Camera megapixels

[woodchip]

Samsung is coming out with a 106 mp camera on the note 11. Question is how good can this be? Packing in all those pixels wou;d make them smaller and , as such, it seems to me that it would limit it's low light capabilities (it pixels work anything like film grain). Thoughts?

[Krom]

Pretty much... These sensors that do huge megapixel numbers have to dramatically cut back the resolution in order to do a proper low-light picture. They can do it at full resolution but it loses a ton of detail from the post processing they use to reduce the noise and it takes a ridiculously long exposure.

I've looked at the outputs of a 40+ mp camera in full daylight and if you zoom in to 100% on a computer monitor everything breaks down and looks almost like an oil painting done with too big of a brush. So honestly I'd call bull★■◆● on those megapixel numbers, the final image might be that big but it is obvious the sensors aren't actually capturing that many pixels and it is a post processed upscale that is faking the final resolution. I would prefer a sensor that consistently returns crisp and clean results at a lower resolution to one that generates ridiculously huge resolution but breaks down to just a bunch of solid color blobs when you zoom in.

[woodchip]

I hear what you are saying. I'll wait until they come out and see if the store will take a picture and put it on a usb drive so I can test it out. Meanwhile I'm debating if I want to start taking slides with my old Nikon F4. I have a Nikon D80 that That has spoiled me so might do some comparisons between the F4 and D80 also. I'm assuming a digital camera has a larger area to place the pixels so the pixels could be larger per given count though no way in hell I could afford a high pixel count camera body. Well wait till I see test results I guess.

[CDN_Merlin]

I won't trade my DSLR for a phone pic at all.

[woodchip]

Before you yhroe out completely the idea of using your smart phone, there are adapters you can hook your smart phone to and use any camera lens with:
https://www.diyphotography.net/this-ada ... martphone/

[vision]

Well wait till I see test results I guess.

That's all you can really do. From what I understand, high pixel count only allows for higher resolution at the expense of added noise and loss of color information. Seems to me in the grand scheme of things the order of importance is LENS > SENSOR > SOFTWARE > PIXEL DENSITY -- but mostly it's about the harmony between these elements. I usually just ignore megapixel counts because it's often used as a marketing tool since it's hard to describe to consumers the changes in sensor and lens quality. Bigger numbers though? Any non-expert can get excited about that!

Note: I'm not an expert and only know the bare minimum about photography.

[Vander]

I looked into the 108MP sensor, and it is quite a bit larger physically than other cell phone camera sensors. (approaching the size of some nice point and shoot cameras) The pixel size is 0.8μm, and apparently drops density to 27MP in low light, making it effectively 1.6μm, which is larger than the Note 10 at 1.4μm.

But really, what do you need past 8MP for other than cropping? A 4K monitor is around 8MP, same with an 8.5x11 300dpi print. The separate optics on new phones seem more important. I'd take 2x optical zoom over 2x megapixel-and-crop any day.

[woodchip]

Vander, I have a 8mp samsung note 4. I find if I enlarge neyond 2x the clarity and resolution drops off. So if I take a pic of say a deer at 100 feet, the reso drops off dramatically if I enlarge via phone 1 or 2 times. I was hoping the 108 mp might reduce that.

[Vander]

It would help some, but more megapixels doesn't give magical "zoom... enhance" powers. Camera phones have typically been decent for close subjects, or wider scenes. I think in your scenario, you'd want a lens with more reach instead of more megapixels.

I did a quick look up on Galaxy 11 phones, and beside the 108MP camera, there may also be a 5x zoom camera with an average sensor. (rumored) That 5x is what you want for your scenario, and would definitely give a better quality photo than the 108MP cropped.

This is at about 80ft with 5x-ish zoom: (250mm lens, APC-S sensor, only cropped for aspect ratio)

[woodchip]

Which is why I linked that phone to a adapter that you can attach any camera lens to the smart phone. So I wonder how well a photo would enlarge on the 108mp with say a Nikon 70-200 zoom lens. Nice photo btw.

[Vander]

Eh. That adapter is a bit of a gimmick. You'd probably get some crazy lens aberration issues that would render any useful resolution benefits (which aren't many if your intent is to use zoom and also crop to zoom) moot in terms of image quality. I don't know how you'd calculate focal length on such a setup, but with that small sensor on a 70-200, the 35mm equivalent zoom would probably be something crazy like 100x, and unusable without stabilization even on a tripod.

[vision]

I think in your scenario, you'd want a lens with more reach instead of more megapixels.

You're exactly right. This is a textbook example of shot composition best practices.

[CDN_Merlin]

Before you yhroe out completely the idea of using your smart phone, there are adapters you can hook your smart phone to and use any camera lens with:
https://www.diyphotography.net/this-ada ... martphone/

Nothing will compare to my 150-600mm lens on a phone

[woodchip]

Pretty much as we discussed though for enlargement the 108mp is better than lesser mp cellphones. Light is also critical. Link has side by side images being enlarged so you can compare the chinese phone using the samsung mp unit:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/bensin/201 ... fd1ec4676e

[woodchip]

Also of interest is the chinese model has 6 different lenses:

The CC9 Pro is a more conventionally designed phone by comparison, although it still managed to pack in five rear cameras: the aforementioned flagship 108-megapixel wide angle lens, a 5-megapixel telephoto with 5x optical zoom (and 10x hybrid zoom), a 12-megapixel telephoto camera designed for portrait mode shots, a 20-megapixel ultra-wide with a 117-degree field of view, and a 2-megapixel macro lens for close-up shots. There’s also a sixth 32-megapixel camera on the front of the phone, which is housed in a teardrop-style notch.

https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker ... ung-sensor

[Vander]

Five cameras is pretty crazy. That's quite a bit of capability in a device you're almost always carrying, and I'm a firm believer in "the world's best camera is the one you have with you."