Why so much interest for FF?

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giellaleafapmu

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I am wondering since a few days why such interest for FF cameras and why every few days there is a new thread about this? It is not like many famous photographers become famous for the ultra shallow depth of field. You name them: Leibovitz, Capa, Cartier Bresson, Kander, McNally, Skoglund, Lando, Salgado, Adams, Newton, I am saying completely random names here, well all of them work(ed) mostly half open, so no dept of field excuse. Sensors are now all incredibly good, even APS sensors can work up to 1,600 iso no problems, besides in the studio iso is usually nailed at 100 or 200 iso. Photojournalists could maybe be interested in the lower noise but they also print much smaller on average. Also, all seem to agree that a small camera is nicer than a large one (I imagine Adams not feeling well in his grave now) but every time there is a rumor about a possible new FF camera all go crazy. Is there anything else I don't see in the numbers 24 and 36?

GLF
 
For me it was being able to put a 35mm lens on my D700 and actually be shooting with that field of view.

For mirrorless compacts it's not really that important because the manufacturer will give you the field of view that's appropriate as in the X100.

There is aways a carrot being dangled by camera makers to get us to open our wallets. First it was the megapixel race, then it moved to higher ISOs, now it's who can offer a full frame sensor.

What is next I wonder?
 
If you have a range of lenses for 35mm film, an APS size sensor forces you to buy new wideangle lenses. A waste of money, better to have a fullframe sensor that 'just works' with them.
 
So people can use lenses at their intended angle of view? Means nothing [to me] if the price is still astronomical.
 
A quality 35mm lens is a lot cheaper than a quality 24mm lens. And there are a lot more choices for 35mm lenses. And, yes, it is nice to know that I can have a shallow depth of field if I want it (even if it won't make me famous). :)
 
Also, in the United States there is an obsession with size. People think that "bigger is better."
 
I like the perspective of larger-sized sensors (like 8x10...) so "full frame" is just another step in that direction. I will keep shooting film as long as I can, and if it goes away I can probably shoot some kind of wet plates using still-readily-available materials, so I'll always have that. It would be nice for digital sensors to go in that larger direction too, though.

It's weird, the beginnings of photography in the 1830's-60's were limited to larger sized image areas because they weren't dealing with negatives and the resulting image would have been too small, so there was always that urge to make a more pocketable camera (ie Leica). Now with digital, small sensors are easy to produce but somehow large sensors are astronomically expensive. I care less about megapixels than I do about perspective and tonality, and both of those are increased as sensor size gets bigger.
 
Unification of gear. It was actually handy to have extra telephoto magnification on DX for free. But it was a lot more noticeable how much I lost trying to fit things in at the wide end. I want to use my lenses how I originally did, before this digital stuff. I'm not worried about the megapixel count- I'm guessing twice as big as the resolution of my monitor is enough. I have been more disappointed by poor dynamic range.
 
keytarjunkie said:
Now with digital, small sensors are easy to produce but somehow large sensors are astronomically expensive.
Click to expand...

Electronics decrease in price mainly because feature size shrinks, allowing more parts to be put on a single wafer —the primary unit of manufacturing. Big sensors don't allow you to put more parts on a wafer. That is why they have not gotten cheap quickly.
 
Sorry, I think I was not clear. I am not surprised by the fact that a larger sensor is, all the rest being the same, probably better than a small one. And of course I don't criticize someone who is switching from film to digital for the first time and has an arsenal of high quality lenses (assuming they all perform as well on a digital sensor as they did on film). My surprise is when I see that even photographers who already have a full range of lenses for the 4/3 or the APS digital sensor which cover everything from ultrawide to mild telephoto still drool on the latest rumor about a FF camera being launched. Here I read posts of people who already have Fuji full range of lenses and wish that Fuji go FF (which ironically would imply exactly buying new wide angle lenses, not telephoto as one could expect since apparently the middle of the field focal range already cover the FF sensor but the wide angles don't!).

GLF
 
giellaleafapmu said:
Sorry, I think I was not clear. I am not surprised by the fact that a larger sensor is, all the rest being the same, probably better than a small one. And of course I don't criticize someone who is switching from film to digital for the first time and has an arsenal of high quality lenses (assuming they all perform as well on a digital sensor as they did on film). My surprise is when I see that even photographers who already have a full range of lenses for the 4/3 or the APS digital sensor which cover everything from ultrawide to mild telephoto still drool on the latest rumor about a FF camera being launched. Here I read posts of people who already have Fuji full range of lenses and wish that Fuji go FF (which ironically would imply exactly buying new wide angle lenses, not telephoto as one could expect since apparently the middle of the field focal range already cover the FF sensor but the wide angles don't!).

GLF
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Well, I agree with you there. I think most of the people that own a lot of m4/3rds gear and are drooling over "full-frame" cameras and rumors, probably have a little too much time and money on hand. At the same time, people get what they can get at the time, and then hope for something better later. I have a X100 and I hope Fuji makes the same camera with a larger sensor (and some of the kinks worked out) in a camera about the same size. But I am not heavily invested into the system. That's exactly why I didn't buy a X-Pro1 and why I don't own any m4/3rds cameras.
 
Three and one-half reasons for full frame.

1. Using lenses with intended coverage. I would like to go back and forth between film and digital.
2. Fast lenses and shallow depth of field.
3. Better low light performance. Of course, we make an assumption that all the latest sensor/amplifier..etc technologies are in play.
3 1/2. Most importantly, I'm from the U.S. and firmly believe that bigger is better.... that made me laugh.

I think that most of the lusting after gear is simply that and seen mainly amongst amateur photographers. I noticed that many pros use pretty beat-up gear. Gear that has worked previously and still delivers.
 
the reason I am excited that FF is soon going to become the norm (I hope) is that finally image quality for most digital cameras on the market can match and exceed that of 35mm film. A cheap 35mm film camera potentially delivers much better quality than an APSC size sensor digital camera. This is what digital camera sensors sizes should be at their smallest (36x24mm) - apart from in phones and really compact cameras etc. and hopefully from here on they will only get bigger while maintaining the same price,

I can only dream of the day a medium format sized sensor is in a camera at the current Sony RX1 price

Cheers,
Richard
 
semilog said:
Electronics decrease in price mainly because feature size shrinks, allowing more parts to be put on a single wafer —the primary unit of manufacturing. Big sensors don't allow you to put more parts on a wafer. That is why they have not gotten cheap quickly.
Click to expand...


We seem to be in a rapidly changing world where nothing is constant.

This caught my eye the other day.


Australian and international researchers say they have designed a tiny crystal able to run a quantum computer so powerful it would take a computer the size of the known universe to match it.

Details of the ion crystal, which is made up of just 300 atoms, are published in the journal Nature today by a team from Australia, South Africa and the United States.
"We've surpassed the computational potential of this system relative to classical computers by something like 10 to the [power of] 80, which is 80 orders of magnitude, a really enormous number," the University of Sydney's Dr Michael Biercuk told AM.
"Quantum computing is a kind of information science that is based on the notion that if one performs computations in a fundamentally different way than the way your classical desktop computer works, there's a huge potential to solve a variety of problems that are very, very hard or near impossible for standard computers," he explained.
"If you wanted to think how big a classical computer would need to be in order to solve this problem of roughly 300 interacting quantum particles, it turns out that that computer would need to be the size of the known universe - which is clearly something that's not possible to achieve."
What is quantum computing?
• Normal computers use data encoded in binary digits (bits)
• They work by manipulating bits that can exist in only one of two states - 0 or 1 - at any given time
• Quantum computers instead use the properties of atoms and molecules to perform calculations
• Quantum computers encode information as 'quantum bits', or 'qubits'
• Qubits can exist in superposition - they can be both 0 and 1, and all points in between - at the same time.
• Physicists believe this superposition will allow quantum computers to work on a million calculations at once, while a normal computer can only handle one
• That gives quantum computers the potential to be millions of times more powerful than conventional machines

However, he says there is still plenty of work to do.
"The central element is something like a millimetre in diameter, 300 atoms that are suspended in space," he said.
"But of course everything depends on a huge amount of technical infrastructure around it.
"So there are vacuum chambers and pumps and lasers, and all of that takes up something like a room."
The quantum computer will move to a stage where it is so far out in front and performing such complex tasks it will be difficult to check if it is working accurately.
"They're not easily checked by a classical computer which opens a whole variety of problems," Dr Biercuk said.
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There are probably as many justifications for full frame as there are people.

But underlying all of this is increased image quality. It may seem to be only perception but a lot of people believe that full frame sensors tend to provide a bit better image quality. They may or may not be correct but over the years larger frame size has meant better quality. 120 roll film produces a higher quality image than 35mm. Larger format trumps medium format. Just because digital has become the prevailing imaging methodology doesn't mean that this quality difference has gone away. One day it may go away but for now, all else being equal, a larger sensor means higher quality. This is true in many cases even though the larger sensor may have less pixels. You can argue all you want but it still holds up in most circumstances. Obviously, because digital technology has progressed so rapidly, you can always point to examples where newer technology out-strips older technology and a newer, smaller sensor has higher quality than an older, larger sensor.
 
There are a lot of advantages with larger sensors, though I find APS-C and M4/3 do just fine. As stated, the focal length you place in front of them does not change, less noise, better high ISO performance, better IQ, larger megapixel counts within reason - means sharper images, more detail captured. The one caveat - your lenses better be good because a lot of sensors can out resolve film and show the poor quality of some optics.
 
Pioneer said:
There are probably as many justifications for full frame as there are people.

But underlying all of this is increased image quality. It may seem to be only perception but a lot of people believe that full frame sensors tend to provide a bit better image quality. They may or may not be correct but over the years larger frame size has meant better quality. 120 roll film produces a higher quality image than 35mm. Larger format trumps medium format. Just because digital has become the prevailing imaging methodology doesn't mean that this quality difference has gone away. One day it may go away but for now, all else being equal, a larger sensor means higher quality. This is true in many cases even though the larger sensor may have less pixels. You can argue all you want but it still holds up in most circumstances. Obviously, because digital technology has progressed so rapidly, you can always point to examples where newer technology out-strips older technology and a newer, smaller sensor has higher quality than an older, larger sensor.
Click to expand...

Quite true.
 
nikkor-watching said:
Unification of gear. It was actually handy to have extra telephoto magnification on DX for free. But it was a lot more noticeable how much I lost trying to fit things in at the wide end. I want to use my lenses how I originally did, before this digital stuff.
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^^^ This is me.

I found the transition from medium format film to APS-C sized digital particularly hard.

There may have been more chatter about full frame cameras as of late thanks to the introduction of DSLR and compact cameras employing same, but the desire has long been around. For my part I'm excited that there are starting to be more compact choices available other than just the Leica M9.

Finally... as the clearest example I have of getting back lost perspectives, my widest RF lens is an 18mm f/4. This approximates a 28/4 on APS-C, a radically different perspective. I want the original back. And especially for 35, 50 and beyond, I'd like the opportunity to use narrow depth of field, again, if I need/want to.

All the other things - potentially better sensors, DR, more resolution than I have today, better high ISO performance, a "virtual crop" camera inside the FF camera (sensor big enough to give APS-C at a decent resolution so if I want I can have 1.5x crop again) are nice to haves as well.

Last comment: prices going down, or expected to go down further, for FF sensor based cameras also has a lot to do with the increase in interest beyond the timeliness of Photokina.
 
RichW said:
the reason I am excited that FF is soon going to become the norm (I hope) is that finally image quality for most digital cameras on the market can match and exceed that of 35mm film. A cheap 35mm film camera potentially delivers much better quality than an APSC size sensor digital camera....
Cheers,
Richard
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I don't know about this one. I like film, including 35mm..especially B&W, but once you are talking color, or anything but slow B&W, I think that my NEX-7 trumps 35mm film at a given ISO. Of course, there is a look that I might like with a particular film stock and I suspect that I would back away from such a strong statement when using Velvia 50, or ultra low ISO B&W. Of course, Velvia's dynamic range is trumped by the NEX-7. I just like film.. I'm currently shooting more 35mm Legacy Pro 400 /TMax Developer.. but the resolution really isn't anywhere near my NEX-7 at EI 400. Some of the other films, like TMY2 get a bit closer.. but..
 
kbg32 said:
There are a lot of advantages with larger sensors, though I find APS-C and M4/3 do just fine. As stated, the focal length you place in front of them does not change, less noise, better high ISO performance, better IQ, larger megapixel counts within reason - means sharper images, more detail captured. The one caveat - your lenses better be good because a lot of sensors can out resolve film and show the poor quality of some optics.
Click to expand...


I made a comparison in tricky lighting between my D700 and OM-D with a series of images from both cameras used alternately for virtually the same shots. Initially they seemed well matched when viewing the results but that soon changed when I started trying to get more information from the Oly files. They fell apart quite quickly in comparison to the Nikon's files ... their workability was nowhere near the full frame files which have amazing recovery capabilities if you under expose ... with minimal loss in quality.
 
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