The Milky way like in my profile photo printed as 24x16 inch from a little canon 200d. It's a blend of 3 truck light painted foregrounds with a 10 image stacked sky but only know it was 23.2mb
This week, I printed a TIF from a 20MP 5DMII to 30x50 gallery wrap on canvas. The printer did use Topaz Gigapixel--so not sure how much that helped. There is no noticeable pixilation or noise on the final print which is of a freight train coming out of the fog. That's my largest print so far and will hang at Norfolk Southern office in Atlanta. Years ago I did a series of lily pad flower pictures that all got printed for a hotel chain (the boring pictures that hang in your hotel room:). Those were all shot on a 6MP original Canon Rebel and were enlarged to 16x20. I just looked at those files this morning and noticed they were all shot with a 100mm 2.8 Macro---lens makes a huge difference too:)
24x20 of a deep crop taken with a D7100 with a 300mm f4 that was up-sampled. From me usual sitting position, 18=24" away, the hummingbird's is sharp enough.
Yes 😂 😂 I agree,I inherited 2 really nice in excellent condition Nikon D-300 AND a Nikon D-90 Dslr's from after my Father passed away last year& I love them.Simon just saved me alot of money 😆 Because I was going to trade them in& get higher megapixel cam,BUT I did the same test Simon talks about& Me& a couple of friends an my lady don't see noticeable difference blur etc.As long as your not"breathing hot breath" 🤭all up close,its NOT huge difference! The average photographer doesn't need super megapixel cams.UNLESS they're really making massive posters etc* 12+mp is enough from both my cams and we've printed out poster sized pics an they're great looking.....Simon you are absolutely awesome,witty and very intelligent sir!Stay creative an we LOVE YOUR CHANNEL& YOUR ENTHUSIASTIC ENERGY!Thank you for all you do ✌🙏
My son (6) is autistic, and he takes photos of things to help him handle transitions or having to put away/eat things he isn't ready to part with. Currently he has to use his tablet but that has quite a lot of problems to it. We're hoping to get him a good, budget, older digital camera he can use instead. We brought one of those kid cameras a couple years back and it's so awful you can hardly tell what it is. 🙄 This video is really helping me understand what we need to get for him to get nice photos and hopefully grow his love for photography. :)
When creating a billboard as a graphic designer, I was so nervous to see the outcome when learning it was 15dpi. They gave me a test cropped section of the picture bc I wanted to check colours and it looked like a blur.... When viewing it from across the street it was sharp as anything and so happy as it cost a lot to put up. I've never worked that big
Hey Simon, Just found your channel and you're a great presenter. I go on a trip tomorrow in the Kimberleys (aus)... For landscapes is there any use for a 50mm prime lens or just go with a 18-85... I thought it would be fun to take a nice camera...
I just found Simon’s video collection on YT. He speaks clearly, with some pace, and doesn’t include content that’s unrelated to the subject(s) of the video(s), staying “on task.” He provides tremendous clarity to what are generally pretty confusing topics. His videos are really, really well done, and his captured images, used in the videos, are quite impressive. I’m subscribing so I don’t miss future content. Thank you, Simon. 😊
I had to watch to this video again, some months later, to reassure myself that my Canon APS-C 24MP camera would meet my needs for the foreseeable future. I knew I would get clear, concise information; info I could trust. Thank you Simon. Best wishes to you and yours for 2024, from a fellow Bluenoser.
I recently visited the offices of a company I used to work for, and they still have several 18x24 photos hanging that I took in 2001 on a 3.1mp Canon D30. Back then I couldn’t imagine it how it could get any better.
I had Canon D30 somewhere around 2000, the image quality was dismal compared to modern cameras. In fact the image quality was improving by leaps and bounds at that time, so every year the resolution was doubling and noise was reduced. I think in 5 years I had it, its price went down from $3000 to $300.
until recently i was shooting on a nikon D50, which is "only" 6 megapixels. the photos it took were gorgeous, and it's a shame i had to replace it. i'm happy with my olympus om-d em10, of course, but "only" 6 megapixels is good enough in 2023.
I took a 16 MP photo of a drifting car on a race track on a 14-year old DSLR, cropped it in so it’s around 12 MP, and printed it on a 3-feet-by-2-feet canvas. It’s hanging above my bed and I get compliments on how sharp it looks. It’s been a few months and I still can’t beat that photo to this day. Also, congrats on becoming a Canon ambassador!🎉
@ivojansen7625 it's enough. I shot some amazing photos lately on a 2004 Panasonic Lumix DMC-LC1 with the leica lens. Quite sharp and still fantastic BW performance
In this day and age of 45 and 60 megapixels, the SWEET SPOT is still 24MP in my opinion....just the right file size, plenty of details, fast enough for slower cards, plenty of cropping headroom and won't degrade high ISO IQ that much
Agreed, or around that area at least. 26MP gives you a 6K sensor which IMO is perfect. I’ve had 40+ MP sensors and tested 60+ ones. The file sizes are waaay too big. A few situations where I was glad I had it for a couple of large prints to be viewed up close. But otherwise just a waste of space most of the time. I’d rather stick with ~26MP and then just *rent* a high megapixel camera for the times you would need it
In 2009, my wife and I took our honeymoon in Victoria, B.C. While there, I just happened to get a photo out over the water of a lighthouse on an island with a tall masted ship going by in the background. Truthfully, it's not a great photo, but we liked it, and it reminds us of our time there. The image was taken with a Canon 40D, which had, as I recall, a 10 MP sensor. Now I cropped the original image by about a factor of two in both axes, which means the end result only had 2.5 MP. We had that printed on canvas at 36 inches on the diagonal and it hangs on the wall of my wife's home office above a day bed. You don't view it closer than about 6 feet away. To my untrained amateur eye, it looks great!
Beautiful island and always enjoyed my visit there. It would be even more awesome if a humpback whale 🐳 graced the lighthouse background. But yeah even 10 MP photos are good enough for large prints. I worked for a large format printer and we'd print all sizes and generally the larger the print the lower the DPI needed. We've done prints from 20 years ago that's only 2 MP and with a bit of enhancements they still look great.
I did a shoot in 2013 with 18 megapixel camera and it was on 80 feet wide billboard..... It was looking tremendously sharp..... I used the viewing distance calculations and applied output sharpening technique in a very effective manner..... I'm glad that you made this vide as many many people are extreamly confused in megapixel war... Keep up great work
I’m still shooting with the D300, D700, and FujiS5Pro (which was marketed as 12MP, but technically 1/2 that because of the pixel design of the sensor). All of these bodies continue to produce beautiful warm photos, with a color pallet seemingly lost as newer and “better” cameras made them extinct. Guys are swarming back to their digital roots in the D700, and are all saying the same thing: color, color, color! These old bodies deliver a film like feel with their images. We have printed 16x23 photos that look crazy beautiful. Most of my work is portraits, so these bodies will continue to be work horses until they give up the ghost.
I'm a commercial photographer who uses 100-200mp digital backs. The thing most people don't touch on is having the ability to make deep crops for the purpose of maintaining depth of field. I've shot automotive campaigns in studio for major manufacturers. When shooting a 3/4 angle it's necessary to pull the camera further away to have the car sharp bumper to bumper. You can only stop down so far until diffraction starts working against you. For professional commercial work more megapixels is always better. But you need to know how to use them correctly.
@@BenAndrews tilt-shift lenses were made not for commercial photography, tbh. I'm sure that you can use them in that way, buy ususally they're less sharp and made for FF or cropped cameras. 100-200mp digital backs that were mentioned are Phase One, Hasselblad or Pentax ones and medium format only. There are no tilt-shift lenses for such big sensors on the market as far as I can remember
@@casualcoffeeshooter of course there are tilt-shift lenses for medium format. I've used 2 of them. Not sure what brand, since I used them 15 years ago in the studio where I was studying photography. There are quite a few options. A number of bellows based options that are around, some are mated to a lens and some allow you to put on any lens you like in whatever system its designed for. A quick search on google shows Hasselblad make a tilt shit adapter. I suspect thats similar to one I used, since we shot our product photos on a Hass. Theres also the Fotodiox Pro ROKR adapters, and a bunch of bellows options. I own a Samyang tilt for canon and have adapted to fuji. Fujifilm GFX also has tilt shift options. Thats not cheap tilt shift and it covers the larger sensors and is adapted to some digital backs. Not a professional option though.
Wouldn't a longer focal length lens achieve the same effect without cropping? Or is your point that the higher pixel count saves you from needing another lens? In that case, it's a matter of redundancy; you have more pixels than you need, so that you can afford to lose some. I don't think the video is making the case that fewer pixels is better, just the the benefits of more pixels is more limited and specific than often assumed.
I took up photography in 1970 when I joined the US Navy. I travelled all over the Mediterranean, Caribbean, etc. Even spent Christmas 1972 in Rome! I enjoyed your video very much.
Simon, this is another high value video. Like all of your work, is comprehensive, accurate and presented in an easy to comprehend delivery. Thanks for both the information and the comprehensible presentation.
@@jaakkotahtela123 , your comment is easy to make and even easier to think is correct only if you understand the concepts involved. If you knew the concepts before seeing the video then for you any length of time was wasted once you saw the complete video. On the other hand, if you knew nothing about the subject and only saw the conclusion you would know the answer but could never explain it to anybody, and thus would justifiably have little confidence in the answer. How do I know this? I have seen several presentations and only watched this one to the end precisely because I recognized and appreciated its value.
Great video. As a, theoretically, retired professional photographer, I now use the micro four thirds system of cameras. The two bodies I currently own are by Olympus, and are 16mp. I've happily printed images up to 40 inches by 30 inches, and the results look fabulous, completely supporting your comments regarding print sizes. In actual fact, they still stand up well, even under much closer viewing conditions 🙂
Same here. I "upgraded" from the E-M1 to the MkII because I felt I "had to" even tho I was perfectly happy with the original. Now I may upgrade to the E-M5 III simply for the lighter weight.
How many MP do you need? A very easy question to answer, as many pixels as make you happy. What makes one person happy is not the same what makes another person happy. And frankly, everybody is only concerned with their own happiness not somebody else. I know that I'm happy with 42MP from my Sony and not happy with 24MP from the other cameras I used, which includes Sony, Canon, Nikon, and Fuji.
I'm pretty sure that most people have an "over inflated" idea as to how many megapixels are required for a good looking page (A4 or letter) sized photo print and thoroughly outlandish expectation for a quart-page newspaper image. Up until very recently, billboard posters had "rosette" pixels which were almost 1/4" across, so even the resolution required for "the side of a building" sized prints is far lower than most people would expect. Of course, this is all presuming that most of the captured image is used, without much cropping and trying to blow up much fewer pixels into an acceptable printed image.
I won a camera club competition with a photo taken on a 2012 12mp camera, but it had been cropped to around 4mp. No one even commented on the lack of resolution, even though it had been enlarged to around 18" x 12". Currently I use cameras up to 45mp, but I still use that 12mp camera without any problems.
An issue rarely mentioned in the megapixel wars: framing. No, not framing for composition. I mean framing the photographic print you made. The more megapixels the larger the print you can have made the larger the frame will need to be to show off your great image. Frame, mat, glazing, backing, labor all go higher nearly exponentially as your print size increases.
A reason why canvas and acrylic prints are so popular in larger sizes. Framing large prints can be prohibitively expensive. Canvas and acrylic fit better into modern decor.
In 2005 or so, I made a full bleed, 16X20 print of a cheetah sleeping in a tree for my dentist, shot in the wild in Africa, not in a zoo. His image was effectively 1600 pixels on the long side. It's been hanging in his office since then. We were both astonished at the quality, admittedly from an excellent printer - my (long dead) Epson 9800.
This video is refreshing. I am so tired of gear pushers with GAS . I just watched a video where a kid said 16 mp is enough for social media if that's all you want to do. People need to get real 5 mp is enough for social media. But then again I'm old and come from 120 film my first digital camera for work was a 5d and I made a lot of money with that 12mp camera. I have had GAS a few times before I remembered that cameras do not take better pictures for you. Sorry this is my weekly rant.
Mr. d'Entremont, you are exactly the best communicator that I have ever listened to. Making all the controls in the camera, concepts about resolution, focus, real need of pixels, etc. something easy to understand goes a long way. Simple language is the secret of instruction and you are probably the best I have found in my life in possession of this art. Thank you for these videos that demystify the "bumba-bumba and yada-yada I hava found in books and classrooms...
I have a lovely framed print of one of my children. It measures 19 inches by 11 inches and was taken on my original Galaxy Note phone, with a camera sensor of just 2 megapixels. It is adequately sharp for the style of print and looks good. I see little appreciable difference between prints made with my Canon 40d, 5d mkiii, and my r5 when printed for hanging, mounted in a frame, for home use
All great points, but I’m always amused at the photographers who make such well thought out arguments for lower end gear, while owning all the very best.
It’s a fun observation, but as Simon has mentioned as well the need for the «best» is often more down to professional features like weather sealing, better build quality, dual card slots. Or they need some of the niche functionality that the equipment provides (insane resolution, higher speeds, low light capabilities etc). It’s true there are a lot of people that suffer from Gear Acquisition Syndrome or just overestimate what they need, but I’m glad they at least can recognize they could live with cheaper equipment.
16'x8' print from a slightly cropped D3 Nikon. It was hung on my Studio wall and people walked past at about 4 to 10 foot away. In about 10 years of customers and fellow professionals walking past and viewing it, not one ever questioned its quality. It was printed straight out of Photoshop without much work done on it bar contrast and exposure control. In fact I actually ADDED digital grain to it which is something I do to pretty much every image I ever take! I gain quite a few commissions because of that one image.
My goodness , I am basically you, I've taught courses on this, given lectures in auditoriums to large audiences for many years. Your speaking and incredible clarity , Your absolute passion and precision delivery of excellent accurate information has me humbled .Great work sir!
I printed a 40 inch morning sunrise /back lit photo from a 12mp Lumix Fz300 with a 25 -600 consistent f2.8 lens . The senor was the size of my little finger nail . I was totally amazed to how good it was . Way back in film days , I printed a 30 inch photo from a throw away fuji camera/film in box . To get the best photo I used a light meter to take the photo when the light was 250 at F11 --- either 400 or 800 asa film !. I used that photo at our mini lab to sell fuji throw away cameras . On another wall I had a similar 30 inch photo printed from a 645 120 negative . It was only when people had a comparison that they could see the and understand the difference --- nothing has really changed. There is so much BS out there ; mostly from the very early days of digital about file size/print size Today I'm totally happy with Olympus cameras between 16 and 20 px --- I think lol What gives me a laugh "best viewed FULL SCREEN" .
I made a spectacular 20x30 inch print from a 12 mp camera cropped to 6mp. It was a detailed city scape and could survive a fairly close inspection. That was 15 years ago.
I was recently discussing this video with a friend of mine who had shared it. After watching, I told him: “That’s the best explanation I have ever heard. This guy is a amazing teacher.” His reply, which I wholeheartedly agree with: “Simon is by far the best at providing and explaining photography related information.” Keep up the great work, Simon!
Thanks for the great video--most people have no idea what resolution they need in the real world. FWIW, the human eye can only resolve approximately 1 radian (1/60 degree) of their field of view. That means that if you are looking at an image which occupies 30 degrees of your horizontal field of view (what you would see looking at a movie screen from the dead-center seat of a well designed movie theater) a 1.5:1 aspect ratio image taken with a 2.16 megapixel sensor would look just as sharp as one taken with anything with more pixels. That, BTW is essentially how the 1080x1920 HDTV resolution standard was determined. Of course, as you noted, having a greater resolution than 2+ megapixels allows for cropping, but still. . . I've also sold many, many, 16x20 images from a 16 megapixel Olympus (admittedly with great glass) that are strikingly sharp.
I used to be eager to upgrade to higher mp cameras back in the day, because I thought there was a benefit of going from an 8 mp Canon 20D to 10 mp 40D to a 15 mp 50D, but that cooled off once I got to 18-20 mp in the 7D bodies. It seemed like diminishing returns at that point. A change in perspective also came when I printed heavily cropped photo I took of a Lapland Longspur on ice. I wasn't very close and couldn't get any closer. It was a fantastic photo opportunity, but I had to crop it down to around 2.0 mp to get the composition I wanted in the end. I upscaled it to print at 11x17@360ppi (my printer prints at 360dpi). The detail on the print was perfectly good when hung on a gallery wall I had set up at my workplace. I was astounded that it turned out as it did. That was years ago with software that didn't upscale as good as present day software.
Excellent video that explodes the myths regarding pixels. People are still being duped into buying 4K phones that are imposible to see any benefit from on a smart phone or any tv smaller than about 55 inches. Even most cinemas today are still only about 2K at best so if you think you are seeing 4K on your phone maybe you have been mislead. The videos may look better on a newer phone but that is not down to it being 4K.
I haven't even bought a camera yet but learning all I can until I get mine next month. Living in South Africa hoping to get into wildlife photography. Thank you Simon, you are a breathe of fresh air compared to most info channels. Honest and sincere....
Hey Paul, fellow South African here, be sure to take a good look at the lenses you want to start with as well as the lenses you want down the road, especially if pricing is a concern. a lot of brands are heavily overpriced here compared to overseas, especially Canon, I ended up going for Sony because of the pricing of third-party lenses, but there's a lot of others to choose from too
@akbarkamdar4906 thanks man. My plan is to understand exactly what I want/need in the next month and then compare prices on Amazon. I ship quite a bit of stuff from USA because even with shipping/duties its cheaper.
If you have a budget to work within, consider Micro Four Thirds. The lenses are much smaller, lighter, and less costly, and have an effective focal length twice that as a full frame. This means if you are shooting wildlife at a distance using a 200mm MFT lens, the subject will look like you shot it with a 400mm full frame lens. I used to go to national parks and compare my photos with those for sale at the gift shop. Very disappointing. A hobbyist will never have the time or money to get the same shot as a pro. A pro may wait a year for the right conditions, and take a thousand shots to pick out the best one. they will then enhance the picture with software. My camera is for memories, and just about any camera will take that sort of picture. Even a smart phone is plenty. If you need a lot of zoom and wide angle, Many bridge cameras do well. I bought a used one with a 42x zoom. I will often use it instead of my high dollar rigs.
Thanks Simon for a well reasoned explanation. I used to do sports photography for a local newspaper. I was using a 6MP sensor and sometimes cropping. The editors never had an issue with the resolution of my images. Even when players and teams asked for prints there were no issues. I find that with a good lens, a 15MP camera can be printed, with some work, up to 17" by 22", but life is a lot easier with a 24 to 26MP camera. My personal record was a 1 MP image (Kodak) printed at 12" by 16". It took a lot of work and filters to change the image to a watercolour effect. Cheating? Maybe, but it is art not reporting.
It's worth noting that 6MP is enough for most purposes. However, if you move from that to say 24mp, you can downsize that 24mp image to 6MP and get a massive reduction in noise as you'd then have 4 pixels being averaged to give one pixel that's far less likely to be influenced by noise and possibly dust particles on the sensor. A photographer with exemplary skills can blow up a low MP image to staggering dimensions and still have something that looks good. But, the bigger you want to go with a smaller number of MP, the better your technique and processing needs to be. The only real upper limit is on storage space, data transmission time and processing.
While working at the Department of Veterans Affairs in Sacramento/Mather we purchased a Canon D30 in 2003 it was a 2.1megapixel. I made a 24 x36 inch print of one of my staff and it worked perfectly using photoshop CS
One of the many things i've learned from following this channel... and one of the most critically important is - and i kid you not - that megapixels are far less important than is how hard you are able to jam the eyepiece against your eyebrow. The callous has ruined my good looks, but boy, has that technique improved my long-lens performance.
So glad you covered this. Digital resolution is definitely a hot topic right now. I taught the ad department at a firm I used to work photoshop and indesign. The most requested topic was DPI and digital resolution. The cameras we had back then were around 12mp. That was 2000. Social media has caused some pros to stop thinking about DPI and optical resolution. Very nicely done!
12Mpixels in 2000? Which camera. Highly doubt. Maybe a Leaf digital back? Not even prior to 2003. But it was not a camera, it was a scanner. Nikon D1 was 2.7Mp and D2X was in 2004.
I have one counter example for you (though your logic, generally speaking, works) - we have a large photo from our wedding on our living room wall (~30x40"). It is a photo of us and all of our guests shot from the second floor balcony. Our wedding photographer used to take it to bridal shows, when he found a more photogenetic group of people, he replaced it and we bought it from him at a discount. You can probably guess why this is a counter example already - everybody that sees the photo walks right up to it, and from 8" (or less) away starts looking to find themselves or somebody they know in the photo. We are old timers however so the question of megapixels was never asked - it was shot on an analog camera with 2"x2" film negatives.
Thank you so much for all your videos. I have learned so much . My husband got me a Camera for Christmas. I was always using my cell phone for my photography. I love photography. I have loved it since I was in high school I loved photography class going in the dark room and developing my own photos. So my husband got me the canon EOS T7. It’s a great beginner camera and I didn’t think I was ever going to get off the auto mode but just six months later I’m ready to upgrade my camera. And have a Canon telephoto lens 100 to 400 mm on order and arriving soon. Last week I practiced on shooting birds in flight from all the tips that you have given. Thank you again you are my favorite to watch on photography and have learned so much.
Upon running across your YT channel, I immediately subscribed. Your ability to present complex topics in a brief and concise way without becoming boring, is a gift that’s hard to find. You have become one of my few “go to “ sources for pro level photography knowledge. You have taught me a lot and I thank you. Please continue the great work. Your photos are predictably amazing!
I once (early digital days) made an 11x14 from a 3MP point and shoot that was fantastic. The other great thing about DXO's database relates to age: when evaluating sensors, they also supply the year the sensor was manufactured, which is significant since - as time goes on - these sensors get better and better. Thanks for the video.
As a graphic artist for print and digital as well as an engineer and also used to own a printing company, here is techno-info that most graphic artists do not know. Printers, for full color magazines, ask for 300dpi photos, but this is actually larger than is needed. The reason is that printing presses actually do not use DPI at all, but LPI (Lines per inch). For example, a full color magazine will print at 150LPI, a B&W magazine is 120LPI, and old fashion newsprint is as low as 65 LPI. LPI is part of the halftoning process. I will not go into all that here, but the science behind LPI's results has a formula, which simplified to its final form (doing some Algebra) is this: LPI * √2, or in English, LPI multiplied by (the Square-Root of 2). A full color magazine printing at 150 LPI, would require a photo of (150LPI * 1.440 = 212 DPI). A photo of 212 DPI will appear the same in the magazine as a 1200 DPI photo or any photo greater than 212 DPI. For B&W magazines (are there any left?) would only require a photo of 170 DPI. Color newspapers are even lower. The √2 is equal to 1.4142135623730950, but that that is hard to do in one's head, so graphic artists who are aware of this formula, would simply use 1.5 instead of 1.4142135623730950 as a rule of thumb that can be done in one's head. Using the ule of thumb, a magazine with 150LPI, would result in 150*1.5, or 225 DPI. This is how most use the formula. In application, this is important if you have an image that you crop down too small. Also, if you submit a photo to a printed piece and the image is going to be enlarged, for best quality, ensure the now enlarged photo's part still exceeds the LPI requirement. Funny thing is that even most of today's printers and graphic artists are unaware of this, whereas back in the 1990's most everyone knew it. Today they just know what works and say 300DPI and it seems to work, so they use it...not knowing why. But if it works it works. Back when hard drive space was premium and one would typeset a magazine, we would use whatever resolution photos we were given. The size on disk would be in gigabytes! It would really slow down the computer. But as the magazine was typeset and done, our software had the option to save a final version to reduce the photo and images to the actual required DPI size. This would make the size on the hard drives a magnitude smaller! And of course, when the final magazine is printed, resulting in no loss in quality. BTW, Adobe Acrobat does this all the time by giving you options for the created PDF to be displayed on a screen, print, or archive. So here is a small novel with old information that might be of interest to some.
Speaking as a professional graphic designer, with 30 years' experience, I've been trying to explain this to clients for years. People just don't seem to get it. Many times I've been tasked with creating exhibition graphics 10 metres and up, using key art with a max res of 300dpi at A4. Absolutely not a problem. Just scale up the artwork to the required size, and let the resolution naturally fall off. It can go as low as it needs, because, as Simon so clearly points out, you are standing further back the larger the image is- so the resolution issue is simply a non-issue.
If I was going through college again I'd seek out any courses you teach. Great clarity of information, presented with an amount of detail and comparisons that makes so much sense. A great match with how I enjoy learning.
About time somebody took on this subject . Even 50 years ago , when I started photography , I learned in my course that the primary concern for a large/ medium/fine grain film , was the intended viewing distance of the finished print . I still shoot film today on a regular basis , and for digital , I have been using a 10.2 megapixel Nikon D3000. I bought this in 2010 and have no intention in getting caught up in the pixel race . I regularly make 16X 24 inch prints . If I want to make bigger prints , I use my C330. No problem ! Thank you for bringing this to the attention of the pixel hungry public who I think are often lured into wasting money by the advertisers.
I think that's why every pro photographer 30 years ago was using medium format for portrait work. It always produced grainless enlargements. 35mm was hideous in this respect.
@@keithwiebe1787 Yes. No pro photographer used any less for portraits and advertising shots.. The C220 /C330 and the RB 67 plus Pentax 6X7 were the most popular here in South Africa . The Rolleiflex was extremely expensive . Also have a 1956 Yashica D in perfect working condition and I use it every couple of weeks . Amazing qualtity durable camera.
Finally a voice of sanity in this wilderness. I use Fuji XH2 and XT4 cameras in my work, but my everyday carry is a Panasonic GX80 with “only” 16MP. When I use prime lenses I regularly make A2+ prints from it that are tack sharp with no visible noise from a normal viewing angle. A good friend is a professional portrait photographer who still uses his 12MP Nikon, and he frequently makes exhibition prints that are over 2 meters on the long side. Most exhibition viewers assume he’s using a medium format camera.
I wanna add an unpopular reason to have more MP: folks who do 3D scan with photogrammetry. You can get amazingly more detailed models with a higher MP camera, but other than that niche, totally agree with Simon, Incredible video
After watching your videos I sometimes have to admit to myself that I had originally learned or understood certain aspects of photography incorrectly. And I realize I've been wrong because of how you make these somerimes complicated subjects so easy to grasp. Also I like the more advanced photographer approach. I've seen too many videos going over stuff I've known for years. Tnanks and please keep making these informative videos because I can not learn too much about photography.
I love your common sense approach to explaining photography. its so easy to get wrapped around the axle over the wrong things when purchasing tech that its really valuable to get that real world experience that you share.
Considering what you use your photos for is very important. I use mine to illustrate music videos on RUclips. My archaic 10 megapixel Canon Rebel with high quality prime lenses gives me photos that are more than adequate for display on any smartphone, tablet or laptop screen. In fact, even my iPhone X photos are also more than adequate.
I have probably watched 100 vids over the years on how many MGP needed, this was by far the most useful and "real world" oriented and I have been happy with large prints made from my Sony APC a6600 camera.
Great video. Megapixels is definitely not the most important thing on digital. I absolutely love shooting with my old Sony A100, not only because of how good it feels to use, but because I simply love the results I get from its "measly" 10 megapixel CCD sensor and its very pleasing, natural look. With some final refinements using Affinity Photo, I get really beautiful results!
Great video Simon, but I'd like to offer a counterpoint. It's important to note that a sensor with a higher pixel density can be beneficial for generating sharper image output, as the pixels will be downsized. The same applies to image noise reduction. With downsampling, noise tends to be lower. This is not to discredit the points made in the video, but rather to add another perspective to the discussion.
This is the reason I chose the Nikon Z7ii over the Z6ii. I crop my photos quite alot and the 45mp was just the better choice for me. I cant wait to start shooting with it and the Z 180-600mm. (I also spent the difference on the camera itself instead of buying a teleconverter, especially with a variable aperture lens)
This is a great video. I've been taking photos for over 40 years. Starting with film, going through all of the megapixel resolutions with Canon and little Nikon. Simon has captured and presented the hard lessons I've learned very well. Old pros will know I'm right. Everybody else you may want to take this info to heart.
I'm into aviation photography and after weeks of consulting your content, I bought my first DSLR yesterday and I'm absolutely thrilled to see what I can do with all of the tips I have picked up from the channel. Thank you Simon!
In the old days, I got some great 8x10 prints from a 2.0 MP camera. These prints are sharp enough that I am very certain that I could blow them up a lot more. The best camera in the world is the one that you've got with you!
I’m so happy that advice like this talked me out of the Canon R5 and into the more capable in most aspects Canon R6 MK 2. The more I research the more satisfied I am with that decision
Being very new to photography, I wanted to add something I learned from coming over from astrophotography. One thing I did, wrong or right, I went pixel chasing with my astro camera (specially cooled cameras). The thing that really stuck out to me more than the importance of resolution, MP, or whatever, is really the pixel size. The smaller the pixel, the lower the noise (kind of, has to do with the electron well), and the crisper the pictures. That was really important to me and can really help make you images pop. One one to "figure out" the pixel size and kind of why people go down these rabbit holes to get the highest pixel is that they are somewhat related. The higher the pixel count on a the same sensor, the smaller the pixel, and the sharper it looks. With that being said, I recently bought an a7r IV, which takes amazing pictures, and have a dedicated astro camera that is only 9MP, BUT both have the same pixel size. Thinking about it, I could go the route of a crop sensor and a cheaper camera than the a7R IV, and create mosaics with Photoshop (what I did with the astro camera), but I have to admit the larger field of view I get with the a7R IV is just so nice.
That is interesting, I would have thought the smaller the pixel the less signal. When you get to photon level (like I think astrophotography goes) the noise in the signa (not camera or ccd) is quantum noise limited which is sqrt(N) so from that point of view signal to noise ratio is N/sqrt(N). If you have 100 photons you S/N is 100/sqrt(10) = 10:1 , but if you double the pixel size you collect 400 photons and your S/N is 400/sqrt(400) = 20:1. Also electronics noise is independent of signal so more signal better S/N which also points to the benefit of a larger pixels size. But what do I know, I'm probably wrong.
Great video! One point I would note is that the DxOMark score in P-Mpix is best considered as a ratio to the sensor resolution that it was tested on. When I was shopping for pro quality Micro 4/3 lenses, I was crestfallen to find that the sharpest lens is only 16 P-Mpix, compared to over 30 for the best Canon and Nikon lenses! But they are actually about the same in optical quality.
I thought I know enough about photography until I started watching your videos. It looks like I am wrong. Also I am now much comfortable using my APS-C camera after watching this video. Took some great photos too. Truly eye opening.
Simon, I'm with you. I shoot with a Nikon D780 (24 mp, full-frame) or a Nikon D7500 (21 mp, crop sensor) and I've never felt that either holds back my photography. By the way I'm an avid amateur enthusiast. When the camera starts limiting my work, I'll think about a new one.
Your videos are always exceptionally well done with great info, but this one is phenomenal! I am an amateur living in New England, with an a7iii Sony. Just upgraded glass from Tamron 28-200 to Tamron 70-180. ( glass is far more important then the body) Years back, I had a 10 megapixel Canon with a entry level zoom from Canon. I photographed a friends wedding with it and I put the pics in a wedding album for them. The bride & groom later told me that they never bought the professional photographer’s work, because mine looked better to them.
I have a Nikon DSLR with a very good 18-140mm zoom, and I use it on occasion, but in the past couple of years, my go-to camera has been a Sony CyberShot RX-100 II. Zoom is shorter than I'd like (only out to 100mm), but the Zeiss lens is superb. 20 MP has produced excellent 16 x 20 prints. I like it so much I bought a second one (newer model with zoom out to 200mm), but the newer one's Zeiss lens is not as sharp as the shorter zoom of the first one, so I use it much less. Both Sonys easily fit in a pocket, not true, of course, of my Nikon. When I'm hiking, not having to lug a camera bag and gear is of great value to my elderly (78) knees.
This is a great explanation. I used to generate 100mpxl images from 6x7 film negatives and the detail was amazing. But you had to be a few inches from the print to see it.
I used to own a Canon EOS 30D and it was an 8 mega-pixel camera and I got excellent results with it every time I used it. I use now the Canon 5DS with 50 mega-pixels and get excellent photos as well but not better in terms of overall image quality but when it comes to great crops the 5DS rocks!
Thank you Simon - although I love the freedom a 60 MP sensor in terms of carrying only one lens, I also appreciate my 24mp sensor. And as always my wife brings me to my Senses when she has large 40x60 cm prints made from her Iphone 12 - they look great, just processed using the native Iphone Fotos app. Thanks for your great, very relevant content competently presented.
Great video. My first digital SLR was a Nikon D40 with 6Mp. Using it with the kit zoom I have printed a 500X900mm (20X36") landscape and it is great. It is framed an hanging in my lounge. Viewing distance is the key. Even at reading distance it is still sharper than most cell phones will get at a quarter of that size.
Great explanation on when more megapixels matter and when they don’t. Love your style of teaching with your videos Simon. Always worth viewing. Greetings from 🇦🇺
A great explanation, thank you. And don't forget, a million megapixels is wasted if the image is crap to start with. Many will say "I'm a great photographer, my camera has 50mp". How many megapixels in some of the magnificent early monochrome prints that still stand out today ?
What’s the largest print you’ve ever made and how many megapixels was the original? I’d love to know!
A2,45megapixels no cropping, no upsizing, shot with Nikon D850
The Milky way like in my profile photo printed as 24x16 inch from a little canon 200d. It's a blend of 3 truck light painted foregrounds with a 10 image stacked sky but only know it was 23.2mb
This week, I printed a TIF from a 20MP 5DMII to 30x50 gallery wrap on canvas. The printer did use Topaz Gigapixel--so not sure how much that helped. There is no noticeable pixilation or noise on the final print which is of a freight train coming out of the fog. That's my largest print so far and will hang at Norfolk Southern office in Atlanta. Years ago I did a series of lily pad flower pictures that all got printed for a hotel chain (the boring pictures that hang in your hotel room:). Those were all shot on a 6MP original Canon Rebel and were enlarged to 16x20. I just looked at those files this morning and noticed they were all shot with a 100mm 2.8 Macro---lens makes a huge difference too:)
24x20 of a deep crop taken with a D7100 with a 300mm f4 that was up-sampled. From me usual sitting position, 18=24" away, the hummingbird's is sharp enough.
40x28 inch lake landscape, very little editing on lightroom nothing more. Olympus E-M1mk3 with 12-40mm f2,8 lens.
I love how Simon beats technical gibberish with logic.🥰
Yes 😂 😂 I agree,I inherited 2 really nice in excellent condition Nikon D-300 AND a Nikon D-90 Dslr's from after my Father passed away last year& I love them.Simon just saved me alot of money 😆 Because I was going to trade them in& get higher megapixel cam,BUT I did the same test Simon talks about& Me& a couple of friends an my lady don't see noticeable difference blur etc.As long as your not"breathing hot breath" 🤭all up close,its NOT huge difference! The average photographer doesn't need super megapixel cams.UNLESS they're really making massive posters etc* 12+mp is enough from both my cams and we've printed out poster sized pics an they're great looking.....Simon you are absolutely awesome,witty and very intelligent sir!Stay creative an we LOVE YOUR CHANNEL& YOUR ENTHUSIASTIC ENERGY!Thank you for all you do ✌🙏
14 minutes long?? I've seen this answered in 30 seconds on Kelby One.
@@jnielsen1956 Still you had to watch a 14 min vid.
@@NSA.Monitored.Device Ha, ha. No, I moved on after a minute and a half.
@@jnielsen1956Funny how you devaluate your "point" one way or another.^^
My son (6) is autistic, and he takes photos of things to help him handle transitions or having to put away/eat things he isn't ready to part with. Currently he has to use his tablet but that has quite a lot of problems to it. We're hoping to get him a good, budget, older digital camera he can use instead. We brought one of those kid cameras a couple years back and it's so awful you can hardly tell what it is. 🙄 This video is really helping me understand what we need to get for him to get nice photos and hopefully grow his love for photography. :)
When creating a billboard as a graphic designer, I was so nervous to see the outcome when learning it was 15dpi. They gave me a test cropped section of the picture bc I wanted to check colours and it looked like a blur.... When viewing it from across the street it was sharp as anything and so happy as it cost a lot to put up. I've never worked that big
Hey Simon, Just found your channel and you're a great presenter. I go on a trip tomorrow in the Kimberleys (aus)... For landscapes is there any use for a 50mm prime lens or just go with a 18-85... I thought it would be fun to take a nice camera...
I do professional work and handle large format print and can say high DPI isn't needed. It also costs more to print and you'll never notice it.
I just found Simon’s video collection on YT. He speaks clearly, with some pace, and doesn’t include content that’s unrelated to the subject(s) of the video(s), staying “on task.” He provides tremendous clarity to what are generally pretty confusing topics. His videos are really, really well done, and his captured images, used in the videos, are quite impressive. I’m subscribing so I don’t miss future content. Thank you, Simon. 😊
Too kind! Thanks!
The old man's not madly chasing views one of the best in the niche
I had to watch to this video again, some months later, to reassure myself that my Canon APS-C 24MP camera would meet my needs for the foreseeable future. I knew I would get clear, concise information; info I could trust. Thank you Simon. Best wishes to you and yours for 2024, from a fellow Bluenoser.
Go for it neighbor!
I recently visited the offices of a company I used to work for, and they still have several 18x24 photos hanging that I took in 2001 on a 3.1mp Canon D30. Back then I couldn’t imagine it how it could get any better.
I still have my D30. It takes brilliant photos with that 50 mm.
I had Canon D30 somewhere around 2000, the image quality was dismal compared to modern cameras. In fact the image quality was improving by leaps and bounds at that time, so every year the resolution was doubling and noise was reduced. I think in 5 years I had it, its price went down from $3000 to $300.
until recently i was shooting on a nikon D50, which is "only" 6 megapixels. the photos it took were gorgeous, and it's a shame i had to replace it. i'm happy with my olympus om-d em10, of course, but "only" 6 megapixels is good enough in 2023.
i actually want that camera because it has the lowest noise of almost any camera..
Sony Mavica was my first camera. 0.6Mp. Great for candids because no one recognized it as a camera. People thought I was watching TV.
I took a 16 MP photo of a drifting car on a race track on a 14-year old DSLR, cropped it in so it’s around 12 MP, and printed it on a 3-feet-by-2-feet canvas. It’s hanging above my bed and I get compliments on how sharp it looks. It’s been a few months and I still can’t beat that photo to this day.
Also, congrats on becoming a Canon ambassador!🎉
My canon 350D only has 8😭
@@ivojansen7625 450 d here with 12mp lol i love this thing tho
@ivojansen7625 it's enough. I shot some amazing photos lately on a 2004 Panasonic Lumix DMC-LC1 with the leica lens. Quite sharp and still fantastic BW performance
That is not a highly detailed image so you don't need many megapixels to communicate the feeling.
10 MP
In this day and age of 45 and 60 megapixels, the SWEET SPOT is still 24MP in my opinion....just the right file size, plenty of details, fast enough for slower cards, plenty of cropping headroom and won't degrade high ISO IQ that much
Agreed, or around that area at least. 26MP gives you a 6K sensor which IMO is perfect. I’ve had 40+ MP sensors and tested 60+ ones. The file sizes are waaay too big. A few situations where I was glad I had it for a couple of large prints to be viewed up close. But otherwise just a waste of space most of the time.
I’d rather stick with ~26MP and then just *rent* a high megapixel camera for the times you would need it
If you are a Nikon shooter, the cost of a D800 has gone down so drastically that I'd suggest it if you want one on hand.
In 2009, my wife and I took our honeymoon in Victoria, B.C. While there, I just happened to get a photo out over the water of a lighthouse on an island with a tall masted ship going by in the background. Truthfully, it's not a great photo, but we liked it, and it reminds us of our time there. The image was taken with a Canon 40D, which had, as I recall, a 10 MP sensor. Now I cropped the original image by about a factor of two in both axes, which means the end result only had 2.5 MP. We had that printed on canvas at 36 inches on the diagonal and it hangs on the wall of my wife's home office above a day bed. You don't view it closer than about 6 feet away. To my untrained amateur eye, it looks great!
Beautiful island and always enjoyed my visit there. It would be even more awesome if a humpback whale 🐳 graced the lighthouse background. But yeah even 10 MP photos are good enough for large prints. I worked for a large format printer and we'd print all sizes and generally the larger the print the lower the DPI needed. We've done prints from 20 years ago that's only 2 MP and with a bit of enhancements they still look great.
I did a shoot in 2013 with 18 megapixel camera and it was on 80 feet wide billboard..... It was looking tremendously sharp..... I used the viewing distance calculations and applied output sharpening technique in a very effective manner..... I'm glad that you made this vide as many many people are extreamly confused in megapixel war... Keep up great work
Damn! This channel is very informative. No fluff, just straight to the point. Good work.
Great advice Simon.
As a 12 MP shooter on my old Nikon D300s, I couldn't be happier.
Same here, also shooting Nikon D300s, great camera.
Same here, I love both of mine, one with the grip and one without. Love the controls on the outside.
John
D300s is a terrific camera. A delight to shoot with and still turns out great images.
I’m still shooting with the D300, D700, and FujiS5Pro (which was marketed as 12MP, but technically 1/2 that because of the pixel design of the sensor). All of these bodies continue to produce beautiful warm photos, with a color pallet seemingly lost as newer and “better” cameras made them extinct. Guys are swarming back to their digital roots in the D700, and are all saying the same thing: color, color, color! These old bodies deliver a film like feel with their images. We have printed 16x23 photos that look crazy beautiful. Most of my work is portraits, so these bodies will continue to be work horses until they give up the ghost.
@@dobrofool I have been loving using the s5 pro, I’ve been shooting the canon 5d classic for years and am enjoying the fun little Fuji.
I'm a commercial photographer who uses 100-200mp digital backs. The thing most people don't touch on is having the ability to make deep crops for the purpose of maintaining depth of field. I've shot automotive campaigns in studio for major manufacturers. When shooting a 3/4 angle it's necessary to pull the camera further away to have the car sharp bumper to bumper. You can only stop down so far until diffraction starts working against you.
For professional commercial work more megapixels is always better. But you need to know how to use them correctly.
I guess this will depend on whats available for your system but tilt shift lenses are made exactly for that purpose.
@@BenAndrews tilt-shift lenses were made not for commercial photography, tbh. I'm sure that you can use them in that way, buy ususally they're less sharp and made for FF or cropped cameras. 100-200mp digital backs that were mentioned are Phase One, Hasselblad or Pentax ones and medium format only. There are no tilt-shift lenses for such big sensors on the market as far as I can remember
@@casualcoffeeshooter of course there are tilt-shift lenses for medium format. I've used 2 of them. Not sure what brand, since I used them 15 years ago in the studio where I was studying photography. There are quite a few options. A number of bellows based options that are around, some are mated to a lens and some allow you to put on any lens you like in whatever system its designed for.
A quick search on google shows Hasselblad make a tilt shit adapter. I suspect thats similar to one I used, since we shot our product photos on a Hass. Theres also the Fotodiox Pro ROKR adapters, and a bunch of bellows options.
I own a Samyang tilt for canon and have adapted to fuji. Fujifilm GFX also has tilt shift options. Thats not cheap tilt shift and it covers the larger sensors and is adapted to some digital backs. Not a professional option though.
@@casualcoffeeshootersure there are. Hasselblad has an adapter or you put the back on a view camera
Wouldn't a longer focal length lens achieve the same effect without cropping? Or is your point that the higher pixel count saves you from needing another lens? In that case, it's a matter of redundancy; you have more pixels than you need, so that you can afford to lose some.
I don't think the video is making the case that fewer pixels is better, just the the benefits of more pixels is more limited and specific than often assumed.
I took up photography in 1970 when I joined the US Navy. I travelled all over the Mediterranean, Caribbean, etc. Even spent Christmas 1972 in Rome! I enjoyed your video very much.
FINALLY !!!!!!!!!!!!
I have been looking for this information for decades ( since the year 2000 ) THANK YOU !!!!!!!
You are welcome!
Simon, this is another high value video. Like all of your work, is comprehensive, accurate and presented in an easy to comprehend delivery. Thanks for both the information and the comprehensible presentation.
Would have been a high value video if it had been under 5 minutes. Now it was unnecessarily long
@@jaakkotahtela123 , your comment is easy to make and even easier to think is correct only if you understand the concepts involved. If you knew the concepts before seeing the video then for you any length of time was wasted once you saw the complete video. On the other hand, if you knew nothing about the subject and only saw the conclusion you would know the answer but could never explain it to anybody, and thus would justifiably have little confidence in the answer. How do I know this? I have seen several presentations and only watched this one to the end precisely because I recognized and appreciated its value.
Many thanks!
@@jaakkotahtela123🙄
@@iridium8341 , the comments in the remainder of the thread says you are in the minority.
This man is an absolute genius!
Great video. As a, theoretically, retired professional photographer, I now use the micro four thirds system of cameras. The two bodies I currently own are by Olympus, and are 16mp. I've happily printed images up to 40 inches by 30 inches, and the results look fabulous, completely supporting your comments regarding print sizes. In actual fact, they still stand up well, even under much closer viewing conditions 🙂
Same here. I "upgraded" from the E-M1 to the MkII because I felt I "had to" even tho I was perfectly happy with the original. Now I may upgrade to the E-M5 III simply for the lighter weight.
How many MP do you need? A very easy question to answer, as many pixels as make you happy. What makes one person happy is not the same what makes another person happy. And frankly, everybody is only concerned with their own happiness not somebody else. I know that I'm happy with 42MP from my Sony and not happy with 24MP from the other cameras I used, which includes Sony, Canon, Nikon, and Fuji.
Can you recommend a professional printing company that you use for large prints? Thanks!
Similar, 67 here; been using 16MP bodies for years; 99.99% of my stuff is never printed- monitor viewed,....so no worries.
I'm pretty sure that most people have an "over inflated" idea as to how many megapixels are required for a good looking page (A4 or letter) sized photo print and thoroughly outlandish expectation for a quart-page newspaper image. Up until very recently, billboard posters had "rosette" pixels which were almost 1/4" across, so even the resolution required for "the side of a building" sized prints is far lower than most people would expect. Of course, this is all presuming that most of the captured image is used, without much cropping and trying to blow up much fewer pixels into an acceptable printed image.
It was interesting to see the upscaled duck eye at 9:57 looking sharper than either the 18MP or 3MP image.
I won a camera club competition with a photo taken on a 2012 12mp camera, but it had been cropped to around 4mp. No one even commented on the lack of resolution, even though it had been enlarged to around 18" x 12". Currently I use cameras up to 45mp, but I still use that 12mp camera without any problems.
One of the internet's best explainers sheds some light on the megapixel measure mystery ... . Thanks / Merci ...
Wow, thank you!
An issue rarely mentioned in the megapixel wars: framing. No, not framing for composition. I mean framing the photographic print you made. The more megapixels the larger the print you can have made the larger the frame will need to be to show off your great image. Frame, mat, glazing, backing, labor all go higher nearly exponentially as your print size increases.
I print poster size photos and proper framing cost me at least $200 or more.
A reason why canvas and acrylic prints are so popular in larger sizes. Framing large prints can be prohibitively expensive. Canvas and acrylic fit better into modern decor.
Canvas and acrylic is not to everyone's taste. If you're decorating in neoclassic style you're bound to use frames and passepartout.
In 2005 or so, I made a full bleed, 16X20 print of a cheetah sleeping in a tree for my dentist, shot in the wild in Africa, not in a zoo. His image was effectively 1600 pixels on the long side. It's been hanging in his office since then. We were both astonished at the quality, admittedly from an excellent printer - my (long dead) Epson 9800.
This video is refreshing. I am so tired of gear pushers with GAS . I just watched a video where a kid said 16 mp is enough for social media if that's all you want to do. People need to get real 5 mp is enough for social media. But then again I'm old and come from 120 film my first digital camera for work was a 5d and I made a lot of money with that 12mp camera. I have had GAS a few times before I remembered that cameras do not take better pictures for you. Sorry this is my weekly rant.
Mr. d'Entremont, you are exactly the best communicator that I have ever listened to. Making all the controls in the camera, concepts about resolution, focus, real need of pixels, etc. something easy to understand goes a long way. Simple language is the secret of instruction and you are probably the best I have found in my life in possession of this art. Thank you for these videos that demystify the "bumba-bumba and yada-yada I hava found in books and classrooms...
I have a lovely framed print of one of my children. It measures 19 inches by 11 inches and was taken on my original Galaxy Note phone, with a camera sensor of just 2 megapixels. It is adequately sharp for the style of print and looks good. I see little appreciable difference between prints made with my Canon 40d, 5d mkiii, and my r5 when printed for hanging, mounted in a frame, for home use
Original galaxy note n7000 had 8 mp camera
@@deepgeny1 You are right. The front facing camera was 2 megapixels. My mistake....the print still looks good though
All great points, but I’m always amused at the photographers who make such well thought out arguments for lower end gear, while owning all the very best.
It’s a fun observation, but as Simon has mentioned as well the need for the «best» is often more down to professional features like weather sealing, better build quality, dual card slots. Or they need some of the niche functionality that the equipment provides (insane resolution, higher speeds, low light capabilities etc). It’s true there are a lot of people that suffer from Gear Acquisition Syndrome or just overestimate what they need, but I’m glad they at least can recognize they could live with cheaper equipment.
16'x8' print from a slightly cropped D3 Nikon. It was hung on my Studio wall and people walked past at about 4 to 10 foot away. In about 10 years of customers and fellow professionals walking past and viewing it, not one ever questioned its quality. It was printed straight out of Photoshop without much work done on it bar contrast and exposure control. In fact I actually ADDED digital grain to it which is something I do to pretty much every image I ever take! I gain quite a few commissions because of that one image.
My goodness , I am basically you, I've taught courses on this, given lectures in auditoriums to large audiences for many years. Your speaking and incredible clarity , Your absolute passion and precision delivery of excellent accurate information has me humbled .Great work sir!
I printed a 40 inch morning sunrise /back lit photo from a 12mp Lumix Fz300 with a 25 -600 consistent f2.8 lens . The senor was the size of my little finger nail . I was totally amazed to how good it was .
Way back in film days , I printed a 30 inch photo from a throw away fuji camera/film in box . To get the best photo I used a light meter to take the photo when the light was 250 at F11 --- either 400 or 800 asa film !. I used that photo at our mini lab to sell fuji throw away cameras . On another wall I had a similar 30 inch photo printed from a 645 120 negative .
It was only when people had a comparison that they could see the and understand the difference --- nothing has really changed.
There is so much BS out there ; mostly from the very early days of digital about file size/print size
Today I'm totally happy with Olympus cameras between 16 and 20 px --- I think lol
What gives me a laugh "best viewed FULL SCREEN" .
Some of my best A3 prints were made from a 16 MP m4/3 bodies, paired with good quality Olympus primes, like the 45/1.2 Pro. Stunningly sharp.
I made a spectacular 20x30 inch print from a 12 mp camera cropped to 6mp. It was a detailed city scape and could survive a fairly close inspection. That was 15 years ago.
I was recently discussing this video with a friend of mine who had shared it. After watching, I told him:
“That’s the best explanation I have ever heard. This guy is a amazing teacher.”
His reply, which I wholeheartedly agree with:
“Simon is by far the best at providing and explaining photography related information.”
Keep up the great work, Simon!
Too kind!
Thanks for the great video--most people have no idea what resolution they need in the real world. FWIW, the human eye can only resolve approximately 1 radian (1/60 degree) of their field of view. That means that if you are looking at an image which occupies 30 degrees of your horizontal field of view (what you would see looking at a movie screen from the dead-center seat of a well designed movie theater) a 1.5:1 aspect ratio image taken with a 2.16 megapixel sensor would look just as sharp as one taken with anything with more pixels. That, BTW is essentially how the 1080x1920 HDTV resolution standard was determined. Of course, as you noted, having a greater resolution than 2+ megapixels allows for cropping, but still. . .
I've also sold many, many, 16x20 images from a 16 megapixel Olympus (admittedly with great glass) that are strikingly sharp.
My go-to RUclips source when I need accurate, thorough and uniquely insightful guidance. Thank you, Simon, for this and all of your other videos.
Best video on this subject I've ever seen on the internet.
Most knowledgeable RUclipsr I've seen. Thankyou for handling complicated topics and making them make sense!!!
I used to be eager to upgrade to higher mp cameras back in the day, because I thought there was a benefit of going from an 8 mp Canon 20D to 10 mp 40D to a 15 mp 50D, but that cooled off once I got to 18-20 mp in the 7D bodies. It seemed like diminishing returns at that point. A change in perspective also came when I printed heavily cropped photo I took of a Lapland Longspur on ice. I wasn't very close and couldn't get any closer. It was a fantastic photo opportunity, but I had to crop it down to around 2.0 mp to get the composition I wanted in the end. I upscaled it to print at 11x17@360ppi (my printer prints at 360dpi). The detail on the print was perfectly good when hung on a gallery wall I had set up at my workplace. I was astounded that it turned out as it did. That was years ago with software that didn't upscale as good as present day software.
Excellent video that explodes the myths regarding pixels. People are still being duped into buying 4K phones that are imposible to see any benefit from on a smart phone or any tv smaller than about 55 inches. Even most cinemas today are still only about 2K at best so if you think you are seeing 4K on your phone maybe you have been mislead. The videos may look better on a newer phone but that is not down to it being 4K.
Thanks Simon. Great video.
I've been shooting with Nikon D750 for years, both day and night and it's just fine at 24mp. A 30x40" print looks great
I haven't even bought a camera yet but learning all I can until I get mine next month. Living in South Africa hoping to get into wildlife photography.
Thank you Simon, you are a breathe of fresh air compared to most info channels. Honest and sincere....
I’m off to Africa in June! Can’t wait!
Invest in the glass, not the body
Hey Paul, fellow South African here, be sure to take a good look at the lenses you want to start with as well as the lenses you want down the road, especially if pricing is a concern. a lot of brands are heavily overpriced here compared to overseas, especially Canon, I ended up going for Sony because of the pricing of third-party lenses, but there's a lot of others to choose from too
@akbarkamdar4906 thanks man. My plan is to understand exactly what I want/need in the next month and then compare prices on Amazon. I ship quite a bit of stuff from USA because even with shipping/duties its cheaper.
If you have a budget to work within, consider Micro Four Thirds. The lenses are much smaller, lighter, and less costly, and have an effective focal length twice that as a full frame. This means if you are shooting wildlife at a distance using a 200mm MFT lens, the subject will look like you shot it with a 400mm full frame lens.
I used to go to national parks and compare my photos with those for sale at the gift shop. Very disappointing. A hobbyist will never have the time or money to get the same shot as a pro. A pro may wait a year for the right conditions, and take a thousand shots to pick out the best one. they will then enhance the picture with software.
My camera is for memories, and just about any camera will take that sort of picture. Even a smart phone is plenty. If you need a lot of zoom and wide angle, Many bridge cameras do well. I bought a used one with a 42x zoom. I will often use it instead of my high dollar rigs.
Not only the voice of reason, but with the ability to explain it in a meaningful way. Thank you Simon.
Thanks Simon for a well reasoned explanation. I used to do sports photography for a local newspaper. I was using a 6MP sensor and sometimes cropping. The editors never had an issue with the resolution of my images. Even when players and teams asked for prints there were no issues.
I find that with a good lens, a 15MP camera can be printed, with some work, up to 17" by 22", but life is a lot easier with a 24 to 26MP camera.
My personal record was a 1 MP image (Kodak) printed at 12" by 16". It took a lot of work and filters to change the image to a watercolour effect. Cheating? Maybe, but it is art not reporting.
It's worth noting that 6MP is enough for most purposes. However, if you move from that to say 24mp, you can downsize that 24mp image to 6MP and get a massive reduction in noise as you'd then have 4 pixels being averaged to give one pixel that's far less likely to be influenced by noise and possibly dust particles on the sensor.
A photographer with exemplary skills can blow up a low MP image to staggering dimensions and still have something that looks good. But, the bigger you want to go with a smaller number of MP, the better your technique and processing needs to be.
The only real upper limit is on storage space, data transmission time and processing.
While working at the Department of Veterans Affairs in Sacramento/Mather we purchased a Canon D30 in 2003 it was a 2.1megapixel. I made a 24 x36 inch print of one of my staff and it worked perfectly using photoshop CS
One of the many things i've learned from following this channel... and one of the most critically important is - and i kid you not - that megapixels are far less important than is how hard you are able to jam the eyepiece against your eyebrow. The callous has ruined my good looks, but boy, has that technique improved my long-lens performance.
Always the calm voice of well informed reasoning. Thank you
So glad you covered this. Digital resolution is definitely a hot topic right now. I taught the ad department at a firm I used to work photoshop and indesign. The most requested topic was DPI and digital resolution. The cameras we had back then were around 12mp. That was 2000. Social media has caused some pros to stop thinking about DPI and optical resolution. Very nicely done!
Thanks for sharing!!
12Mpixels in 2000? Which camera. Highly doubt. Maybe a Leaf digital back? Not even prior to 2003. But it was not a camera, it was a scanner. Nikon D1 was 2.7Mp and D2X was in 2004.
I know a person who's happily driving 15 yo Fiat 500. It doesn't make it a good car though.
@@ElementaryWatson-123 Why is it not a good car?
I appreciate the break down of what our eye sees vs what we need. Very informative for someone new into all of the photography jargon like myself.
I have one counter example for you (though your logic, generally speaking, works) - we have a large photo from our wedding on our living room wall (~30x40"). It is a photo of us and all of our guests shot from the second floor balcony. Our wedding photographer used to take it to bridal shows, when he found a more photogenetic group of people, he replaced it and we bought it from him at a discount. You can probably guess why this is a counter example already - everybody that sees the photo walks right up to it, and from 8" (or less) away starts looking to find themselves or somebody they know in the photo.
We are old timers however so the question of megapixels was never asked - it was shot on an analog camera with 2"x2" film negatives.
Thank you so much for all your videos. I have learned so much . My husband got me a Camera for Christmas. I was always using my cell phone for my photography. I love photography. I have loved it since I was in high school I loved photography class going in the dark room and developing my own photos. So my husband got me the canon EOS T7. It’s a great beginner camera and I didn’t think I was ever going to get off the auto mode but just six months later I’m ready to upgrade my camera. And have a Canon telephoto lens 100 to 400 mm on order and arriving soon. Last week I practiced on shooting birds in flight from all the tips that you have given. Thank you again you are my favorite to watch on photography and have learned so much.
Upon running across your YT channel, I immediately subscribed. Your ability to present complex topics in a brief and concise way without becoming boring, is a gift that’s hard to find. You have become one of my few “go to “ sources for pro level photography knowledge. You have taught me a lot and I thank you. Please continue the great work. Your photos are predictably amazing!
Wow, thank you
I once (early digital days) made an 11x14 from a 3MP point and shoot that was fantastic. The other great thing about DXO's database relates to age: when evaluating sensors, they also supply the year the sensor was manufactured, which is significant since - as time goes on - these sensors get better and better. Thanks for the video.
do you teach because you would make an awesome teacher. ❤
The whole camera industry sales managers will hate you!
That's why people like my (passionate hobby photographer) will love you!
Oops!
This was such a crazy helpful video, I've been doing photography for a decade and I'm learning so much recently. Your channel has been a life saver.
Happy to help!
I decided to give you a LIKE right at this moment 04:26 "who looks at an image this large..from this close???" LOL
It’s always nice to hear accurate information
Excellent information. I print 24X17 at 240DPI, and I have never heard a complaint.
That's what my 24MP Canon T7I (6,000 x 4,000 pixels) will do. Larger would also work if viewing at more of a distance.
As a graphic artist for print and digital as well as an engineer and also used to own a printing company, here is techno-info that most graphic artists do not know. Printers, for full color magazines, ask for 300dpi photos, but this is actually larger than is needed. The reason is that printing presses actually do not use DPI at all, but LPI (Lines per inch). For example, a full color magazine will print at 150LPI, a B&W magazine is 120LPI, and old fashion newsprint is as low as 65 LPI.
LPI is part of the halftoning process. I will not go into all that here, but the science behind LPI's results has a formula, which simplified to its final form (doing some Algebra) is this: LPI * √2, or in English, LPI multiplied by (the Square-Root of 2).
A full color magazine printing at 150 LPI, would require a photo of (150LPI * 1.440 = 212 DPI). A photo of 212 DPI will appear the same in the magazine as a 1200 DPI photo or any photo greater than 212 DPI. For B&W magazines (are there any left?) would only require a photo of 170 DPI. Color newspapers are even lower.
The √2 is equal to 1.4142135623730950, but that that is hard to do in one's head, so graphic artists who are aware of this formula, would simply use 1.5 instead of 1.4142135623730950 as a rule of thumb that can be done in one's head. Using the ule of thumb, a magazine with 150LPI, would result in 150*1.5, or 225 DPI. This is how most use the formula.
In application, this is important if you have an image that you crop down too small. Also, if you submit a photo to a printed piece and the image is going to be enlarged, for best quality, ensure the now enlarged photo's part still exceeds the LPI requirement.
Funny thing is that even most of today's printers and graphic artists are unaware of this, whereas back in the 1990's most everyone knew it. Today they just know what works and say 300DPI and it seems to work, so they use it...not knowing why. But if it works it works.
Back when hard drive space was premium and one would typeset a magazine, we would use whatever resolution photos we were given. The size on disk would be in gigabytes! It would really slow down the computer. But as the magazine was typeset and done, our software had the option to save a final version to reduce the photo and images to the actual required DPI size. This would make the size on the hard drives a magnitude smaller! And of course, when the final magazine is printed, resulting in no loss in quality. BTW, Adobe Acrobat does this all the time by giving you options for the created PDF to be displayed on a screen, print, or archive.
So here is a small novel with old information that might be of interest to some.
One of the best videos I have seen - rather than the usual sale pitches an honest assessment of real world needs. Thank You for a refreshing view.
Wow, thanks!
Speaking as a professional graphic designer, with 30 years' experience, I've been trying to explain this to clients for years. People just don't seem to get it. Many times I've been tasked with creating exhibition graphics 10 metres and up, using key art with a max res of 300dpi at A4. Absolutely not a problem. Just scale up the artwork to the required size, and let the resolution naturally fall off. It can go as low as it needs, because, as Simon so clearly points out, you are standing further back the larger the image is- so the resolution issue is simply a non-issue.
If I was going through college again I'd seek out any courses you teach. Great clarity of information, presented with an amount of detail and comparisons that makes so much sense. A great match with how I enjoy learning.
About time somebody took on this subject . Even 50 years ago , when I started photography , I learned in my course that the primary concern for a large/ medium/fine grain film , was the intended viewing distance of the finished print . I still shoot film today on a regular basis , and for digital , I have been using a 10.2 megapixel Nikon D3000. I bought this in 2010 and have no intention in getting caught up in the pixel race . I regularly make 16X 24 inch prints . If I want to make bigger prints , I use my C330. No problem ! Thank you for bringing this to the attention of the pixel hungry public who I think are often lured into wasting money by the advertisers.
the 7 mp camera is even better
I think that's why every pro photographer 30 years ago was using medium format for portrait work. It always produced grainless enlargements. 35mm was hideous in this respect.
@@keithwiebe1787 Yes. No pro photographer used any less for portraits and advertising shots.. The C220 /C330 and the RB 67 plus Pentax 6X7 were the most popular here in South Africa . The Rolleiflex was extremely expensive . Also have a 1956 Yashica D in perfect working condition and I use it every couple of weeks . Amazing qualtity durable camera.
@Rob Howarth I used the C330f in my business but nobody else that I knew. They mostly used Mamiya RB67 in studio and maybe Hasselblad for weddings.
@@keithwiebe1787 The C330 was used here extensively in wedding photography . I personally , love the square format .
This guy just started not so long but its growth has come in a super speed that one cannot believe
Finally a voice of sanity in this wilderness. I use Fuji XH2 and XT4 cameras in my work, but my everyday carry is a Panasonic GX80 with “only” 16MP. When I use prime lenses I regularly make A2+ prints from it that are tack sharp with no visible noise from a normal viewing angle. A good friend is a professional portrait photographer who still uses his 12MP Nikon, and he frequently makes exhibition prints that are over 2 meters on the long side. Most exhibition viewers assume he’s using a medium format camera.
I wanna add an unpopular reason to have more MP: folks who do 3D scan with photogrammetry. You can get amazingly more detailed models with a higher MP camera, but other than that niche, totally agree with Simon, Incredible video
Thanks for sharing
After watching your videos I sometimes have to admit to myself that I had originally learned or understood certain aspects of photography incorrectly. And I realize I've been wrong because of how you make these somerimes complicated subjects so easy to grasp. Also I like the more advanced photographer approach. I've seen too many videos going over stuff I've known for years. Tnanks and please keep making these informative videos because I can not learn too much about photography.
I love your common sense approach to explaining photography. its so easy to get wrapped around the axle over the wrong things when purchasing tech that its really valuable to get that real world experience that you share.
Thanks 👍
as a 61 megapixel shooter, i absolutely love the cropping i can do, and the detail I can get. Its just so much elbow room.
Considering what you use your photos for is very important. I use mine to illustrate music videos on RUclips. My archaic 10 megapixel Canon Rebel with high quality prime lenses gives me photos that are more than adequate for display on any smartphone, tablet or laptop screen. In fact, even my iPhone X photos are also more than adequate.
I have probably watched 100 vids over the years on how many MGP needed, this was by far the most useful and "real world" oriented and I have been happy with large prints made from my Sony APC a6600 camera.
Great video. Megapixels is definitely not the most important thing on digital. I absolutely love shooting with my old Sony A100, not only because of how good it feels to use, but because I simply love the results I get from its "measly" 10 megapixel CCD sensor and its very pleasing, natural look. With some final refinements using Affinity Photo, I get really beautiful results!
Great video Simon, but I'd like to offer a counterpoint. It's important to note that a sensor with a higher pixel density can be beneficial for generating sharper image output, as the pixels will be downsized. The same applies to image noise reduction. With downsampling, noise tends to be lower. This is not to discredit the points made in the video, but rather to add another perspective to the discussion.
Sometimes I forget to pay attention to what you are saying, because im lost starting at your background. Awesome setup Simon. Thanks for the videos!
I've tried to tell people the same thing for years. You do it better but some will still not believe it.
This is the reason I chose the Nikon Z7ii over the Z6ii. I crop my photos quite alot and the 45mp was just the better choice for me. I cant wait to start shooting with it and the Z 180-600mm. (I also spent the difference on the camera itself instead of buying a teleconverter, especially with a variable aperture lens)
This is a great video. I've been taking photos for over 40 years. Starting with film, going through all of the megapixel resolutions with Canon and little Nikon. Simon has captured and presented the hard lessons I've learned very well. Old pros will know I'm right. Everybody else you may want to take this info to heart.
I hear ya. I learned this when I started printing large(r) images.
I'm into aviation photography and after weeks of consulting your content, I bought my first DSLR yesterday and I'm absolutely thrilled to see what I can do with all of the tips I have picked up from the channel.
Thank you Simon!
And what was your findings?. Wich dsrl did you choose?
Are you shooting moving planes? What is your mp?
@@martinj9251 Yes I was also on a budget. I’m on the 18mp 7D.
@@iflyplanes4MC
Are u getting good moving shots with that mp
In the old days, I got some great 8x10 prints from a 2.0 MP camera. These prints are sharp enough that I am very certain that I could blow them up a lot more. The best camera in the world is the one that you've got with you!
I’m so happy that advice like this talked me out of the Canon R5 and into the more capable in most aspects Canon R6 MK 2. The more I research the more satisfied I am with that decision
Being very new to photography, I wanted to add something I learned from coming over from astrophotography. One thing I did, wrong or right, I went pixel chasing with my astro camera (specially cooled cameras). The thing that really stuck out to me more than the importance of resolution, MP, or whatever, is really the pixel size. The smaller the pixel, the lower the noise (kind of, has to do with the electron well), and the crisper the pictures. That was really important to me and can really help make you images pop. One one to "figure out" the pixel size and kind of why people go down these rabbit holes to get the highest pixel is that they are somewhat related. The higher the pixel count on a the same sensor, the smaller the pixel, and the sharper it looks. With that being said, I recently bought an a7r IV, which takes amazing pictures, and have a dedicated astro camera that is only 9MP, BUT both have the same pixel size. Thinking about it, I could go the route of a crop sensor and a cheaper camera than the a7R IV, and create mosaics with Photoshop (what I did with the astro camera), but I have to admit the larger field of view I get with the a7R IV is just so nice.
That is interesting, I would have thought the smaller the pixel the less signal. When you get to photon level (like I think astrophotography goes) the noise in the signa (not camera or ccd) is quantum noise limited which is sqrt(N) so from that point of view signal to noise ratio is N/sqrt(N). If you have 100 photons you S/N is 100/sqrt(10) = 10:1 , but if you double the pixel size you collect 400 photons and your S/N is 400/sqrt(400) = 20:1. Also electronics noise is independent of signal so more signal better S/N which also points to the benefit of a larger pixels size. But what do I know, I'm probably wrong.
Thanks Simon. You are just the best to explain the meaning between censor and lenses. Short and clear!! I subscribe to your channel.
Great video! One point I would note is that the DxOMark score in P-Mpix is best considered as a ratio to the sensor resolution that it was tested on. When I was shopping for pro quality Micro 4/3 lenses, I was crestfallen to find that the sharpest lens is only 16 P-Mpix, compared to over 30 for the best Canon and Nikon lenses! But they are actually about the same in optical quality.
I'm still shooting the 8MP 1D MkII I bought new in 2004 through an efficient collection of L series glass covering 17-300mm in focal length.
I thought I know enough about photography until I started watching your videos. It looks like I am wrong. Also I am now much comfortable using my APS-C camera after watching this video. Took some great photos too. Truly eye opening.
Simon, I'm with you. I shoot with a Nikon D780 (24 mp, full-frame) or a Nikon D7500 (21 mp, crop sensor) and I've never felt that either holds back my photography. By the way I'm an avid amateur enthusiast. When the camera starts limiting my work, I'll think about a new one.
Your videos are always exceptionally well done with great info, but this one is phenomenal!
I am an amateur living in New England, with an a7iii Sony. Just upgraded glass from Tamron 28-200 to Tamron 70-180. ( glass is far more important then the body)
Years back, I had a 10 megapixel Canon with a entry level zoom from Canon. I photographed a friends wedding with it and I put the pics in a wedding album for them. The bride & groom later told me that they never bought the professional photographer’s work, because mine looked better to them.
I'm curious to know how they make contents for the Sphere (Las vegas) 🤔
I have a Nikon DSLR with a very good 18-140mm zoom, and I use it on occasion, but in the past couple of years, my go-to camera has been a Sony CyberShot RX-100 II. Zoom is shorter than I'd like (only out to 100mm), but the Zeiss lens is superb. 20 MP has produced excellent 16 x 20 prints. I like it so much I bought a second one (newer model with zoom out to 200mm), but the newer one's Zeiss lens is not as sharp as the shorter zoom of the first one, so I use it much less. Both Sonys easily fit in a pocket, not true, of course, of my Nikon. When I'm hiking, not having to lug a camera bag and gear is of great value to my elderly (78) knees.
My EOS 30D with 8mp and 8mb files, with the most beautiful colors and contrast, is more than I will ever need.
This is a great explanation. I used to generate 100mpxl images from 6x7 film negatives and the detail was amazing. But you had to be a few inches from the print to see it.
It is nice to see someone explain pixel count and to point out the fact that for the majority of photographers 20mp is all they need.
I used to own a Canon EOS 30D and it was an 8 mega-pixel camera and I got excellent results with it every time I used it. I use now the Canon 5DS with 50 mega-pixels and get excellent photos as well but not better in terms of overall image quality but when it comes to great crops the 5DS rocks!
Thank you Simon - although I love the freedom a 60 MP sensor in terms of carrying only one lens, I also appreciate my 24mp sensor. And as always my wife brings me to my Senses when she has large 40x60 cm prints made from her Iphone 12 - they look great, just processed using the native Iphone Fotos app. Thanks for your great, very relevant content competently presented.
20" x 16" portrait of our granddaughter taken on Olympus OMD EM1 MK3 20mp micro four thirds it looks amazing
Great video. My first digital SLR was a Nikon D40 with 6Mp. Using it with the kit zoom I have printed a 500X900mm (20X36") landscape and it is great. It is framed an hanging in my lounge. Viewing distance is the key. Even at reading distance it is still sharper than most cell phones will get at a quarter of that size.
Great explanation on when more megapixels matter and when they don’t. Love your style of teaching with your videos Simon. Always worth viewing. Greetings from 🇦🇺
Simon, your explanations are so clear and easy to follow! Thanks for the work you put into them.
A great explanation, thank you. And don't forget, a million megapixels is wasted if the image is crap to start with. Many will say "I'm a great photographer, my camera has 50mp". How many megapixels in some of the magnificent early monochrome prints that still stand out today ?