I use my 20 megapixel OM-1 MK II the most, but I do also have a Sony 43 megapixel FF camera with many fast lenses. But I mostly use the images on Instagram, so there are never videos at anything more than 4k at max, that is 8 megapixels. So, do I need to upgrade to the newer 61 megapixel FF? No, not at all.
@@idahofallsmagazine3691 the only reason megapixels matter is because most people shoot wildlife casually and spend little time trying to get closer to the subject. Many pros still use 24MP cameras. Because getting closer and filling the frame gives better images. Cropping does not, 1000MP or not.
Lens quality matters more than anything. 24MP is the sweet spot for most people, case in point Sony's flagship low light monster is 12MP and their pro level A9iii is 24MP. If you need more then you're likely printing huge and most people rarely print anything at all.
Agreed. This is one of the reasons why m43 has become more important to me over the years. I get 25MP, and if I really wanted to, I could shoot at 50MP or 100MP using my camera's pixel shift function. I have used it, of course, but did not perceive any benefit in my case. Things would be different for a very large print. If today's sensors deliver 99% of what we expect (high read-out speed is important), then we should probably focus on high-quality glass. It's readily available for most systems (I find the selection for APS-C appalling in the case of Sony and Canon).
@@illicit008 Sony's flagship "LOW LIGHT" camera is 12 MP referring to the A7s models. I never once said the A9 was their flagship, I called it their pro level camera. Are YOU high or you just can't read?
You don't need more, even if you're printing larger sizes, because the larger the print the farther away people will be to look at it. Look at the billboards. They can be made from 24MP photos and they will look great, because you're not looking at them up close.
Back in 2004 I took a photo of my sons with a Canon Powershot S5 which is 5mp and at work we had a colour plotter (used for plotting drawings), so I thought I plot one of his outdoor portrait on A0 normal plan paper and to my surprise it was fantastic. Even today I look at the plot and I am amazed that it was done by a 5mp camera. So, to this day, I am still using my Nikon D700 and happily print 8x12 and 16x12 prints. I have no plans in spending thousands on new cameras unless my D700 packs it in.
I still have the camera my dad used to take pictures of my childhood from 2007 as well although it was 8 MP. I've tested it out and it still looks great!
I'm always 50/50 when it comes to the topic of 'do megapixels matter'. On 1 hand the fundamentals of photography are the most important, having a good composition, good lighting and creativity. On the otherhand, what makes photos special to me is that fact it can be higher quality than video, giving you the ability to zoom in and inspect the moment in time.
there is still no replacement for a high megapixel (20+) fast focusing, fast shooting, agile full frame camera in the medium format realm. FF quality has gotten closer to medium format (it will never reach it, since digital medium format also gets better and there is physics involved with sensor size). However medium format cameras are still really slow beasts with really large lenses (if going for high speed especially). FF is my sweet spot but I always envy the image quality when I browse some samples and if your workflow allows for a slower process and you have the disposable income (or you are making $$$$ using it) then medium format is sweet.
If you walk up close to a billboard, you'll quickly see why megapixels alone don't matter, it’s all about perspective! When it comes to high-resolution sensors, the quality of the image starts and ends with the lens. No matter how many megapixels a camera has, there’s a limit to what the glass can resolve. Once that limit is reached, adding more megapixels just results in a blurry mass of extra data, rather than capturing any new detail. Like trying to see more detail through a frosted glass.
Yes sir! I have discovered that HQ glass is the defining factor in an amazing photo. I shoot on a M4/3 sensor and when I shot my first Leica 'projector lens', I promptly sold around 80% of my VGC 60's-70's Japanese lenses that didn't make the cut. Now I chase great glass and could care less about the sensor till it breaks.
I'd agree with you more if you said, "If you walk up close to a billboard, you'll quickly see why megapixels alone don't matter ... but only when you walk up close to a billboard." (Also ironic because you can't walk up close to a billboard in the first place.)
I was about to make that point about billboards. As a kid I was building a tree house from bits of a disused billboard and saw the dots that made up the image almost comically big. Learned about halftone long before I knew what it was called...
If you're looking at images on your phone screen, pixel resolution don't matter. But if you're a photographer, work in the printing industry, or own a printing business, they DO matter. It's better to go from big to small and not the other way around, even with AI, the quality doesn't match the original pixel resolution of an image.
Or not. One can live and photograph without cropping. But you are right size does.matter, proof, comparing two 24 Mp sensors, the one with the larger area (and larger photosites) will behave better in low light, and have a greater dynamic range, require less amplification (more chances of accurate colours).
You can't get enough megapixels when you're photographing wildlife, because you'll need to crop in 2 to 6 times (or have you ever been closer than 30 meters to a stork ?)
Vielleicht sollten Sie mal ihre Arbeitsweise überdenken. Mit einigen artbezogenen Kenntnissen und ein bisschen Erfahrung fotografieren Sie Störche, Milane, Silberreiher usw. auf 10 - 15 m. Ja und gelegentlich reicht die Naheinstellgrenze nicht für den Eisvogel.
The ability to crop is certainly a boon to bird photographers, but it's not like no one ever got a picture of a stork, or kingfisher or hummingbird before we had 45 or 61 megapixel cameras! Photographers used blinds, long lenses and knowledge about the subject. In fact, they would often spend far more time studying subjects than photographing them. Nothing wrong with finding an easier way, but to imply that it's impossible to photograph small birds and wildlife without high megapixel cameras flies in the face of reality.
@@EgoundderRest I shoot wildlife of years and megapixels are crucial. it's not about rethinking and even not about coping. It's about the details. For portraits I use medium format and the difference if dramatic.
@@helloianzakharov Sicher ist der eine oder andere Megapixel mehr nicht schlecht - und besagt doch nicht alles. Ich habe auch aus Aufnahmen mit der Nikon D500 noch Ausschnitte mit ca. 10 Mpix gezogen, scharf und detailliert. Für hochwertige Drucke in einigen Journalen und Büchern reichte die Qualität jedenfalls aus. Auch in sehr großer Projektion ist die Qualität noch bemerkenswert.
I am a hobbyist, I bought an A7RV about 3weeks ago from an A7III - I noticed my shots looked better AND worse going up from the 20mp A7II sensor to 61mp sensor - I became so much more privy to image sharpness, and the lacking detail of my lenses, I noticed low iso artifacts more easily and tbh it just made casual photography a lot harder.
It's easy to fall into the "Pixel-peeping" trap, when you can zoom way in on a large screen computer monitor. Yes, you are seeing differences--in that environment. But what will viewers see when they look at the same picture printed and hanging on a wall, or when it's filling up 1/2 of their laptop screens, let alone what it looks like on their smartphones? Though, if you think about your photography as a communicative act, resolution issues change dramatically. When that becomes your perspective, all that matters is what will my viewers "see." If a resolution difference won't be noticed, nor have any effect, by your viewer, then, essentially, it ceases to exist, communicatively. This way of thinking can renew the joy, once again, of your casual photography--as it should be.
Simply downsample all you photos to 30-ish Mpix and all your worries will be gone. And you will be amazed how much sharpness and details you gain over your former 20Mpix camera.
When i upgraded to an 8k display, i had a big problem finding crisp wallpapers at that resolution. 8k it's about 30 megapixels, so a photographer needs slightly more than 30 to shot pic good enough for me
Don't forget a lens' resolving ability. For my 45-megapixel full-frame camera, I need a good lens to actually resolve that resolution. Furthermore, at an aperture smaller than about f7, I lose effective resolution due to refraction (on a 45-megapixel sensor)-no matter how high-end the lens. There's no point in having a high-megapixel camera if you don't have the glass to go with it, or if you're taking pictures at smaller apertures. At lease that's my understanding of it.
you will lose theoretical sharpness and be diffraction limited long before F7. In practice, 5.6 is a good spot. If lens is very good and depth allows, F4 is even better. If lens has optical aberrations or you need depth of field, it's always better to be slightly diffractiono limited though.
@@letni9506 agree. Having more won't hurt, except to say, all things equal, more sometimes leads to inferior ISO performance on a given-sized sensor. Personally, I do like more to a point. Hence, my 32MP APS C and my 45MP full frame.
I use a 24MP Nikon D750. I am not a landscape artist, but the camera sensor is perfect for my needs. A3+ prints are beautiful no matter how close you get. It's just horses for courses. As always a really interesting vlog.
I'll take my Sony 61MP over my Z6 any day. Depends what you're looking for. DX Crop the Z6 and you're back to the D70. DX Crop the Sony and you have a Z6.
@@unclefart5527 A DX crop is exactly what it implies, so with the Sony you would actually have a D3500 rather than a Z6. To be more precise you would actually have a Fuji XT4. The A7r4, XT4 and GFX 100 all have the same pixel density, probably using the same wafer cut into different sizes.
There's something you left out when discussing pixel size and low light performance: Bayer arrays. When pixels get really small, you begin to get significant differences in the photons hitting each sensor element. It might sound crazy, because photons are so incredibly small and there are so many of them, that any pixel to pixel deviation would be insignificant--but it is, in some circumstances. When you have a relatively small sensor size, like on a m43 camera, coupled with a large number of pixels, say 25 megapixels, you wind up with imaging sensor elements less than 100,000th of a square millimeter. At that scale, in low light situations, you begin to get some pixels which receive stimulation from a photon, triggering an electric discharge during the exposure period, whereas neighboring pixels don't. And as each sensor element is filtered (through what is called a Bayer array) to allow either red, blue, or green wavelengths of light through (which, composited, generates color from an otherwise B&W source), those pixel-to-pixel discrepancies wind up creating stray blue, red, and green, dots in the photographic image. I think we've all seen them. No amount of amplification cleanness will take away that initially generated red, blue, or green signal. Yes, noise-correction software can detect these variations and replace those red, blue, or green dots with a color and luminance value derived from adjacent pixels, but then you're relying on that software to get it right. With larger sensors, this becomes less of an issue, as each sensor element becomes larger, mitigating the issues of pixel-to-pixel deviations (a 50 MP full-frame pixel is still covers twice the area that a 25 MP m43 pixel will). But when we start cramming 40-50 MP on a sensor which is a mere fraction of the size of an m43 camera's, then this can become a serious issue, requiring a lot of image processing to fix. So, sensor pixel density can have an effect on low-light image noise, even with the cleanest of signal amplification systems.
I use a Sony a7RIV and while I mostly share photos online I find the high resolution very beneficial exactly because I have gotten much more comfortable with cropping in post. It helps me with telephoto lens fomo in that I focus more on bringing wide lenses and if I did not have the space to carry a 70-200, I might crop from 70 or 85 all the way up to 200 and everything still looks crisp and nice. In the beginning I was second-guessing my choice of the R model due to noise performance. The grain is significantly more noticeable compared to other Sony bodies from same generation. But since the resolution is so high, the noise is also much finer, so if you are not both cropping 300% in post and shooting crazy high iso, chances are nobody will notice the noise at a normal zoom level. Further, I find that the finer grained noise lends itself better to AI denoising. The main drawback is the size of the files and the fact that I regularly have slowdowns in Lightroom because my 32GB of RAM is getting maxed out. But overall for me it has been worth it.
Very well explained. I printed yesterday some of my pictures for an exhibition. Their format is 40cm x 50cm. One picture was from an old Nikon D3 (12,87 megapixels). The only "issue" with the raw file was a bit grain (could be removed in Lightroom), but megapixels were not an issue.
I work on industrial printers for a living and have had the practical application discussion about DPI both at work and in photography forums! I use 16 and 20 Mp micro 4/3 cameras.
Another aspect that needs to be added to the discussion is post processing software such as Topaz Gigapixel the can be a very useful tool when cropping images from cameras with lower megapixel counts. As I shoot with micro 4/3 gear and my M1 Mark II has a 20 megapixel sensor, Topaz Gigapixel helps a lot when I need to make a significant crop. Since my prints are never larger than 13" X 19" , I haven't had any problems printing very good images. As I'm getting up there in age, photography is much more enjoyable when I can keep the amount of weight I'm carrying on the lower side while still having the ability to carry a few lenses and two camera bodies, so the micro 4/3 system works for me.
Exactly, thank you 🙏 This is what I've been preaching for a couple of years, Topax Gigapixel is incredible, I also use the free Upscayl tool, results and insanely great... no need for some 36, 48... 100mp sensore for most situations, you can upscale now with M43 and APSC and results virtually indistinguishable (as far as rez. and detail) from larger formats/pixel counts. Cheating? I dunno. And AI seems to be 'filling in' detail that might not actually exist but it looks incredible, my M43 looks like they were shot with FF.
Very well explained! I got quite a bit out of it, except I didn't think the title fits well. I do a lot of landscape and wildlife photography and find myself cropping photos alot! So you kind of confirmed that megapixels matter when significantly cropping photos. Regardless, well explained. :)
The popularity of higher megapixel cameras is largely because more pixels are easier to deliver, technologically speaking, than things like more dynamic range, especially in highlights. They also reflect the popularity of wildlife and landscape photography, which increasingly resembles data trawling, rather like shooting video to select an interesting still photograph from a file. Printing demonstrates what we really need for our creative purposes, but that's less popular than enlarging 200%, heading to the corners, and declaring the photograph deficient.
I used to thinking that megapixels do not matter. In fact, they do. Now I am using Fuji GFX system. Imagine the possibility of cropping. It is insane. It's virtually 4 APS-C sensors stiched together.
I’ve enjoyed travel photography for a lifetime and the way I see it is that if you earn your income from photography, you probably know a lot about what your equipment can do for you in each situation you are facing and choose accordingly. When you just shoot for yourself and perhaps family and friends, you likely can get the results you want from a decent point and shoot. I have a 24mp full frame Sony and a good 24-135 G lens but much prefer the portability and results from my point and shoot 20.1mp RX100 v and vii.
Have you tried that with the Mona Lisa? Or an Andy Warhol? Or Picasso? Just because some people do it doesn't mean it's a valid observation because it's not its an irrelevance. There is a perfect viewing distance for every size piece, catering to everyone is an impossibility.
First, this video is spot-on. To your post, most of Ansel Adams prints are 16x20 or smaller. Larger sizes were the exception. Yes, I have been up close to actual Ansel Adams prints. Some of them have blocked up blacks that I doubt were intentional. I own a couple Westons. I have a Masters degree in art specializing in photography and am also a Master Optician. In my earlier film days I shot a variety of formats, including 4x5, mostly manual with tripods and exposure meters. I was a master printer and used the zone system. Made my own chemicals, had my own darkroom, even dabbled with alternative and old processes and made my own paper. I especially loved the print quality I could achieve with my 6x7 camera. Since 2012 I have been shooting exclusively with M43 cameras with 16MP sensors and lenses with excellent optics. I shoot RAW and use DXO Photolab. Print with an Epson SC-P900. Not being a snob here, really. Fact is the prints I produce are much better than anything I ever made with film in any format. Sharper with better representation. Perfect shadows and highlights. And I have so much more control over the process to bring out the best in my images. Nuff said.
The other aspect of this is that in real life, when we move closer to something we see more and more detail. I've seen a few quite large, very high resolution prints, that I could stand close to and see the fine details and it was awesome. I hope to have some of my own printed like that at some point and display them in my home.
My feeling is that pros can get away easier with lower pixel cameras, whereas amateurs can make use of higher pixel cameras. Pros are more likely to frame the shot they want, amateurs are more likely to need to crop.
This is absolutely true. When 4k TVs came out, I was working at an appliance store. I took home the USB drive used to display 4K content on our flagship 4K TV and played it on our regular HD TV. Honestly, that 4K video content made our HD TV look like it was 4K.
Local contrast makes the image look more real . You will see the difference in print . Resolution is key for that to happen . We do like to stand closer to see detail . Bill boards are not to good looking .
I've had 8MP images printed on billboards (and side of buses) and they looked amazing. I've also printed 10MP images on posters that look equally amazing. I've also compared 24MP R6 II files to 45MP R5 files printed on huge poster prints and couldn't see any difference. MP are mostly marketing at this point to drive FOMO. I think Chris Hau made a video where he had photographers try to pick between images from a 12MP A7SIII and a 100MP Medium Format camera. They looked at images on a tablet, also images on social media, then they looked at a medium print, then they looked at MASSIVE poster size prints. They thought the 12MP was the 100MP most of the time... they were wrong 90% of the time. IE. They could not tell the difference between 12 and 100 MP files in any real world situation.
Kann überhaupt nicht zustimmen. Das ist wie mit guten Lautsprechern: Am Anfang empfindet man den Unterschied gar nicht so gross zu anderen Lautsprechern oder empfindet sie sogar nur als anders. Hat man sich nach einer gewissen Zeit daran gewöhnt, hört man plötzlich drastische Unterschiede wenn man wieder normale Lautsprecher hört. Bei Ausdrucken ist das nichts anderes: Man ist zufrieden mit dem was man sieht, kann sich nicht vorstellen wie es besser sein sollte, schlicht weil man es nicht anders kennt. Druckt man längere Zeit 100MP und geht dann wieder auf eine geringere Auflösung zurück, sieht man den Unterschied plötzlich sehr deutlich. Das heißt: mach diesen Vergleichstest mit Fotografen die schon längere Zeit mit hohen Auflösungen arbeiten und ich bin überzeugt davon, dass das Ergebnis anders ausfällt. Im übrigen hab ich das auch für mich selber schon gemacht, mit Freunden, die mich fragten woran ich das denn immer erkenne. Aber wie bei Lautsprechern: der eigene Anspruch ist entscheidend, manche hören auch Musik am Smartphone und sind mit dem Klang zufrieden. Ich wollte weder meine KEF noch meine GFX missen, weil ich die Qualität einfach liebe. Aber so wie die Lautsprecher nichts für schlechte Musik können, macht die Kamera alleine auch keine besseren Bilder.
I worked at a photo primting company and people always wanted their pictures cropped and later asked why the prints were blurry. Well, you lost pixals! Duh!
I admit that I have spent too much money over the years on the latest and greatest, hoping they would improve my photos. I have a camera in the 45 MP range that I rarely use, but I gravitate back to my Canon 5D IV and III over and over for professional work. They take beautiful photos, are super reliable, and I'm extremely comfortable using them (main reason). Over the last few years, I have had a shift in my hobby camera use. I found that I was using my phone increasingly and realized it was because it was so convenient. Additionally, it is a real hassle to lug a huge camera system when hiking (something that I like to do). Now, I find that I use a smaller APS-C camera on hobby shoots, and for the first time, I will take a 1" sensor camera (RX100) on an upcoming camping/hiking trip out west. As my photography skills have improved over the years and my photos look better, I'm simply less impressed with specs on paper and more interested in real-world convenience. My smaller cameras have the controls that I need to get the image that I want. Super dynamic range, or the ability to see like a cat, is less important. When I need those, I'll pull out my 45 MP camera.
Das ist wie mit guten Lautsprechern: Am Anfang empfindet man den Unterschied gar nicht so gross zu anderen Lautsprechern oder empfindet sie sogar nur als anders. Hat man sich nach einer gewissen Zeit daran gewöhnt, hört man plötzlich drastische Unterschiede wenn man wieder normale Lautsprecher hört. Bei Ausdrucken ist das nichts anderes: Man ist zufrieden mit dem was man sieht, kann sich nicht vorstellen wie es besser sein sollte, schlicht weil man es nicht anders kennt. Druckt man längere Zeit 100MP und geht dann wieder auf eine geringere Auflösung zurück, sieht man den Unterschied plötzlich sehr deutlich. Aber wie bei Lautsprechern: der eigene Anspruch ist entscheidend, manche hören auch Musik am Smartphone und sind mit dem Klang zufrieden. Ich wollte weder meine KEF noch meine GFX missen, weil ich die Qualität einfach liebe. Aber so wie die Lautsprecher nichts für schlechte Musik können, macht die Kamera alleine auch keine besseren Bilder.
Up scaling software is getting better and better. I have a tough time seeing a measurable difference between my good ole D700 upscaled 4X and my D850 at native file size. Impressive results with a nice sharp image, which is key.
@@Teluric2 Hi I use DXO PL 7 for the denoise and Topaz Photo AI for upscaling. I am very happy with the upscaling results; but Topaz acts more like a "finisher". I use a M43rds camera and it has a 20 megapixel sensor. So, if I go to, say, a car show the numbers on a car plate are not perfectly formed when I Zoom right in. If I upscale the image by 4x, the numbers are perfect; as are other details; eg in the engine bay. So, in this way, the upscaling just touched the clarity and sharpness of an image before I finalise it.
Go back several years and look at reviews for cameras that were coming out with 20MP. Photographers were over the moon. Now it’s like if you don’t have 45MP, you shouldn’t even bother leaving the house.
I do aircraft photography (mostly fighter jets) and recently changed from a 12 megapixel bridge to a 26.1 mirrorless interchangeable lens with a 100-400mm lense. Its made a massive difference. Mostly coming from the lens but the higher megapixel count allows me to crop in that bit more which is useful if they are on the far side of the air base
Just a little extra: more megapixels are really usefull nowadays because of AI noise reduction, when Sony A7iii and r3 were released the A7III was much better in low light, but now with the AI noise redutcion that basically any photo editor software has, the A7r3 is much much better because of the extra detail that alows the software to get a better result
I own both 45 and 24 megapixel cameras, but I frequently use the 24mp camera for casual photography. Since I don't print my photos and rarely crop them, the 24mp resolution suits my needs perfectly. The files are smaller, which saves space and makes editing smoother. Unless photography is your profession, the main reason to opt for a higher megapixel camera would be if you frequently crop your images. With 24mp, you can do some cropping without significant quality loss, especially if you're only sharing photos online.
Ditto. I use both Sony (A7r5) and Olympus (OM1 & OM5) and TBH I use the Olympus cameras more. It's not as simple as more MPs vs fewer, there are far more important factors affecting the choice. When it comes to print, books, social media, agency updates etc. the MPs don't matter onc iota. If you crop a lot - then more MPS are critical. There are other differences but most are very minor in actual use and shouldn't be a deciding factor for most people.
I think high resolution cameras (50 MP and up) are especially useful for guys who like to make huge fine art prints, like 1m x 1m or bigger. For most of us hobbyists, who rarely prints (let alone make prints that big), perhaps 24 or 36 MP is the sweet spot. Remember, bigger RAW files mean more computing power is needed for image processing and also bigger data storage as well.
The title is "MEGAPIXELS Don't Matter" but the content of the video says otherwise which means the title is misleading or a click bait. The facts are: - Higher resolution doesn't mean more noise in photos - High resolution is useful if you need to crop - High resolution increases rolling shutter when taking photos with electronic shutter or when recording video - High resolution camera needs more processing power for oversampling each frame when recording video which creates more heat and drains more battery. If there is not enough processing power, the camera would crop each frame or it would skip pixels (both will reduce increase noise levels) I personally think that high resolution cameras are useful in some genres (like wildlife) but for most people it's wiser to buy less expensive lower resolution camera and invest more money in lenses. For video makers, lower resolution cameras are better.
I believe point #1 is more nuanced. In my experience, it depends on how you process the image. Straight out of camera with no down sampling higher resolution does mean more noise at higher ISOs for cameras of similar generations.
Exactly... I have two older but very capable 12MP DSLRs, two 16MP ones, a 24MP mirrorless and one 48MP mirrorless. They are tools to help one create and each has its purpose. I love my 12MP FF sensor DSLRs, the huge photosites give a wonderful look, an almost slide quality to them plus the file sizes are reasonable. I wouldn't use them for product shots or cropped for birding etc.. We are so lucky in our choices of cameras available, some of the great old ones at very low prices too. But all of these tools are only as good as the lens on the front and the operator. That will make the biggest difference, especially for large prints.
As an astro photographer I use a 32.5MP Canon full spectrum camera. Being able to crop in significantly without loosing detail on my target is like having a bigger telescope. Bought that years ago and have thought of moving to an even higher resolution. Actual pixel size makes this more complicated though.
For me, the most important thing is the sensor size. In cameras, photographers usually pay attention to this, but in smartphones, which is what most people use, it is hidden information. MP was important when comparing 0.3MP with 1MP. A large 4k screen has 8MP, so with 12MP there is still room to crop the image and display it on a large screen, so more than that is unnecessary unless you want a huge digital zoom.
I have a canon R5 and a canon RP. The only way I can tell which pic was taken by which camera is if I do pixel peeping. A4 and A3 printing produces the same results.
i didn't even know they existed until now. so that looks like two orders of magnitude. the rp and then the r5. suddenly the eos things I've been using for years appear as mere toys.
Honestly, a good lens will take you a lot farther than a super high pixel count in most cases I'd rather shoot a 12 mp camera with a good lens than a 48mp one with a bad one.
@@bobdemuynck9904 Exactly... Unless you've got Leica money, any more than 24MP is wasted, as all you end up being able to see (when you zoom in on the image) is your shitty lenses poor autofocus.
@@bobdemuynck9904 I guess so. I guess I wasn't thinking about phones as I never use my phone camera for anything. I don't do video either so a lot of the newer mirrorless cameras don't interest me too much for that reason even though I'm sure they take great photos. My gear is not new but it is good gear and it suits what I do with it. I would love to try medium format though. And yes, I admit, I am a pixel peeper.
Funny you mentioned 12MP, my all time favorite DSLR is my old Nikon D300, 12MP apsc, and now I've been using AI Upscaling to see what I can get with these .jpgs and the results are astounding..
I have found that having an excess of pixels is useful in landscape photography when it is physically impossible to get close to an object which has complex detail. I use a Sony RX1R - II.
Thank you for an excellent presentation of this subject. I will be sending my students to view this video. The lab that the studio I work for uses makes smaller prints at about 240 dpi. Prints bigger than about 8x10 are printed at a lower resolution for exactly the reasons you said. The biggest digitally derived print I have ever sold to a non-commercial customer was a 30x40 inch print. It was shot with a Canon 40d, which is a whopping ten megapixel camera with an APS-C sensor. Since that print is a shorter aspect ratio than the sensor on my camera, it was cropped down to a bit over seven megapixels. It was so beautiful that we ordered another to display in the office. Another important factor is the amount of detail that is needed. The aforementioned big print was of a Mom, Dad, their three-year-old daughter, and their Labradoodle, on the beach. If that had been a group of thirty or so people, we would not have been able to make that giant print and still have it look tack sharp. Some of the things that we are called upon to do with distressing regularity is head-swaps, face-swaps, and eye-openings. When minute detail has to be manipulated, I want as many pixels as I can get my greedy little hands on, regardless of how it will be displayed. The images we post to Facebook or Instagram are usually just 900 pixels on the long side. The images on our portrait proofing web galleries are about five megapixels. You're exactly right, size matters, but that doesn't always mean it has to be a big size.
Depending on the photographer sometimes high megapixels are needed for the work they do. There is one wedding and portrait photographer that shoots Fuji Medium format 100 megapixels. He does landscape family portraits. For example he sells very large landscape prints and puts the family in a place in the image so when they walk up to the print they are then looking at a maybe 8x10, 11x14 or 16x20 print. So it becomes kind of two prints in one. I forgot his name but he's a photographer from Texas I think and he has used Olympus and Fuji crop and medium format. Not sure if he still does TH-cam?
For my practice, astrophotography, having a very large definition can be very important. Typically, on a lunar image, I use a 2500mm focal length telescope coupled to a camera with 2.9μm photosites. This camera may only be in 4k, but once I've taken lots of small areas and put all these tiles together, it gives me a 1m by 1m shot at 300dpi using the super resolution given by the stacking of multiple images whereas if I use my D850, which allows me to have the entire moon at once, I end up with "only" 200ppp for the same image size. The difference is visible because although my prints are large, they are still designed to be viewed or even scrutinized closely. So yes, if I had a 100Mp full frame camera, it would obviously make my work easier. Same in solar photography where in any case, I have to use the D850 to have the entire star in a short time (the surface of the sun is moving)
I have been into Photography since about 1965. I have seen so much change in time. I started shooting digital images years ago and started with the 1-megapixel Kodak digital camera. The point is, that in all of that time, NEVER, have I seen a clearer, nor better explanation of megapixel relativity. I have to say, that this a great video, that should be viewed by all photographers. Cheers! Ron
Maybe you should see more: there are contradicting points between beginning and end and there is a definite misunderstanding of the difference between DPI (printer resolution: 1440 or 2880 dpi) and PPI (file resolution: usually a minimum of 200 ppi, 300 ppi required by any professional printer or the press).
I've been taking some great photos with my 12.1 megapixel camera. In fact, I have several airshow photos that had to be cropped pretty significantly to get the right composition and I'd swear they where professional shots of the airshow. That said, I'll be upgrading the camera within a few days. The catalyst is mostly because the lens is not interchangeable. Getting a better sensor, a much better auto focus, and the ability to shoot raw are going to be really nice.
Megapixels matter when it comes to detail. The key is to find the sweet spot to megapixels count versus sensor size to get the cleanest possible image with the most available detail. I put my phone, from 12MP mode, into 50MP and then 200MP mode and the difference in detail is huge.
This is a ridiculous statement. Of COURSE they do if either you cannot get physically close enough to the subject or cannot afford hugely expensive long lenses. Cropping linear by half reduces the area by 3/4 ie leaving only 25% of the original
They don't matter if you know exactly what you're doing. But when you don't know, and you're later going to crop the final photo to the area you do need, that's when megapixels matter.
The megapixel range really depends on your use case scenario. I love the details from 100mp Hasselblad and it's hard to un-see this level of quality compared to a 12-megapixel camera. I would say 50 megapixels and up means a more specific focus on your target-shooting needs and any less than 50 mp is for general shooting and using specific lenses for more fine-tuned photo capture
When I got my first SLR, which had a whopping 6MP, I got a professional A3 print. I had to downsize the image. It was crisp and clear. From that point onward, I haven't been bothered too much by MP counts. My current camera is a Pentax KS2 with 20MP. I haven't upgraded it because between the sharpness of images, the image stabilisation and the ISO (52.000) it continues to meet my needs.
This was some great info. So question to you is: I have a z6iii but really considering to go back to my OM-1 for the inbody stacking and live composition. If I do this, will see any image quality differences? I do landscape with some macro and wildlife and street. I don’t do video. Or just keep my new system and discover its possibilities. (Looking for your opinion) I occasionally print up to 2x24’s. But that’s about it. I’m not selling any photos, but maybe one day. Looking at all the videos out there my brain is overwhelmed.
@@richardfink7666 Well, I guess it’s the live ND filters, the inbody stacking, and live composite. But I really never did use them a lot. I have the z6iii, and the ergo is much better and the colors of the Nikon look much better and the DR is better. If I leave focus brokering and how to stack photos, I suppose I might miss the OM system a lot less.
Thanks for shedding some light on the topic. Knowing what you do and what you need it for, determines the megapixels. For my portrait work, in terms of output, mostly there is no need to have more than 20MP. However - for retouching more pixels a more than just nice to have. You get better, cleaner results quicker, as with low res files. And you get the ability to crop in, but also gain some flexibility when your client decides to go for a different crop. You take a wider shot and crop in to what is finally needed. On the other hand, for some landscape panoramic work - I use a 16MP camera, the files will end up easily 100MP+, enough for most serious work. So, it depends ;)
Manufacturers have invented the "pixel binning" method to combine neighbouring pixels and the result is a moving average for the brightness of the pixel - it is broken up depending on his neighbours. (They did it already for many years to decide the color of a pixel and applied the technique in the "Bayer sensor"). But if you want a today's smartphone, for example, to produce a 12 Megapixel phone camera you need a 48 Megapixel sensor even if you combine only four pixels. (Neither you nor any technical writer in the world ever mentions that the quality of the lens is more important than the sensor, however ... or stating that the ideas, the eyes of the photographer, his perception of light, colors, graphic patterns and perspective, is more important than the quality of the lens ...).
Damn, I came here thinking I can't wait to comment and prove this guy wrong when in reality he nailed it. Only thing I'd add is the experiment a guy did where he compared the low light performance of the a73 and the a7r4. The A7R4 did considerably better when taking the 61mp image and reducing it down to the same size as the a73 image. The 61mp just has so much more headroom for noise reduction and detail.
Unfair comparison: The 61 mp image was processed and then compared to the 12mp unprocessed image. It would then be fair to compare against a processed (with for example, Gigapixel program) 12mp image. In addition, downscaling is time consuming.
Quick question: If I use a 24 MP camera and when I shoot @12MP from the same camera. Is it going to impact the low light performance? I noticed 12 MP looks better in low light. Is it because the pixel size on sensor goes bigger @ 12MP or its just seems to be doing better as its less zoomed at 100% crop???
A lot is said in the comments about the need for high megapixels on larger sensors when cropping wildlife shots, this gives the same results as a 24mp M4/3 sensor as the pixel density will be similar. The only advantage then of the larger sensor is the shallower depth of field.
I am a fan of the 24 mega pixel cameras I have. I print 11x17 and 13x19 on a regular basis. A little crop, if needed and I get great results. Shooting RAW is more important, in my opinion, and the file size does come into play. I do have several prints taken with a 10mp camera hanging in my house. They are 20x30 inches. They are also hanging high in my staircase and you can’t be closer than 10 feet from them. They look great.
Yes, cropping is a good reason. And in the same thought, if you have, for example, several E mount APS-C lenses and you use them on your full frame Sony E camera, you can still use those lenses on the camera setting it in APS-C mode. So keeping all your lenses useful is a good reason for higher megapixel sensors.
I totally agree with that light is always a problem who doesn’t shoot in studio environments. For me low light performance is the key deciding factor, that’s why I switched from Nikon to Sony. Dynamic range is really high for Sony systems in most of the high iso scenes.
More megapixels really only make a difference if you are making large prints or zooming in to the image to a great extent. If you can afford the megapixels and you think you might make large prints or crop in a whole bunch then go for it, but most people don't really need it.
Because there is noise in light, similar to audible noise in nature or a city. There are photons bouncing around randomly everywhere. If you take a picture of something brightly lit the photons coming from the very thing you want to photograph through your lens are just so many more than the random photons that those random photons don't make a noticeable difference in the picture. But if your picture is taken in bad lighting conditions those random photons are getting bigger in ratio compared to the photons you really want to capture so you start noticing their impact.
@LeonidAndronov as long as there is any source of light there are photons ... even if it's just the display or indicator lights on your camera. And i guess you won't be taking photos of a black void but rather a dark scenery, so as long as there is anything to be seen or photographed there have to be photons around because that's how human vision and photography works ...
@@cycl0n362 This kind of noise (shot noise) does not need background, it originates from the signal itself. Because the photons are discrete and arrive at random moments, when there are few of them, the signal starts looking discontinuous (noisy).
MPs matter when you want to pull details from farther away. Case in point... Canon's t6i resolves more detail at 24MP than Canon's 7DMKII at 20MP even with the 7D's larger sensor. MPs matter with landscape and wildlife photography hands down.
The error in thinking is that the megapixels are completely irrelevant for the output medium. It is completely wrong to think that I need fewer megapixels just because the output medium requires fewer pixels. Of course, the maximum number of negapixels is always correct, because this is where you have stored the most information. Scaling down from 100MP to 24MP produces a higher image quality than shooting in 24MP. The images are sharper and do not need to be sharpened at all or only to a lesser extent. I have been doing this practically every day for years and know the advantages of the highest resolution when shooting. There's nothing to argue about, it's clearly better. I use the upscaler from Topas and when I have low resolution photos, I always use the maximum of 6x magnification and then scale to the smaller format. The best way to get the best picture quality. The same principle also applies to video. The more MP in the recording, the better the image quality when scaled down compared to the same resolution recorded natively. The maximum resolution is always better. Period.
When comparing the 24MP Canon R3 with the 45MP Canon R5ii, the latter's significant advantage lies in cropping capabilities. The R5ii's 45MP sensor offers enhanced noise reduction for RAW or CRAW images. Pairing the R5ii with a 400mm f/2.8 lens, for instance, allows for a 50% crop while still achieving a higher resolution than one would with the Canon R3 or R6ii using the same lens. My 45MP cameras at f/2.8 steers me clear of the 1.4x teleconverter to prevent losing a stop of light at f/4, which would necessitate increasing the ISO by one stop or decreasing the shutter speed to preserve the original ISO.
As a fun megapixel trivia point, doubling the number of megapixels only increases resolution by about 12.5% which is hardly noticeable. I find the sweet spot for full frame sensors, or even APS-c sensors is about 18 to 30 mp. I've seen 10 mp images blown up to five feet diagonally that look as good as 30, 40 or even 50 megapixels. If I have a need for 100 mp or better for a commercial shoot (which isn't really needed unless it makes a customer happy), I'll rent a Phase One for a few days. From the view of a professional photographer, I find that 18 mp is way more than sufficient for my purposes. I normally shoot with a Canon 5D MK III or MK IV. It's way more resolution than I actually need for even the largest prints.
Finally someone explain something that takes into account everything that affects the quality of a photo instead of just sticking to large sensor and lower megapixels is better 😁😁
Well the reality is that large sensor and lower resolution (and not "lower megapixels") do improve image quality (higher ISO capacity, larger dynamic range).
High resolution is important in different types of photography.. For example on Macro Photography resolution gives you the possibility to shot 8K macros or crop on high NA objectives, resolving power on Macro photography depends on the numerical aperture of the lens and the sensor resolution of the camera.. So the resolution matters a lot. Real 24mpx is the perfect balance and real 45mpx to 65mpx is the max you need.
Freget megapixels that's pretty low res, I use GIGAPIXEL IMAGES, compression ruins the images and I love being able to zoom into a specific part of the image and still screenshot a full 4K PNG to set as my wallpaper. It's like downloading 100 images in one
In the "good old 😊 I used a 6 MP Nikon D70, and I was able to have a3 paper prints. Of course, with my now 24 MP Nikon D5300 and D780 the prints will be better, still, cropping is still possible while I can still have a large enough print, even when this means a print of 250dpi and not 300dpi. The main disadvantage of large size pictures is that the computer is quickly full, and thus, 24 MP is fine for me.
One misnomer is what is a pixel on a display. A single pixel is made up of 1 red, 1 blue and 1 green led. On a camera sensor we refer to each individual red, green or blue sensor site as a pixel. So in fact a display with 1000 pixels actually has 1000 of each of the red, green and blue pixels so going by the way we do the calculation for a Bayer sensor the display would be 3000 pixels wide. This always trips up the basic comparison of setting a Bayer pixel resolution directly to a display resolution.
I come from the photographic film world where maximum detail and minimum grain or sensor noise is valued. As a result, I shoot all of my photos at maximum photo size and maximum color density, so that in the future, the photo can easily cropped and manipulated.
I'm left wondering if the biggest difference in image cropping performance between your original Panasonic camera and the Sony you replaced it with was as much to do with the IBIS in the Sony as anything else.
Pixel size also matters. The smaller the pixels the more of them u can put inside a D x D size area. More pixels means more electric noise but larger pixels will look less 'noisy" than smaller pixels.
I have a question. I am trying to decide between an Iphone 16 Pro (48MP) and a Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra (200MP) for take pictures for social media when I cannot have my camera with me. I don´t post pics without editing before in Lightroom and Photoshop, so, in that case, is it a Samsung better for me than an Iphone?
One thing that you neglected to mention is that another downside of high megapixel cameras is: more megapixels = longer processing time, both in and out of camera. In camera, that might mean that a reduction in frame rate of videos or burst photography is necessary for the camera. Or at least a lower amount of burst shots being able to be taken before the camera stops it to buffer the data. Out of camera, that might mean you may have to take longer in editing as changes load, or a more powerful computer. In this instance, Lower megapixel cameras therefore might be better in sports photography or other situations in which things can change in the blink of an eye, while high-resolution cameras are generally better suited for studio photography in which things don't move very much.
Good glass matters. MPs do matter depending on what you're doing. If you want to crop something, print something and make it larger than the original image, they count. I find a sweet spot at 24MP. I do have a Z6, a Z7. The former, the Z6, because of the noise at higher ISOs on the Z7, I use for night time, astro photography. I also use it for landscapes. I did have a D5, that was a fantastic bit of kit. But when cropping in, even at 600mm, the pixelisation became too much. Whereas on the Z7, it's not the same issue. But if all of these cameras mentioned had rubbish glass affixed, then the MPs wouldn't matter.
Megapixel numbers are one thing -- that anyone can understand. But not all sensors are equally constructed and probably the most important thing in your camera is the processor that generates the "raw" (in fact highly processed) image data. Now camera manfacturers will tell your roughly what kind of sensor they use and that their new processor is better than the old one, but everything else is kept a secret -- and most people wouldn't even understand it, if they were given all the technical specifications. Hence they just talk about sensor sizes and pixel counts...
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I use my 20 megapixel OM-1 MK II the most, but I do also have a Sony 43 megapixel FF camera with many fast lenses. But I mostly use the images on Instagram, so there are never videos at anything more than 4k at max, that is 8 megapixels. So, do I need to upgrade to the newer 61 megapixel FF? No, not at all.
Megapixels help ezoom
Megapixels don't matter... until they matter...
The title is unbelievably bogus. If you shoot wildlife, megapixels matter more than anything except autofocus.
@@idahofallsmagazine3691 the only reason megapixels matter is because most people shoot wildlife casually and spend little time trying to get closer to the subject. Many pros still use 24MP cameras. Because getting closer and filling the frame gives better images. Cropping does not, 1000MP or not.
I love it!!!!!
@@idahofallsmagazine3691 Depending on your wildlife ;) birds yes. Underwater BIG NOPE!
Point of the video is how much they matter duhh
Lens quality matters more than anything. 24MP is the sweet spot for most people, case in point Sony's flagship low light monster is 12MP and their pro level A9iii is 24MP. If you need more then you're likely printing huge and most people rarely print anything at all.
Agreed. This is one of the reasons why m43 has become more important to me over the years. I get 25MP, and if I really wanted to, I could shoot at 50MP or 100MP using my camera's pixel shift function. I have used it, of course, but did not perceive any benefit in my case. Things would be different for a very large print. If today's sensors deliver 99% of what we expect (high read-out speed is important), then we should probably focus on high-quality glass. It's readily available for most systems (I find the selection for APS-C appalling in the case of Sony and Canon).
Sony Alpha 1 is the flagship dude, are you high.
@@illicit008 Sony's flagship "LOW LIGHT" camera is 12 MP referring to the A7s models. I never once said the A9 was their flagship, I called it their pro level camera. Are YOU high or you just can't read?
You don't need more, even if you're printing larger sizes, because the larger the print the farther away people will be to look at it. Look at the billboards. They can be made from 24MP photos and they will look great, because you're not looking at them up close.
@@mcaetano2000totally agree
Back in 2004 I took a photo of my sons with a Canon Powershot S5 which is 5mp and at work we had a colour plotter (used for plotting drawings), so I thought I plot one of his outdoor portrait on A0 normal plan paper and to my surprise it was fantastic. Even today I look at the plot and I am amazed that it was done by a 5mp camera. So, to this day, I am still using my Nikon D700 and happily print 8x12 and 16x12 prints. I have no plans in spending thousands on new cameras unless my D700 packs it in.
I still have the camera my dad used to take pictures of my childhood from 2007 as well although it was 8 MP. I've tested it out and it still looks great!
D700 is the best there ever was.. Nothing else comes even close to the sharp and crisp images it produces ❤
@@annadapriyadarshinee125ehhh really??
Is the camera good fir taking wide landscape images?...and portraits with blur too?
@@motionoftheocean7524 It is not the camera that will take what you want - got the drift?
I'm always 50/50 when it comes to the topic of 'do megapixels matter'. On 1 hand the fundamentals of photography are the most important, having a good composition, good lighting and creativity. On the otherhand, what makes photos special to me is that fact it can be higher quality than video, giving you the ability to zoom in and inspect the moment in time.
This exactly would not replace any Hasselblad / Phase One / Fuji GFX
@@ichigokotetsu9540 True, but MF is also about superior tonality and highlight roll-off due to the larger sensor.
there is still no replacement for a high megapixel (20+) fast focusing, fast shooting, agile full frame camera in the medium format realm. FF quality has gotten closer to medium format (it will never reach it, since digital medium format also gets better and there is physics involved with sensor size). However medium format cameras are still really slow beasts with really large lenses (if going for high speed especially). FF is my sweet spot but I always envy the image quality when I browse some samples and if your workflow allows for a slower process and you have the disposable income (or you are making $$$$ using it) then medium format is sweet.
@@nat-lj8kt full frame is like a Ferrari. Medium format is like a Rolls Royce.
If you walk up close to a billboard, you'll quickly see why megapixels alone don't matter, it’s all about perspective! When it comes to high-resolution sensors, the quality of the image starts and ends with the lens. No matter how many megapixels a camera has, there’s a limit to what the glass can resolve. Once that limit is reached, adding more megapixels just results in a blurry mass of extra data, rather than capturing any new detail. Like trying to see more detail through a frosted glass.
Exactly.👍
Yes sir! I have discovered that HQ glass is the defining factor in an amazing photo. I shoot on a M4/3 sensor and when I shot my first Leica 'projector lens', I promptly sold around 80% of my VGC 60's-70's Japanese lenses that didn't make the cut. Now I chase great glass and could care less about the sensor till it breaks.
I'd agree with you more if you said, "If you walk up close to a billboard, you'll quickly see why megapixels alone don't matter ... but only when you walk up close to a billboard." (Also ironic because you can't walk up close to a billboard in the first place.)
I was about to make that point about billboards. As a kid I was building a tree house from bits of a disused billboard and saw the dots that made up the image almost comically big. Learned about halftone long before I knew what it was called...
@@zhuanjifarms5050 what are VGC lenses ?
If you're looking at images on your phone screen, pixel resolution don't matter. But if you're a photographer, work in the printing industry, or own a printing business, they DO matter. It's better to go from big to small and not the other way around, even with AI, the quality doesn't match the original pixel resolution of an image.
Even on a cell-phone pixel resolution matters, imagine having images that show at 40 pixels per inch on your screen.
Cropping matters, that's why megapixels matter.
If You crop. I do not crop.
I agree. Cropping does matter. Not all the time but when it does matter, megapixels often matter too.
When composition right, kick out cropping 😅
@@Channel-xx8qt Sometimes we don't have time to compose. We take what we can get or risk missing a shot all together.
Or not. One can live and photograph without cropping. But you are right size does.matter, proof, comparing two 24 Mp sensors, the one with the larger area (and larger photosites) will behave better in low light, and have a greater dynamic range, require less amplification (more chances of accurate colours).
You can't get enough megapixels when you're photographing wildlife, because you'll need to crop in 2 to 6 times (or have you ever been closer than 30 meters to a stork ?)
Vielleicht sollten Sie mal ihre Arbeitsweise überdenken. Mit einigen artbezogenen Kenntnissen und ein bisschen Erfahrung fotografieren Sie Störche, Milane, Silberreiher usw. auf 10 - 15 m. Ja und gelegentlich reicht die Naheinstellgrenze nicht für den Eisvogel.
The ability to crop is certainly a boon to bird photographers, but it's not like no one ever got a picture of a stork, or kingfisher or hummingbird before we had 45 or 61 megapixel cameras! Photographers used blinds, long lenses and knowledge about the subject. In fact, they would often spend far more time studying subjects than photographing them. Nothing wrong with finding an easier way, but to imply that it's impossible to photograph small birds and wildlife without high megapixel cameras flies in the face of reality.
@@EgoundderRest I shoot wildlife of years and megapixels are crucial. it's not about rethinking and even not about coping. It's about the details. For portraits I use medium format and the difference if dramatic.
@@alansach8437 Well, I didn't say (or imply) that it were impossible …
@@helloianzakharov Sicher ist der eine oder andere Megapixel mehr nicht schlecht - und besagt doch nicht alles.
Ich habe auch aus Aufnahmen mit der Nikon D500 noch Ausschnitte mit ca. 10 Mpix gezogen, scharf und detailliert.
Für hochwertige Drucke in einigen Journalen und Büchern reichte die Qualität jedenfalls aus.
Auch in sehr großer Projektion ist die Qualität noch bemerkenswert.
"Megapixels Don't Matter"
You know we're getting a phone camera guy perspective.
I am a hobbyist, I bought an A7RV about 3weeks ago from an A7III - I noticed my shots looked better AND worse going up from the 20mp A7II sensor to 61mp sensor - I became so much more privy to image sharpness, and the lacking detail of my lenses, I noticed low iso artifacts more easily and tbh it just made casual photography a lot harder.
It's easy to fall into the "Pixel-peeping" trap, when you can zoom way in on a large screen computer monitor. Yes, you are seeing differences--in that environment. But what will viewers see when they look at the same picture printed and hanging on a wall, or when it's filling up 1/2 of their laptop screens, let alone what it looks like on their smartphones? Though, if you think about your photography as a communicative act, resolution issues change dramatically. When that becomes your perspective, all that matters is what will my viewers "see." If a resolution difference won't be noticed, nor have any effect, by your viewer, then, essentially, it ceases to exist, communicatively. This way of thinking can renew the joy, once again, of your casual photography--as it should be.
Simply downsample all you photos to 30-ish Mpix and all your worries will be gone. And you will be amazed how much sharpness and details you gain over your former 20Mpix camera.
When i upgraded to an 8k display, i had a big problem finding crisp wallpapers at that resolution. 8k it's about 30 megapixels, so a photographer needs slightly more than 30 to shot pic good enough for me
Don't forget a lens' resolving ability. For my 45-megapixel full-frame camera, I need a good lens to actually resolve that resolution. Furthermore, at an aperture smaller than about f7, I lose effective resolution due to refraction (on a 45-megapixel sensor)-no matter how high-end the lens. There's no point in having a high-megapixel camera if you don't have the glass to go with it, or if you're taking pictures at smaller apertures. At lease that's my understanding of it.
You need good glass regardless
But having more won't hurt.
Poor glass is poor glass.
The main reason I like high mp is just for cropping wildlife photos tbh.
you will lose theoretical sharpness and be diffraction limited long before F7. In practice, 5.6 is a good spot. If lens is very good and depth allows, F4 is even better. If lens has optical aberrations or you need depth of field, it's always better to be slightly diffractiono limited though.
@@chrisalger5589 spot on.
@@letni9506 agree. Having more won't hurt, except to say, all things equal, more sometimes leads to inferior ISO performance on a given-sized sensor. Personally, I do like more to a point. Hence, my 32MP APS C and my 45MP full frame.
I use a 24MP Nikon D750. I am not a landscape artist, but the camera sensor is perfect for my needs. A3+ prints are beautiful no matter how close you get. It's just horses for courses. As always a really interesting vlog.
I'll take my Sony 61MP over my Z6 any day. Depends what you're looking for. DX Crop the Z6 and you're back to the D70. DX Crop the Sony and you have a Z6.
@@unclefart5527 A DX crop is exactly what it implies, so with the Sony you would actually have a D3500 rather than a Z6. To be more precise you would actually have a Fuji XT4. The A7r4, XT4 and GFX 100 all have the same pixel density, probably using the same wafer cut into different sizes.
There's something you left out when discussing pixel size and low light performance: Bayer arrays. When pixels get really small, you begin to get significant differences in the photons hitting each sensor element. It might sound crazy, because photons are so incredibly small and there are so many of them, that any pixel to pixel deviation would be insignificant--but it is, in some circumstances. When you have a relatively small sensor size, like on a m43 camera, coupled with a large number of pixels, say 25 megapixels, you wind up with imaging sensor elements less than 100,000th of a square millimeter. At that scale, in low light situations, you begin to get some pixels which receive stimulation from a photon, triggering an electric discharge during the exposure period, whereas neighboring pixels don't. And as each sensor element is filtered (through what is called a Bayer array) to allow either red, blue, or green wavelengths of light through (which, composited, generates color from an otherwise B&W source), those pixel-to-pixel discrepancies wind up creating stray blue, red, and green, dots in the photographic image. I think we've all seen them. No amount of amplification cleanness will take away that initially generated red, blue, or green signal. Yes, noise-correction software can detect these variations and replace those red, blue, or green dots with a color and luminance value derived from adjacent pixels, but then you're relying on that software to get it right. With larger sensors, this becomes less of an issue, as each sensor element becomes larger, mitigating the issues of pixel-to-pixel deviations (a 50 MP full-frame pixel is still covers twice the area that a 25 MP m43 pixel will). But when we start cramming 40-50 MP on a sensor which is a mere fraction of the size of an m43 camera's, then this can become a serious issue, requiring a lot of image processing to fix. So, sensor pixel density can have an effect on low-light image noise, even with the cleanest of signal amplification systems.
Very interesting! Thank you for taking the time to share this information!
True, this is why Sony a7s iii has best low light performance while operating only 12 megapixels full frame sensor
@@WindNiksha ...nah!
Perfectly said!
@@YgorCortes Thanks. I once taught graduate courses in technical and scientific photography.
I use a Sony a7RIV and while I mostly share photos online I find the high resolution very beneficial exactly because I have gotten much more comfortable with cropping in post. It helps me with telephoto lens fomo in that I focus more on bringing wide lenses and if I did not have the space to carry a 70-200, I might crop from 70 or 85 all the way up to 200 and everything still looks crisp and nice.
In the beginning I was second-guessing my choice of the R model due to noise performance. The grain is significantly more noticeable compared to other Sony bodies from same generation. But since the resolution is so high, the noise is also much finer, so if you are not both cropping 300% in post and shooting crazy high iso, chances are nobody will notice the noise at a normal zoom level. Further, I find that the finer grained noise lends itself better to AI denoising.
The main drawback is the size of the files and the fact that I regularly have slowdowns in Lightroom because my 32GB of RAM is getting maxed out. But overall for me it has been worth it.
Very well explained.
I printed yesterday some of my pictures for an exhibition. Their format is 40cm x 50cm. One picture was from an old Nikon D3 (12,87 megapixels).
The only "issue" with the raw file was a bit grain (could be removed in Lightroom), but megapixels were not an issue.
I work on industrial printers for a living and have had the practical application discussion about DPI both at work and in photography forums! I use 16 and 20 Mp micro 4/3 cameras.
Another aspect that needs to be added to the discussion is post processing software such as Topaz Gigapixel the can be a very useful tool when cropping images from cameras with lower megapixel counts. As I shoot with micro 4/3 gear and my M1 Mark II has a 20 megapixel sensor, Topaz Gigapixel helps a lot when I need to make a significant crop. Since my prints are never larger than 13" X 19" , I haven't had any problems printing very good images. As I'm getting up there in age, photography is much more enjoyable when I can keep the amount of weight I'm carrying on the lower side while still having the ability to carry a few lenses and two camera bodies, so the micro 4/3 system works for me.
Exactly, thank you 🙏 This is what I've been preaching for a couple of years, Topax Gigapixel is incredible, I also use the free Upscayl tool, results and insanely great... no need for some 36, 48... 100mp sensore for most situations, you can upscale now with M43 and APSC and results virtually indistinguishable (as far as rez. and detail) from larger formats/pixel counts. Cheating? I dunno. And AI seems to be 'filling in' detail that might not actually exist but it looks incredible, my M43 looks like they were shot with FF.
Very well explained! I got quite a bit out of it, except I didn't think the title fits well. I do a lot of landscape and wildlife photography and find myself cropping photos alot! So you kind of confirmed that megapixels matter when significantly cropping photos. Regardless, well explained. :)
In a nutshell, it's a clickbait title. I've selected "do not recommend channel" as a result of this.
Still using my full frame Canon 5D mk1 from 2005. it's had a good life.
People raved over it at the time. A fantastic print from then is still a fantastic print.
The popularity of higher megapixel cameras is largely because more pixels are easier to deliver, technologically speaking, than things like more dynamic range, especially in highlights. They also reflect the popularity of wildlife and landscape photography, which increasingly resembles data trawling, rather like shooting video to select an interesting still photograph from a file. Printing demonstrates what we really need for our creative purposes, but that's less popular than enlarging 200%, heading to the corners, and declaring the photograph deficient.
"data trawling," that's tight. I'm going to steal that phrase.
I used to thinking that megapixels do not matter. In fact, they do. Now I am using Fuji GFX system. Imagine the possibility of cropping. It is insane. It's virtually 4 APS-C sensors stiched together.
Great choice , i think these guys like hearing their own voices , like high iso's are best , untill you try regaining contrast and natural colours ,
I’ve enjoyed travel photography for a lifetime and the way I see it is that if you earn your income from photography, you probably know a lot about what your equipment can do for you in each situation you are facing and choose accordingly. When you just shoot for yourself and perhaps family and friends, you likely can get the results you want from a decent point and shoot. I have a 24mp full frame Sony and a good 24-135 G lens but much prefer the portability and results from my point and shoot 20.1mp RX100 v and vii.
People move back to look at larger prints but they also move in to examine the detail. There's nothing like getting up close to an Ansel Adams print.
Have you tried that with the Mona Lisa? Or an Andy Warhol? Or Picasso? Just because some people do it doesn't mean it's a valid observation because it's not its an irrelevance. There is a perfect viewing distance for every size piece, catering to everyone is an impossibility.
First, this video is spot-on. To your post, most of Ansel Adams prints are 16x20 or smaller. Larger sizes were the exception. Yes, I have been up close to actual Ansel Adams prints. Some of them have blocked up blacks that I doubt were intentional. I own a couple Westons. I have a Masters degree in art specializing in photography and am also a Master Optician. In my earlier film days I shot a variety of formats, including 4x5, mostly manual with tripods and exposure meters. I was a master printer and used the zone system. Made my own chemicals, had my own darkroom, even dabbled with alternative and old processes and made my own paper. I especially loved the print quality I could achieve with my 6x7 camera. Since 2012 I have been shooting exclusively with M43 cameras with 16MP sensors and lenses with excellent optics. I shoot RAW and use DXO Photolab. Print with an Epson SC-P900. Not being a snob here, really. Fact is the prints I produce are much better than anything I ever made with film in any format. Sharper with better representation. Perfect shadows and highlights. And I have so much more control over the process to bring out the best in my images. Nuff said.
You are exactly right. I actually saw a few Ansel Adams prints at the gallery when visiting Yosemite NP, CA. Very impressive indeed.
@@Grfx88having done colour/b&w film printing and digital image printing, I can wholly agree with what you said.
The other aspect of this is that in real life, when we move closer to something we see more and more detail. I've seen a few quite large, very high resolution prints, that I could stand close to and see the fine details and it was awesome. I hope to have some of my own printed like that at some point and display them in my home.
The analogies in this one were great! Helped someone that knows nothing understand what you were on about
Cheers dude!
My feeling is that pros can get away easier with lower pixel cameras, whereas amateurs can make use of higher pixel cameras. Pros are more likely to frame the shot they want, amateurs are more likely to need to crop.
This is absolutely true. When 4k TVs came out, I was working at an appliance store. I took home the USB drive used to display 4K content on our flagship 4K TV and played it on our regular HD TV. Honestly, that 4K video content made our HD TV look like it was 4K.
Local contrast makes the image look more real . You will see the difference in print . Resolution is key for that to happen .
We do like to stand closer to see detail . Bill boards are not to good looking .
I've had 8MP images printed on billboards (and side of buses) and they looked amazing. I've also printed 10MP images on posters that look equally amazing. I've also compared 24MP R6 II files to 45MP R5 files printed on huge poster prints and couldn't see any difference. MP are mostly marketing at this point to drive FOMO. I think Chris Hau made a video where he had photographers try to pick between images from a 12MP A7SIII and a 100MP Medium Format camera. They looked at images on a tablet, also images on social media, then they looked at a medium print, then they looked at MASSIVE poster size prints. They thought the 12MP was the 100MP most of the time... they were wrong 90% of the time. IE. They could not tell the difference between 12 and 100 MP files in any real world situation.
They would if you took a photo of a bird and cropped in on it though.
I figured cause cameras were less than 1mp at one point and they were printed on billboards and etc.
@@Warrior_Resisting_ColonialismBut the point is MOST photographers aren't doing that. If you are, maybe you need the extra megapixels.
Kann überhaupt nicht zustimmen.
Das ist wie mit guten Lautsprechern: Am Anfang empfindet man den Unterschied gar nicht so gross zu anderen Lautsprechern oder empfindet sie sogar nur als anders.
Hat man sich nach einer gewissen Zeit daran gewöhnt, hört man plötzlich drastische Unterschiede wenn man wieder normale Lautsprecher hört.
Bei Ausdrucken ist das nichts anderes: Man ist zufrieden mit dem was man sieht, kann sich nicht vorstellen wie es besser sein sollte, schlicht weil man es nicht anders kennt.
Druckt man längere Zeit 100MP und geht dann wieder auf eine geringere Auflösung zurück, sieht man den Unterschied plötzlich sehr deutlich.
Das heißt: mach diesen Vergleichstest mit Fotografen die schon längere Zeit mit hohen Auflösungen arbeiten und ich bin überzeugt davon, dass das Ergebnis anders ausfällt.
Im übrigen hab ich das auch für mich selber schon gemacht, mit Freunden, die mich fragten woran ich das denn immer erkenne.
Aber wie bei Lautsprechern: der eigene Anspruch ist entscheidend, manche hören auch Musik am Smartphone und sind mit dem Klang zufrieden. Ich wollte weder meine KEF noch meine GFX missen, weil ich die Qualität einfach liebe. Aber so wie die Lautsprecher nichts für schlechte Musik können, macht die Kamera alleine auch keine besseren Bilder.
well it sounds like they could tell the difference, in the main, 90% of the time. But the fewer pixels looked better to them. That's very interesting.
I worked at a photo primting company and people always wanted their pictures cropped and later asked why the prints were blurry. Well, you lost pixals! Duh!
m43 user here - I crop a lot, but I do it optically. I just turn the zoom ring on my 12-100 lens :D
I admit that I have spent too much money over the years on the latest and greatest, hoping they would improve my photos. I have a camera in the 45 MP range that I rarely use, but I gravitate back to my Canon 5D IV and III over and over for professional work. They take beautiful photos, are super reliable, and I'm extremely comfortable using them (main reason).
Over the last few years, I have had a shift in my hobby camera use. I found that I was using my phone increasingly and realized it was because it was so convenient. Additionally, it is a real hassle to lug a huge camera system when hiking (something that I like to do). Now, I find that I use a smaller APS-C camera on hobby shoots, and for the first time, I will take a 1" sensor camera (RX100) on an upcoming camping/hiking trip out west. As my photography skills have improved over the years and my photos look better, I'm simply less impressed with specs on paper and more interested in real-world convenience. My smaller cameras have the controls that I need to get the image that I want. Super dynamic range, or the ability to see like a cat, is less important. When I need those, I'll pull out my 45 MP camera.
Das ist wie mit guten Lautsprechern: Am Anfang empfindet man den Unterschied gar nicht so gross zu anderen Lautsprechern oder empfindet sie sogar nur als anders.
Hat man sich nach einer gewissen Zeit daran gewöhnt, hört man plötzlich drastische Unterschiede wenn man wieder normale Lautsprecher hört.
Bei Ausdrucken ist das nichts anderes: Man ist zufrieden mit dem was man sieht, kann sich nicht vorstellen wie es besser sein sollte, schlicht weil man es nicht anders kennt.
Druckt man längere Zeit 100MP und geht dann wieder auf eine geringere Auflösung zurück, sieht man den Unterschied plötzlich sehr deutlich.
Aber wie bei Lautsprechern: der eigene Anspruch ist entscheidend, manche hören auch Musik am Smartphone und sind mit dem Klang zufrieden. Ich wollte weder meine KEF noch meine GFX missen, weil ich die Qualität einfach liebe. Aber so wie die Lautsprecher nichts für schlechte Musik können, macht die Kamera alleine auch keine besseren Bilder.
Up scaling software is getting better and better. I have a tough time seeing a measurable difference between my good ole D700 upscaled 4X and my D850 at native file size. Impressive results with a nice sharp image, which is key.
100% agree and modern denoising software is also unbelievable.
What software is better for upscale?
@@Teluric2 Hi I use DXO PL 7 for the denoise and Topaz Photo AI for upscaling. I am very happy with the upscaling results; but Topaz acts more like a "finisher".
I use a M43rds camera and it has a 20 megapixel sensor. So, if I go to, say, a car show the numbers on a car plate are not perfectly formed when I Zoom right in. If I upscale the image by 4x, the numbers are perfect; as are other details; eg in the engine bay.
So, in this way, the upscaling just touched the clarity and sharpness of an image before I finalise it.
Go back several years and look at reviews for cameras that were coming out with 20MP. Photographers were over the moon. Now it’s like if you don’t have 45MP, you shouldn’t even bother leaving the house.
I do aircraft photography (mostly fighter jets) and recently changed from a 12 megapixel bridge to a 26.1 mirrorless interchangeable lens with a 100-400mm lense. Its made a massive difference. Mostly coming from the lens but the higher megapixel count allows me to crop in that bit more which is useful if they are on the far side of the air base
Just a little extra: more megapixels are really usefull nowadays because of AI noise reduction, when Sony A7iii and r3 were released the A7III was much better in low light, but now with the AI noise redutcion that basically any photo editor software has, the A7r3 is much much better because of the extra detail that alows the software to get a better result
I own both 45 and 24 megapixel cameras, but I frequently use the 24mp camera for casual photography. Since I don't print my photos and rarely crop them, the 24mp resolution suits my needs perfectly. The files are smaller, which saves space and makes editing smoother. Unless photography is your profession, the main reason to opt for a higher megapixel camera would be if you frequently crop your images. With 24mp, you can do some cropping without significant quality loss, especially if you're only sharing photos online.
Ditto. I use both Sony (A7r5) and Olympus (OM1 & OM5) and TBH I use the Olympus cameras more. It's not as simple as more MPs vs fewer, there are far more important factors affecting the choice.
When it comes to print, books, social media, agency updates etc. the MPs don't matter onc iota.
If you crop a lot - then more MPS are critical. There are other differences but most are very minor in actual use and shouldn't be a deciding factor for most people.
Buys an expensive high megapixel camera. Uploads the images, then social media platforms lower its quality. Best buy of the century
I think high resolution cameras (50 MP and up) are especially useful for guys who like to make huge fine art prints, like 1m x 1m or bigger. For most of us hobbyists, who rarely prints (let alone make prints that big), perhaps 24 or 36 MP is the sweet spot. Remember, bigger RAW files mean more computing power is needed for image processing and also bigger data storage as well.
The title is "MEGAPIXELS Don't Matter" but the content of the video says otherwise which means the title is misleading or a click bait.
The facts are:
- Higher resolution doesn't mean more noise in photos
- High resolution is useful if you need to crop
- High resolution increases rolling shutter when taking photos with electronic shutter or when recording video
- High resolution camera needs more processing power for oversampling each frame when recording video which creates more heat and drains more battery. If there is not enough processing power, the camera would crop each frame or it would skip pixels (both will reduce increase noise levels)
I personally think that high resolution cameras are useful in some genres (like wildlife) but for most people it's wiser to buy less expensive lower resolution camera and invest more money in lenses. For video makers, lower resolution cameras are better.
All the points here valid🙏
I believe point #1 is more nuanced. In my experience, it depends on how you process the image. Straight out of camera with no down sampling higher resolution does mean more noise at higher ISOs for cameras of similar generations.
Exactly... I have two older but very capable 12MP DSLRs, two 16MP ones, a 24MP mirrorless and one 48MP mirrorless. They are tools to help one create and each has its purpose. I love my 12MP FF sensor DSLRs, the huge photosites give a wonderful look, an almost slide quality to them plus the file sizes are reasonable. I wouldn't use them for product shots or cropped for birding etc.. We are so lucky in our choices of cameras available, some of the great old ones at very low prices too. But all of these tools are only as good as the lens on the front and the operator. That will make the biggest difference, especially for large prints.
I shoot architecture and landscape so I like having the higher resolution of the 5DSr for the details it captures. I'm pretty much always on a tripod.
As an astro photographer I use a 32.5MP Canon full spectrum camera. Being able to crop in significantly without loosing detail on my target is like having a bigger telescope. Bought that years ago and have thought of moving to an even higher resolution. Actual pixel size makes this more complicated though.
Sensor size is more important
For me, the most important thing is the sensor size. In cameras, photographers usually pay attention to this, but in smartphones, which is what most people use, it is hidden information. MP was important when comparing 0.3MP with 1MP. A large 4k screen has 8MP, so with 12MP there is still room to crop the image and display it on a large screen, so more than that is unnecessary unless you want a huge digital zoom.
I have a canon R5 and a canon RP. The only way I can tell which pic was taken by which camera is if I do pixel peeping. A4 and A3 printing produces the same results.
i didn't even know they existed until now. so that looks like two orders of magnitude. the rp and then the r5. suddenly the eos things I've been using for years appear as mere toys.
@@abrogard142 They are tools just like any camera. Learn to use them. I also have a canon 1dx and a canon 5d mk2.
Honestly, a good lens will take you a lot farther than a super high pixel count in most cases I'd rather shoot a 12 mp camera with a good lens than a 48mp one with a bad one.
Honestly, who would buy an expensive high resolution camera and stick a crap lens on it?
@@jerryinsc
Some people effectively just do that … look at 52 Megapixel smartphones!
@@bobdemuynck9904 Exactly... Unless you've got Leica money, any more than 24MP is wasted, as all you end up being able to see (when you zoom in on the image) is your shitty lenses poor autofocus.
@@bobdemuynck9904 I guess so. I guess I wasn't thinking about phones as I never use my phone camera for anything. I don't do video either so a lot of the newer mirrorless cameras don't interest me too much for that reason even though I'm sure they take great photos. My gear is not new but it is good gear and it suits what I do with it. I would love to try medium format though. And yes, I admit, I am a pixel peeper.
Funny you mentioned 12MP, my all time favorite DSLR is my old Nikon D300, 12MP apsc, and now I've been using AI Upscaling to see what I can get with these .jpgs and the results are astounding..
I have found that having an excess of pixels is useful in landscape photography when it is physically impossible to get close to an object which has complex detail. I use a Sony RX1R - II.
Thank you for an excellent presentation of this subject. I will be sending my students to view this video.
The lab that the studio I work for uses makes smaller prints at about 240 dpi. Prints bigger than about 8x10 are printed at a lower resolution for exactly the reasons you said.
The biggest digitally derived print I have ever sold to a non-commercial customer was a 30x40 inch print. It was shot with a Canon 40d, which is a whopping ten megapixel camera with an APS-C sensor. Since that print is a shorter aspect ratio than the sensor on my camera, it was cropped down to a bit over seven megapixels. It was so beautiful that we ordered another to display in the office.
Another important factor is the amount of detail that is needed. The aforementioned big print was of a Mom, Dad, their three-year-old daughter, and their Labradoodle, on the beach. If that had been a group of thirty or so people, we would not have been able to make that giant print and still have it look tack sharp.
Some of the things that we are called upon to do with distressing regularity is head-swaps, face-swaps, and eye-openings. When minute detail has to be manipulated, I want as many pixels as I can get my greedy little hands on, regardless of how it will be displayed.
The images we post to Facebook or Instagram are usually just 900 pixels on the long side. The images on our portrait proofing web galleries are about five megapixels.
You're exactly right, size matters, but that doesn't always mean it has to be a big size.
Depending on the photographer sometimes high megapixels are needed for the work they do. There is one wedding and portrait photographer that shoots Fuji Medium format 100 megapixels. He does landscape family portraits.
For example he sells very large landscape prints and puts the family in a place in the image so when they walk up to the print they are then looking at a maybe 8x10, 11x14 or 16x20 print. So it becomes kind of two prints in one.
I forgot his name but he's a photographer from Texas I think and he has used Olympus and Fuji crop and medium format. Not sure if he still does TH-cam?
Noise is primarily produced by the sensor in quality cameras so collecting more photons per pixel does give you a lower noise image.
For my practice, astrophotography, having a very large definition can be very important.
Typically, on a lunar image, I use a 2500mm focal length telescope coupled to a camera with 2.9μm photosites.
This camera may only be in 4k, but once I've taken lots of small areas and put all these tiles together, it gives me a 1m by 1m shot at 300dpi using the super resolution given by the stacking of multiple images whereas if I use my D850, which allows me to have the entire moon at once, I end up with "only" 200ppp for the same image size.
The difference is visible because although my prints are large, they are still designed to be viewed or even scrutinized closely.
So yes, if I had a 100Mp full frame camera, it would obviously make my work easier. Same in solar photography where in any case, I have to use the D850 to have the entire star in a short time (the surface of the sun is moving)
I have been into Photography since about 1965. I have seen so much change in time. I started shooting digital images years ago and started with the 1-megapixel Kodak digital camera. The point is, that in all of that time, NEVER, have I seen a clearer, nor better explanation of megapixel relativity. I have to say, that this a great video, that should be viewed by all photographers. Cheers! Ron
Maybe you should see more: there are contradicting points between beginning and end and there is a definite misunderstanding of the difference between DPI (printer resolution: 1440 or 2880 dpi) and PPI (file resolution: usually a minimum of 200 ppi, 300 ppi required by any professional printer or the press).
@@BrunoChalifour Thanks!
Higher resolution means that one is capturing more movement. It becomes harder to get a sharp image.
I've been taking some great photos with my 12.1 megapixel camera. In fact, I have several airshow photos that had to be cropped pretty significantly to get the right composition and I'd swear they where professional shots of the airshow. That said, I'll be upgrading the camera within a few days. The catalyst is mostly because the lens is not interchangeable. Getting a better sensor, a much better auto focus, and the ability to shoot raw are going to be really nice.
Megapixels matter when it comes to detail. The key is to find the sweet spot to megapixels count versus sensor size to get the cleanest possible image with the most available detail.
I put my phone, from 12MP mode, into 50MP and then 200MP mode and the difference in detail is huge.
I recently purchased a Fuji GFX 100, it was the best purchase I have ever made in my life, the camera is splendid
How many megapixels do I need, you ask? ALL OF THEM!
This is a ridiculous statement.
Of COURSE they do if either you cannot get physically close enough to the subject or cannot afford hugely expensive long lenses.
Cropping linear by half reduces the area by 3/4
ie leaving only 25% of the original
They don't matter if you know exactly what you're doing. But when you don't know, and you're later going to crop the final photo to the area you do need, that's when megapixels matter.
The megapixel range really depends on your use case scenario. I love the details from 100mp Hasselblad and it's hard to un-see this level of quality compared to a 12-megapixel camera. I would say 50 megapixels and up means a more specific focus on your target-shooting needs and any less than 50 mp is for general shooting and using specific lenses for more fine-tuned photo capture
When I got my first SLR, which had a whopping 6MP, I got a professional A3 print. I had to downsize the image. It was crisp and clear. From that point onward, I haven't been bothered too much by MP counts. My current camera is a Pentax KS2 with 20MP. I haven't upgraded it because between the sharpness of images, the image stabilisation and the ISO (52.000) it continues to meet my needs.
This was some great info.
So question to you is: I have a z6iii but really considering to go back to my OM-1 for the inbody stacking and live composition. If I do this, will see any image quality differences? I do landscape with some macro and wildlife and street. I don’t do video. Or just keep my new system and discover its possibilities. (Looking for your opinion) I occasionally print up to 2x24’s.
But that’s about it. I’m not selling any photos, but maybe one day.
Looking at all the videos out there my brain is overwhelmed.
Will the OM-1 help you get the picture? Getting the picture is way more important than the small difference in image quality.
For me the answer is simple. I take the camera which is more fun. What do you have from a camera that you don`t like using?
@@richardfink7666
Well, I guess it’s the live ND filters, the inbody stacking, and live composite.
But I really never did use them a lot. I have the z6iii, and the ergo is much better and the colors of the Nikon look much better and the DR is better. If I leave focus brokering and how to stack photos, I suppose I might miss the OM system a lot less.
Thanks for shedding some light on the topic. Knowing what you do and what you need it for, determines the megapixels. For my portrait work, in terms of output, mostly there is no need to have more than 20MP. However - for retouching more pixels a more than just nice to have. You get better, cleaner results quicker, as with low res files. And you get the ability to crop in, but also gain some flexibility when your client decides to go for a different crop. You take a wider shot and crop in to what is finally needed. On the other hand, for some landscape panoramic work - I use a 16MP camera, the files will end up easily 100MP+, enough for most serious work. So, it depends ;)
Manufacturers have invented the "pixel binning" method to combine neighbouring pixels and the result is a moving average for the brightness of the pixel - it is broken up depending on his neighbours. (They did it already for many years to decide the color of a pixel and applied the technique in the "Bayer sensor"). But if you want a today's smartphone, for example, to produce a 12 Megapixel phone camera you need a 48 Megapixel sensor even if you combine only four pixels.
(Neither you nor any technical writer in the world ever mentions that the quality of the lens is more important than the sensor, however ... or stating that the ideas, the eyes of the photographer, his perception of light, colors, graphic patterns and perspective, is more important than the quality of the lens ...).
More resolution means you can see more noise, less resolution, you see less noise
Still using a X100T with 16 mp. I never crop my images. I see no difference in sharpness compared to my XT3 with 26 mp on a big screen.
Damn, I came here thinking I can't wait to comment and prove this guy wrong when in reality he nailed it. Only thing I'd add is the experiment a guy did where he compared the low light performance of the a73 and the a7r4. The A7R4 did considerably better when taking the 61mp image and reducing it down to the same size as the a73 image. The 61mp just has so much more headroom for noise reduction and detail.
Unfair comparison: The 61 mp image was processed and then compared to the 12mp unprocessed image.
It would then be fair to compare against a processed (with for example, Gigapixel program) 12mp image.
In addition, downscaling is time consuming.
I casually take photos on my old 2002 Canon Powershot S45 that uses a 4mp CCD and the photos from it looks great despite the smaller resolution.
Quick question:
If I use a 24 MP camera and when I shoot @12MP from the same camera.
Is it going to impact the low light performance?
I noticed 12 MP looks better in low light. Is it because the pixel size on sensor goes bigger @ 12MP or its just seems to be doing better as its less zoomed at 100% crop???
bigger pixel size.
Same as the full frame discussion, you dont need it but its not that more expensive and has a certain look
A lot is said in the comments about the need for high megapixels on larger sensors when cropping wildlife shots, this gives the same results as a 24mp M4/3 sensor as the pixel density will be similar. The only advantage then of the larger sensor is the shallower depth of field.
I am a fan of the 24 mega pixel cameras I have. I print 11x17 and 13x19 on a regular basis. A little crop, if needed and I get great results. Shooting RAW is more important, in my opinion, and the file size does come into play. I do have several prints taken with a 10mp camera hanging in my house. They are 20x30 inches. They are also hanging high in my staircase and you can’t be closer than 10 feet from them. They look great.
I have a good number of 16mp images that I have printed myself in A3 sizing and I can be inches away and they still sharp and clear
Yes, cropping is a good reason. And in the same thought, if you have, for example, several E mount APS-C lenses and you use them on your full frame Sony E camera, you can still use those lenses on the camera setting it in APS-C mode. So keeping all your lenses useful is a good reason for higher megapixel sensors.
I totally agree with that light is always a problem who doesn’t shoot in studio environments. For me low light performance is the key deciding factor, that’s why I switched from Nikon to Sony. Dynamic range is really high for Sony systems in most of the high iso scenes.
More megapixels really only make a difference if you are making large prints or zooming in to the image to a great extent. If you can afford the megapixels and you think you might make large prints or crop in a whole bunch then go for it, but most people don't really need it.
The "amplification" of modern cameras does not produce much noise. So why is there still noise at low light?
Because there is noise in light, similar to audible noise in nature or a city. There are photons bouncing around randomly everywhere. If you take a picture of something brightly lit the photons coming from the very thing you want to photograph through your lens are just so many more than the random photons that those random photons don't make a noticeable difference in the picture.
But if your picture is taken in bad lighting conditions those random photons are getting bigger in ratio compared to the photons you really want to capture so you start noticing their impact.
@cycl0n362 I don't think there are randomly bouncing photons in complete darkness? Where would they come from?
@LeonidAndronov as long as there is any source of light there are photons ... even if it's just the display or indicator lights on your camera.
And i guess you won't be taking photos of a black void but rather a dark scenery, so as long as there is anything to be seen or photographed there have to be photons around because that's how human vision and photography works ...
@@cycl0n362 This kind of noise (shot noise) does not need background, it originates from the signal itself. Because the photons are discrete and arrive at random moments, when there are few of them, the signal starts looking discontinuous (noisy).
MPs matter when you want to pull details from farther away. Case in point... Canon's t6i resolves more detail at 24MP than Canon's 7DMKII at 20MP even with the 7D's larger sensor. MPs matter with landscape and wildlife photography hands down.
The error in thinking is that the megapixels are completely irrelevant for the output medium. It is completely wrong to think that I need fewer megapixels just because the output medium requires fewer pixels. Of course, the maximum number of negapixels is always correct, because this is where you have stored the most information. Scaling down from 100MP to 24MP produces a higher image quality than shooting in 24MP. The images are sharper and do not need to be sharpened at all or only to a lesser extent. I have been doing this practically every day for years and know the advantages of the highest resolution when shooting. There's nothing to argue about, it's clearly better.
I use the upscaler from Topas and when I have low resolution photos, I always use the maximum of 6x magnification and then scale to the smaller format. The best way to get the best picture quality.
The same principle also applies to video. The more MP in the recording, the better the image quality when scaled down compared to the same resolution recorded natively.
The maximum resolution is always better. Period.
He is speaking to the 95% of photographers out there....
does the quality of the lenses matter in sharpness?
When comparing the 24MP Canon R3 with the 45MP Canon R5ii, the latter's significant advantage lies in cropping capabilities. The R5ii's 45MP sensor offers enhanced noise reduction for RAW or CRAW images. Pairing the R5ii with a 400mm f/2.8 lens, for instance, allows for a 50% crop while still achieving a higher resolution than one would with the Canon R3 or R6ii using the same lens. My 45MP cameras at f/2.8 steers me clear of the 1.4x teleconverter to prevent losing a stop of light at f/4, which would necessitate increasing the ISO by one stop or decreasing the shutter speed to preserve the original ISO.
As a fun megapixel trivia point, doubling the number of megapixels only increases resolution by about 12.5% which is hardly noticeable. I find the sweet spot for full frame sensors, or even APS-c sensors is about 18 to 30 mp. I've seen 10 mp images blown up to five feet diagonally that look as good as 30, 40 or even 50 megapixels. If I have a need for 100 mp or better for a commercial shoot (which isn't really needed unless it makes a customer happy), I'll rent a Phase One for a few days.
From the view of a professional photographer, I find that 18 mp is way more than sufficient for my purposes. I normally shoot with a Canon 5D MK III or MK IV. It's way more resolution than I actually need for even the largest prints.
I find this post one of the most significant and important.
Excellent editing
Finally someone explain something that takes into account everything that affects the quality of a photo instead of just sticking to large sensor and lower megapixels is better 😁😁
Well the reality is that large sensor and lower resolution (and not "lower megapixels") do improve image quality (higher ISO capacity, larger dynamic range).
High resolution is important in different types of photography..
For example on Macro Photography resolution gives you the possibility to shot 8K macros or crop on high NA objectives, resolving power on Macro photography depends on the numerical aperture of the lens and the sensor resolution of the camera.. So the resolution matters a lot.
Real 24mpx is the perfect balance and real 45mpx to 65mpx is the max you need.
Freget megapixels that's pretty low res, I use GIGAPIXEL IMAGES, compression ruins the images and I love being able to zoom into a specific part of the image and still screenshot a full 4K PNG to set as my wallpaper. It's like downloading 100 images in one
In the "good old 😊 I used a 6 MP Nikon D70, and I was able to have a3 paper prints.
Of course, with my now 24 MP Nikon D5300 and D780 the prints will be better, still, cropping is still possible while I can still have a large enough print, even when this means a print of 250dpi and not 300dpi.
The main disadvantage of large size pictures is that the computer is quickly full, and thus, 24 MP is fine for me.
So it,s the sensor that makes the differen,t
Fullframe camera with 30mp is good enough for me😊
Megapixels do matter they make your footage sharper and more dynamic. Bigger is always better.
One misnomer is what is a pixel on a display. A single pixel is made up of 1 red, 1 blue and 1 green led. On a camera sensor we refer to each individual red, green or blue sensor site as a pixel. So in fact a display with 1000 pixels actually has 1000 of each of the red, green and blue pixels so going by the way we do the calculation for a Bayer sensor the display would be 3000 pixels wide. This always trips up the basic comparison of setting a Bayer pixel resolution directly to a display resolution.
I come from the photographic film world where maximum detail and minimum grain or sensor noise is valued. As a result, I shoot all of my photos at maximum photo size and maximum color density, so that in the future, the photo can easily cropped and manipulated.
I'm left wondering if the biggest difference in image cropping performance between your original Panasonic camera and the Sony you replaced it with was as much to do with the IBIS in the Sony as anything else.
What about Astrophotography?
Is high megapixel necessary for clean and sharp looking deep space objects? Could you explain?
Pixel size also matters. The smaller the pixels the more of them u can put inside a D x D size area. More pixels means more electric noise but larger pixels will look less 'noisy" than smaller pixels.
I don't want bigger photos. I want better photos....which involves bigger pixels capturing more light.
Megapixels do matter but sensor size behind them matters a lot more.
I have a question. I am trying to decide between an Iphone 16 Pro (48MP) and a Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra (200MP) for take pictures for social media when I cannot have my camera with me. I don´t post pics without editing before in Lightroom and Photoshop, so, in that case, is it a Samsung better for me than an Iphone?
One thing that you neglected to mention is that another downside of high megapixel cameras is: more megapixels = longer processing time, both in and out of camera. In camera, that might mean that a reduction in frame rate of videos or burst photography is necessary for the camera. Or at least a lower amount of burst shots being able to be taken before the camera stops it to buffer the data. Out of camera, that might mean you may have to take longer in editing as changes load, or a more powerful computer.
In this instance, Lower megapixel cameras therefore might be better in sports photography or other situations in which things can change in the blink of an eye, while high-resolution cameras are generally better suited for studio photography in which things don't move very much.
It all depends on the technology you are using. Equipment, both computers and cameras, are getting better and better, faster and faster.
Good glass matters. MPs do matter depending on what you're doing. If you want to crop something, print something and make it larger than the original image, they count. I find a sweet spot at 24MP. I do have a Z6, a Z7. The former, the Z6, because of the noise at higher ISOs on the Z7, I use for night time, astro photography. I also use it for landscapes. I did have a D5, that was a fantastic bit of kit. But when cropping in, even at 600mm, the pixelisation became too much. Whereas on the Z7, it's not the same issue. But if all of these cameras mentioned had rubbish glass affixed, then the MPs wouldn't matter.
Thank you for a very illuminating summary
Glad you enjoyed the video Chris. Thanks for the comment!
Megapixel numbers are one thing -- that anyone can understand. But not all sensors are equally constructed and probably the most important thing in your camera is the processor that generates the "raw" (in fact highly processed) image data. Now camera manfacturers will tell your roughly what kind of sensor they use and that their new processor is better than the old one, but everything else is kept a secret -- and most people wouldn't even understand it, if they were given all the technical specifications. Hence they just talk about sensor sizes and pixel counts...