Pixel counting joins film in obsolete bin

With the collapse of the film camera market and the end of the megapixel race, there are big changes in the photographic air.
The New York Times

The story "Pixel counting joins film in obsolete bin" published February 4, 2006 at 6:00 AM is no longer available on CNET News.

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[thebignoticeboard.com]

Message has been deleted.

[bobbutts]

another reason

7 megapixel images are around 3 MB. That's 90 seconds to upload at 256kb/s which is pretty standard for a US broadband connection.

[shoffmueller]

and more storage

Let's ditch the flash cards and put iPod-style hard drives into the
cameras.

[cagerattler]

Digital cams and hard drive storage-been there done that

Polaroids PDC2000's hard drive was 40mb and used a SCSI cable to connect to your computer. It captured uncompressed TIFF files and was used primarily in studios.

In fact, I still have mine.

I also believe that the first Digital Backs for SLR's came with external HD storage that you could put in a convenient bag that attached to your belt. (see betterlight's digi backs)

I'm not sure there's anything to gain from using hard drives as storage. Power consumption, time to store/write files, error potential, portability, compatibility may have been matched fairly well by other storage media. Although, it might be a while before compact flash attains the multi-gig levels of hard drives.

[markdoiron]

MicroDrives

most cameras that accept a compact flash card can accept a microdrive. here's a 6-gb model:

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.memorysuppliers.com/hi6gbmi6cofl.html" target="_newWindow">http://www.memorysuppliers.com/hi6gbmi6cofl.html</a>

mark d.

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[ber_]

Lens' are already liquid

We already have liquid lenses. Glass is a super-cooled liquid ...! :o)

[markdoiron]

Myth

i used to believe this because i learned it in a college physics class--even my old textbook still recites this myth. but i got "re-educated" on sci.astro.amateur (saa) usenet group quite a few years ago. search around the internet and i'm certain you can find an explanation--start with a 1998 thread on "glass supercooled liquid" on saa (search at groups.google.com).

mark d.

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[cagerattler]

pixel counting, dpi counting, who's counting?

Pixel counting may be waning, because it really doesn't matter. What really matter's is final output quality - because that's what you put in the frame and hang on your wall. And output quality is measured in DPI (dots per inch).

7 megapixel camera can capture an image that can output (printed) as large as 8 x 10 in. and still maintain high quality. It is commonly accepted that the image should be 300 dpi in its final dimensions to achieve the highest quality print.

Where this begins to fall apart is when images are cropped and edited. For example, if you decide to crop the image closer to the subject matter (eliminated much of the background) and still print it out at 8 x 10, you may not get the best quality print (because the edited image must be scaled up to fit 8 x 10, thereby reducing dpi).

Pixels still matter, but final aspect DPI matters more.

[markdoiron]

Excellent Point

that's an excellent point that i'd like to build on briefly: many "snapshooters" are unskilled at taking pictures. the number one biggest mistake they make is standing too far back--taking a picture of the room instead of the cub scout smiling with his pinewood derby trophy, for example. but, they usually see that mistake when they go to make enlargements and then they're savvy enough to ask for a crop. more mp's can allow them to salvage that image into a acceptable 8x10 to put on the young man's nightstand.

mark d.

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[cmcmanis]

DPI's, Screen Resolution, etc

One of the things that really struck me when I got into digital cameras was how much there was "below" just how many pixels your camera could capture.

This discussion exemplifies one of those in that the human eye's ability to resolve "pixels" is limited to how much color change exists between pixels. So from a light grey to a lighter grey you may only be able to resolve 30 lines per inch but between black and white, perhaps 200 lines per inch.

Then there are color print processes ability to print colors. They range of colors they can print is called their "Gamut" and except that gamut is not constant with their dots per inch. So at their highest resolution their gamut may include 100 distinct colors, but at a lower resolution they can reproduce thousands of colors. The resolution at which they get maximum color fidelity is called their "screen size" (as a throwback to the time when such things were silk screened). For many printers their screen size is in the neighborhood of 100 - 150 dots per inch.

All in all it comes down to whether or not you, as a consumer, like the pictures you take. And if your pictures look the same with a 3 MP cameras and a 5 MP cameras then you won't pay a premium for a 5MP camera. Purists will note that the gigapixel project still uses film, but the fact is that pictures, like anything, serve to pleasure the viewer, and if its a great picture pixels won't matter at all.

[Gromit801]

Film's not dead, and probably won't be.

I use film and digital. Digital (even with Photoshop) cannot give
you the perfect facial tone gradations that are natural. Not to
mention, digital cameras are extremely fragile compared to a metal
frame film camera. No digital made would stand the abuse some
of my film cameras have suffered, and keep working. Also, with my
film cameras, I can still take shots with dead batteries.

Digital is strictly a case of convenience.

[squished]

Film is going the way of vinyl albums

I guess it depends on how you define 'dead'. You probably mean dead as in zero people using it. Of course that won't happen. But I say dead means no significant innovation or investment thereby establishing itself as a shrinking niche.

Digital imagery is still relatively in it's infancy compared to film. The disadvantages you've listed will be mitigated through various technology improvements (software, lighter bodies, fuel cells) while the advantages of digital far outpace the disadvantages.

[cagerattler]

Digital vs. Film, Chevy vs. Ford, your opinion vs. my opinion...

Film is not dead, but Digital has suplanted film in the consumer market. Why? Because consumer's don't care about "the perfect facial tone gradations." Ask a consumer why they like a certain picture, I doubt they'll say that.

Digital is new, Film is old. Consumers like new things, they throw away old things. It's our culture.

I have a digital camera that was manufactured for police/fire services and insurance agencies. It is water proof, dust proof and, to a certain extent, drop/bump proof. None of the SLR's I own would survive what this camera has been through.

Digital is not a case of convenience. It's much easier, less expensive and less time consuming to shoot film, drop it off at Longs, and then pick it up later. With digital, you have to transer the files, look at each of them and decide which ones you want to print. If you are using archival inks and photo quality paper and photo quality settings on your printer, the cost per print is higher for the digital image than the cost per print for the film image. (cost = materials + time).

Film captures and stores the image in an unadulterated form. Many digital camera's store the images in JPEG format. JPEG, by its definition, is a lossy format which degrades the image.

So, how is digital more convenient than film?

[zaznet]

Not dead, but a smaller market

With 92% of new camera customers going for Digital, the film market has shrunk by enormous measures in a relatively short time. You either adapt, or abandon ship as several companies have taken either option.

[t8]

When will digital catchup with slide film?

I use Fuji Vevia film in a Nikon SLR camera. I scan the slide film into my Minolata Dimage scan and can achieve files up to 112 megs, 7000 x 5000 and 600 even more dpi.

I want to change to digital, but when will digital catchup with what I can do with film and scanner?

How many megapixels is needed before we can get 7000+ x 5000+ px

I license my work and sometimes my images are printed on banners, so the bigger the image can scale the better.

[im_thatoneguy]

About 20

20 megapixels is 7648 x 5408. However this is considered to be the upper limit of 35mm film resolution.

Film is usually rated somewhere in the 12-17 megapixel range in comparable sharpness.

[JulesLt]

Low Light performance

In terms of image quality, for standard 6x4 prints I'm perfectly
happy with my 4MP camera - the only thing making me think of
replacing it is the improved low-light performance of recent
Olympus and Fuji cameras. That's an area of innovation where
there is still a lot of work to go - basically until they are literally
as sensitive as the human eye (the plus side would be reducing
the need to power the flash).

As for SLRs - it would already be possible to vastly reduce the
body size of digital SLR cameras, but they would become very
difficult to use - imagine trying to hold something that weighed
the same as a pocket camera with a lens that weighed 6 times as
much stuck on the front. There are good reasons why some of
these zoom lens are the size they are - same reason as
telescopes - and I'm not convinced a liquid lens will be able to
solve this. There's also the fact that it sounds more like the
approach used in cheap binoculars and zooms - thicker glass
with a higher refractive index, rather than using a larger lens
that can capture more light.

light level

When it comes to DSLRs with there large sensors they seem to have the advantage over film, but for compacts film still has the edge there definately, especially with the new inproved emultions.

[im_thatoneguy]

The future of digital is getting to where we are now

Digital photography still has some benchmarks to achieve before it completely replaces film.

The megapixel race is over and should be over in the 35mm film replacement category. Somewhere around 15 megapixels things just become overkill. Now while this race is "over".. there are still some straglers who haven't crossed the finish line yet. (Mostly due to the cost of such high resolution chips.)

The size of the chip is the next obstacle to overcome. For snapshots a small 1/3" ccd is fine. For quality photography you want a full 35mm CCD for the Depth of Field that the lenses will offer. (With clever 'cropping' on say a 30 megapixel camera 70mm ccd this could offer intrigueing DOF flexibility not conventionally available.)

Latitude: If there is one area that CCD/CMOS manufacturers need to work on it, it's latitude. This is still where film is dominant, and digital needs to make some progress on. Forget Megapixels, latitude is going to be the next big battle. I can't wait until the day when we have 32bit floating HDR CCDs.

In my mind the future still camera has:

a 35mm 32bit floating precision HDR CMOS sensor.
a 4" screen with eye tracking software for focus assist.
and a highspeed wireless connection which uploads my photos to an FTP server for global access.
I'll also take the option for that blink protection software, but I would like to also slave the facial recognition software to my friends database so that it will auto tag the people in my photos.

[im_thatoneguy]

About 20

20 megapixels is 7648 x 5408. However this is considered to be the upper limit of 35mm film resolution.

Film is usually rated somewhere in the 12-17 megapixel range in comparable sharpness.

[im_thatoneguy]

Whoops... didn't mean to post a new topic.

Sorry. I hit the wrong button,I meant to reply to comment, not topic.

[retnaip]

Megapixel war is over?

The megapixel war is over?
Didn't Bill Gates say that we'll only need 640K?
If you believe what a marketing guy says, you should be ashamed of yourselves. That guy will say what he has practiced for this years' convention. He's going to sell you cameras, trying to get you to believe that the world is comfortable with 7-8 meg cameras. What happens when Sony offers 9-10 meg cameras? Or when Panasonic starts offering 11-12 meg cameras? Do you really think that Canon's marketing fluff is going to hold water? Do you think Nikon and Canon are going to sit there and tell you the same story? "Hey, don't buy that other stuff, 7-8 meg is all you'll ever need."
Sure, most of the development in the next few years will be over features like image stabilization and better color management (auto white balance), better flash coverage, improved power consumption, etc. But the megapixel war is not over. Canon might not be making a big jump at this years' PMA, but that won't hold forever.
Have you ever held the modern day P&#38;S? It's not a very substantial camera... the idea of "planned obsolescence" comes to mind. The cameras of today are going to be obsolete in 2-3 years. They will deteriorate. They will need to be replaced. They're NOT built like a Leica. When Canon starts building point and shoots and durability becomes a factor, or "this camera will last you the rest of your life", then, and ONLY then, will I begin to believe that the megapixel war is over. Until then, don't believe what the marketing types are selling. They're trying to improve the bottom line today. And again tomorrow, and the next day. They're NOT asking you to think about 1, 2, or 3 years down the road. They want your money now.

[spike69]

Good article, but ast paragraph is ridiculous

&lt;&lt;&lt;
for one thing, nobody has yet figured out how to store all those digital photos for future generations. It's not clear how long hard drives and home-burned CD's can last, and the software question is even more frightening.
&gt;&gt;&gt;
Give me a break! As floppies stop being supported, we consumers transfer them to CD (before floppies stop working). As those are becoming obsolete, we consumers transfer them to DVD, befor the CDs stop working. It's simple and is automatic for most people. But the conclusion of the paragraph is ridiculous, because even if these formats do stop working and everyone happens to not rewrite their pictures to the media used at the time, the Internet is where everyone does and will increasingly store their pictures. Everything is moving towards the Internet, even word processors and I believe OSes. But even right now, flickr and many other websites exist that people use to store their photos. And the article calls the future in terms of picture retrieval "frightening"? Give me a break. It's not like all of a sudden technologies and websites disappear and all our pictures are gone! As technologies and websites gradually fade, new ones come up and consumers naturally move their pictures etc over to the new tech.

&lt;&lt;&lt;
Will the under-the-skin nanocomputers of 2100 still recognize JPEG files?
&gt;&gt;&gt;
What a silly idea! Once again, things are gradual. We won't all of a sudden be wearing computers that all of a sudden don't recognize our pictures. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't but an "under-the-skin nanocomputer" until I know it can read all my existing photos, or unless I can convert my JPEGs to whatever the standard of 2100 will be. What a ridiculous paragraph in an otherwise solid article!

[markdoiron]

Loss of Data is a Real Problem

Jason--

you're right that there is a path that can be taken for the migration of images. and you're touch on the subject that with so many folks storing images, there will be incentive for mfg's to provide good answers.

but, regardless. the article is also correct--the loss of the capability to read media form-factors and data file types has plagued us for many years. sure, some folks are savvy enough to take actions to prevent this from happening--i still have copies of 360-kb 5-1/4" floppies on my hard drive. but some of those files can no longer be opened because the software that did that long ago disappeared from compatibility with win whatever. and i recall nasa and the problems they had reading images collected by some of the original satellites to visit mars. and i personally experienced the loss of recordings of military combat missions during a few critical days in viet nam because no one makes a compatible tape head. so it's good that the author highlights this as a concern, because if it remains a concern than there will be good answers. and if it doesn't, it might be forgotten, just as it has in the past.

mark d.

Megapixies!

Digital SLRs maybe good quality but no amount of megapixels in a digital compact is going to get up to film standard.
The sensors in digital compacts are 22x smaller that a 35mm frame, thats a bigger difference than 35mm and large format, meaning a 7x5" print from a digital compact is a 25x enlargement, basicly the sensors in most digital compacts have more resolution than the lens in the camera is capable of.
Trouble is at 6x4 and 7x5" the difference isn't that noticable to Joe average. 9x6" it becomes blatant. Sensor size also has an afect on Dynamic range and taking portraits with the background out of focus can't really be done. All I am saying if quantity is inportant and/or the pictures arn't that special or are not likley to be blown up then use a digital (even I do). If it's a wedding, graduation, reunion ETC and the pictures are inportant use a film compact, you won't care that you had to have it developed when you are looking at the picture in 25 years/

[markdoiron]

I Have Good Results from 5-mp P&S

i've had good results from a canon a95 point and shoot, my primary camera when backpacking the wilderness. poster-size (24x36") prints from it compare favorably with my digital rebel, as well as my old nikon f film camera.

as for sensor size: you're right. the dynamic range of film was never anything to brag about (when compared to the human eye, that is), and digital is about one f/stop worse. i do miss that with all three of my digital cameras.

mark d.
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[dantso]

3D/Stereo ?

One obvious feature missing from current cameras is a 3d/stereo capability. Either 2 sensors, or just double optics, space a few inches apart, like human eyes, and you'd be able to create stereo images. There would be some issues in printing or displaying such images (solved in labs for 20-30 years), but they could be solved for the mass-market.

It'd be more difficult, but get enough sample viewpoints (not just two), and you could build an entire 3D image/model of the subject... (probably not practical for a while...)

[itworker--2008]

shutter lag

I would just like a point and shoot camera that I can just point and shoot with, like my 35mm camera. I'm tired of that little lag time from the click of the button till when the actaul picture is taken.

I bet that's the number one pet peeve of users, and the article didn't say anything about it. Yes, I know SLRs are better at this, but most ppl don't have expensive SLR digicams

[markdoiron]

Some Cameras Better

some of the p&#38;s cameras are better at this. i normally shoot with a digital 35-mm slr, so was very sensitive to shutter lag when i bought a canon a95 p&#38;s for backpacking. i almost always compose and pre-focus before shooting and, to tell the truth, i don't ever notice shutter lag. except when someone hands me their own digital camera to take a pic for them--then i do!

mark d.

[avanie]

More than hope liquid lens is a reality

Varioptic, announced the general availability of the Arctic 320 liquid lens, which is the industrys first and only multi mega-pixel, auto-focus, liquid lens for camera phones.

Since introducing its first patented liquid lenses last year, Varioptic has been working closely with Samsung Electro-Mechanics to provide auto focus lenses for camera phones. Over this time, Varioptic has made continuous improvements to its liquid lenses, expanding the storage temperature range to minus 40°/plus 85°C, while expanding the operating temperature range to minus 20°/plus 60°C. Additional enhancements in durability, low power consumption and miniaturization enable the Arctic 320 lens to fit within existing x-y camera module footprints, making it ideal for the mobile phone market.

The enhancements also apply to other Varioptic liquid lenses that are designed for less demanding environments, such as:

Communications: web cams, video conferencing, and integrated PC/laptop cameras
Healthcare: medical and dental imaging
Industry: barcode imagers and industrial endoscopes
Security: indoor video surveillance and biometry
Entertainment: digital still cameras, camcorders and gaming applications.