Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/11/27
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]This is an interesting topic for me today as I did an experiment yesterday comparing cropped images of a 1.6X crop camera to a FF camera. The reason I did the experiment was to see if I was hurting my bird photos by using a FF camera. The experiment was in response to a comment that Doug made where in the absence of a DMR the best results would probably come from the 1DS Mark II. Well I don't have a 1DS but I do have a 5D. My experiment was to photograph an object using my 400mm lens on both the 1.6X and FF bodies at ISO 800. The same object was centered in the frame shooting from the exact same position. That would force me to crop the FF shot to match the 1.6X shot. Since I normally end up with a slight crop on all my photos anyway, my starting 1.6X photo was cropped to about 80% of the original. I then cropped the FF image to be exactly the same as the cropped 1.6X cropped image. I then compared the two. Guess what. The final two images looked identical. This is noise level and clump size and image resolution or perceived sharpness. It seems the improved image and noise performance of the 5D offset the less cropped image of the other camera. I did not expect this at all. Since the 1DS MK II has a finer noise structure then the 5D, it is logical to assume it would produce the best images of the three cameras. Doug is right. Oh. As an alternative, I also used a 1.4X lens extender ( Canon 1.4X II) on the FF body and cropped to the same size as the other two photos. The extender degraded the photo somewhat to where it was not as good as the two shots without extender. Thanks for stiking with me this far. Len On Nov 27, 2007, at 7:50 AM, G Hopkinson wrote: > Philip I posted a response. I was trying to say that four thirds is > by no means half frame WRT resolution. I see the perceived issue > as noise levels since the photo-sites on a smaller sensor for the > same resolution are by necessity smaller. However there are huge > advances in sensor designs, processing algorithms, micro-lens > configurations and post processing. There are advantages such as the > less angled input to the peripheral photo-sites (given the four > thirds philosophy of lens design) and finally compact form factors > which make sense to me for four thirds bodies. It seems to depend > on your frame of reference. From the film world 1600 ISO or > similar, grain would be expected and accepted without comment. Now > noise is a problem. The holy grail being 6400ISO equivalent at > Kodachrome 25 grain or some such. Oh and a dynamic range of 12 > stops of course. > I don't know, I have seen some superb results from the E410, 510 > and now the E3, not to mention the L1, Digilux 3 etc. Really we > must be past film/sensor comparisons. Apples and oranges and all that. > > To drift back on topic, I wonder what Photokina will bring from > Solms or will it be Wetzlar? Some suprises I bet. > > Cheers > Geoff > Film guy > > -----Original Message----- > Subject: Re: [Leica] Leica D lens 4/3rds question. > > A visual representation of same: > > <http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/ec/SensorSizes.png> > > Phil > On Nov 26, 2007, at 11:20 PM, Mark Rabiner wrote: > >> In film terms the camera format is half half frame. >> They've got to scale down the camera to to get my attention. >> There are nice digital half frames out here (APS-2 or DX) which are >> half the >> size of these bloated 4/3's babies. >> >> >> >> Mark William Rabiner >> markrabiner.com >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Leica Users Group. >> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information > > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information > > > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information