E
Erik Magnuson
Guest
Nope. Don't buy it. The processing time just isn't that long on modern cameras. No modern bayer camera is significantly slower processing Bayer/Jpeg than raw. At worst it can be pipelined with the very slow CF write time so that the I/O size reduction triumphs over any compute time.For example,
since the processing time required to save a final image (not raw)
will be greatly reduced due to not needing complex color
interpolation, you could substitute other much-needed things in its
place.
Their processing pipeline is highly optimized for the current transformations. So, yes, this would increase time significantly. But it does not follow that it would be any faster with X3.One reason that
manufacturers continue to claim that they can't support a real
color management engine inside the camera is due to the processing
time required to take the raw image and run it through ICC profiles
in addition to having to interpolate the colors from the Bayer
design.
Of course the huge, gaping hole in this theory is that the SD-9 does not support JPEG in camera. It's not clear when or if it ever will. Foveon touts their raw format as the proper format. The lack of JPEG support on the SD-9 has been a source of puzzlement since it's announcement.If some of these things are true, it might enable photographers
to finally depend on JPEG format images.
Huh? What camera are you using where Bayer/JPEG is a performance issue? Now I can see arguing that due to the need to keep in-camera performance high, the in-camera routines are not optimal. That you can do a better job with more time and compute resources (although a PC is not the best signal processor architecture). That you can exploit the human eye to make the final adjustments. Of course, the same arguments apply to off-camera bayer processing as well. On the PC, X3 may be faster than Bayer.The complex "stuff" you have to do to a Bayer raw image is
time intensive enough that you really need to do it on a
computer... outside the camera, or your save times may be too long
to be usable.
Again, the unstated and unproven assumption is that there is no complex processing needed for the Foveon sensor. But we still have no description and no numbers yet. Phil won't comment because the SW is still beta. When this part is proven and efficient and fast in-camera processing of X3 is available, perhaps some of this might be possible.but not having to do the
complex interpolation associated with the Bayer design should give
camera manufacturers some more flexibility to do other things.
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Erik