would be Q-image (which is similar to a RIP (Raster Image Processor) that you use this program sort of like a print driver as this is the program you use to enlarge the image as it is sent to the printer).

now if you are using a commerical service these providers have excellent rips for there printer (fuji frontier, durst, or lightjet, etc) that will enlarge the file for the print needed. on another board im on a user wanted to take a d70 file and make a 20x30 out of a image but didnt have all of the programs and digital darkroom knowledge to enlarge it to what they wanted so they sent the file to mpix.com and they sent the file through there rip and enlarged the file to 200 dpi (about a 50% increase in pixels, nad 200 dpi is fine for large prints as there not really designed to be viewed super close) and sent it through the machine and when they got the print they were amazed as the image was sharp down to nose level.

so it really depends on the output but yes it is possible.

ifyou want to look at my professors work who prints exclusively on inkjet and uses a D70 look at www.petercalvin.com its some pretty amazing stuff.


FWIW

Tooth