killing a fly with a sledgehammer . . . or not

[lenslover]

Years ago, I shot newsprint ads for a local department store. They had me do a spread of luggage that would run double full page on the back. Because I was out of smaller Polaroid, I shot it with 4x5 sheet film and turned in an 11x14 print, wondering if it was worth the extra trouble and expense of doing it on 120 roll film. What a shock! It looked astonishingly better.

I bring this up because of the astonishingly better jpegs, 72 dpi, 11x14", 12 quality, that come off of my Phase One P65+ back. Non-photographers call me and ask me what camera I'm using to get such sharp clear jpegs.

I think this relates to people saying that for most jobs, 60 megapixels is overkill. Maybe not. Even is Sensor Plus, a 15 megapixel file blows away 16 megapixel Canon files.

Bill

 

[Bill Caulfeild-Browne]

Yep!
Bill

 

[dougpeterson]

In my experience a 15mp sensor plus P65+ file is on even footing with a 22mp raw file from a 5D3 once cropped to 4:3 or 1:1 as far as absolute subject detail goes. And they are not even close on footing regarding color, file elasticity, and overall umph (the favor going to the 65+ sensor plus file).

It's only natural that people assume all megapixels are created equally and that megapixels should be the first-line measure of a camera's quality/suitability for a particular need, but it's just not the case.

 

[shortpballer]

In my experience a 15mp sensor plus P65+ file is on even footing with a 22mp raw file from a 5D3 once cropped to 4:3 or 1:1 as far as absolute subject detail goes. And they are not even close on footing regarding color, file elasticity, and overall umph (the favor going to the 65+ sensor plus file).

It's only natural that people assume all megapixels are created equally and that megapixels should be the first-line measure of a camera's quality/suitability for a particular need, but it's just not the case.

Its good that everyone else thinks it is megapixels that make a camera. This keeps us separate from the rest

 

[aeaemd]

Agreed!
I enjoy night photography and recently I have been taking my D800e and 45+ on cambo WRS side by side on two separate tripods and the phase one images are far better than Nikon's even when it comes to noise. I had to turn on the LENR on Nikon to get rid of most (not all) of the noise. So, like you said, megapixels are not created equal and tobe fair, not all the glass are created equal as well and that is an additional advantage to using medium format systems. Nikon doesn't have glass good enough for that much megapixels.

Amr

 

[shortpballer]

Very much agreed! I rented a D800e and was not all that satisfied. Colors are not even close to Phase One colors. And I think a lot has to do with glass as well.

Agreed!
I enjoy night photography and recently I have been taking my D800e and 45+ on cambo WRS side by side on two separate tripods and the phase one images are far better than Nikon's even when it comes to noise. I had to turn on the LENR on Nikon to get rid of most (not all) of the noise. So, like you said, megapixels are not created equal and tobe fair, not all the glass are created equal as well and that is an additional advantage to using medium format systems. Nikon doesn't have glass good enough for that much megapixels.

Amr