46 megapixels, announces the new press release for the upcoming Sigma SD1.
I nearly got up and did a jig. Holy crow... oh wait. The press release is written in Sigma-ese, so it's actually a 15.36 megapixel sensor that they want to sell at a 46 megapixel Price! Shucks.
But, wait. What is it really, 46 or 15? Only here will you find the truth, my friend.
In September of 2009, the highly reputable DPreview compared the raw files of the DP2 with those of the Olympus E-P1.
"for those with clicking phobias, here's the punchline;
...the level of detail being rendered is clearly very high and not dissimilar to that of a well-processed image from a camera with a 12mp conventional sensor such as the E-P1.
Per-pixel sharpness on the DP2 is way ahead of the E-P1 and even in a large print it seems ulikely that the extra pixels on the Olympus sensor would give you any advantage.
"
So here's the thing, even though the Olympus creates a raw image that is nearly twice the size of the DP2, the DP2 contains greater detail, enough detail to enlarge the image to the 12mp size without losing detail, theoretically.
"BUT IT HAS A 4.9 Megapixel Sensor!!!" Cries the terrified public, "or rather, it has 4900000 pixel spaces." says one slightly less terrified man.
A woman stands up and says, "If each pixel site reports a red, blue, and green signal of some sort, and a bayer pixel only reports one, that's 3 times the pixels, right?" GET OUT OF HERE!
Sorry, I don't know where all those people came from.
With a 12 megapixel sensor, the sensor only reports if it is activated by it's frequency, either red blue or green.
A typical sensor uses a Bayer filter array, and each sensor reports only one of the colors. The image a typical 12 mp camera produces is interpolated to make a
This really really cheeses people off. They are used to a Bayer sensor array, 12 million little squares that are either red green or blue, or red green blue and emerald (sony).
Also, when somebody says a camera is 14 megapixels, that means you can print out a 30X30" poster without any problem.
I have to admit, I have had trouble making enlargements of a XRF (Sigma's Raw File) files, but I haven't really given it my all yet. I've only messed around a little, and felt like it was too much trouble.
But what kind of Foveist would I be if I didn't try?
A crappo one. So, to settle this issue, this week I will make large prints from my Sigma SD14 and my Kodak DCS 14n, and we can compare them. Okay? Okay!
