So with 12 bit files you end up with 4 bits, or TWICE, the non compressible random data!
Why would you possibly want that?
-
Welcome to the new forums! Please read this first. For known issues we are working to resolve, click here.
Filesize of modern DSLR killing?
- Thread starter twan
- Start date
Why would you possibly want that?
RJ-07
Forum Enthusiast
Most people these days have two to three 32 GB CF cards and upgraded their hard drives to a minimum of 1 Terabyte. Yes, I agree if you want better lenses and your 30D is working great....you should keep you camera but if you would like to upgrade your camera, the kit lens with the 7D is not a bad lens. It's your choice in the end.
I picked up an old manual film camera a while ago that I play around with once in a while. That is one of the biggest contributing factors to me improving my photography. I take alot less pictures with my digital and get more keepers because I learned to think about each shot alot more.
jboyer
Senior Member
I have been thinking that, if one has a small laptop (netbook?), one could easily connect 2 USB drives of 1 Terabyte each, for less than $300...(one for primary storage, one for backup) that should go a long way... let me see 1000 Gigs / 25 Mb... not even sure how to calculate such a high number...LOL.
In today's world, one tends to think in Gigs, not Megs. So a 25 Meg RAW file is a pretty small file. Newer laptops come with 500 Gigs, for less than $600.
Jerome Boyer
http://www.pbase.com/jboyer
Equipment in profile
In today's world, one tends to think in Gigs, not Megs. So a 25 Meg RAW file is a pretty small file. Newer laptops come with 500 Gigs, for less than $600.
--
Jerome Boyer
http://www.pbase.com/jboyer
Equipment in profile
Yes, the brain actually learns more when it's not in spray 'n' pray mode. I can sometimes go a couple of months on a 36 exposure roll of b+w film, because for me good b+w subjects are hard to come by. What the digital shooter needs to consider (not sports or kids in action) is "should I really take this photo or will I just end up deleting it later tonight on my computer?" That's sometimes I think about when I use my 5D instead of my film SLRs.
Sometimes it's fun to use a full manual film SLR, that operates on nothing but a watch battery where you are responsible for everything!
Andreas Helke
Senior Member
I don´t understand what you want to say. If the sensor delivers 12 bit of image data the 12 bit raw format would be perfect to store them without having to fill out unneeded extra bits with random numbers.
I hope that the sensor offers enough data to fill the first 12 bits with actual image data. But I would not be terribly suprised if the 12th bit has just random noise too.
The point I was wanting to make is that the extra 2 bits just waste space on your raw buffer and flash card and hardisk and offer no quality advantage at all. And because random numbers are not compressible to store those to extra bits occupies more than their fair share of file space.
I did experiment to convert raw files with less bits in them. A 9 bit raw file came very close to the actual image while an 8 bit raw file produced useless junk because the raw format does not use the gamma curve that lets the JPG format and computer monitor get away with using just 8 bits.
I am pretty sure that not the Canon engineers but the marketing department introduced the 14 bit raw fornat of the latest cameras.
The engineers should have made the actual number of bits a custom function instead of only offering 14 bit storage.
pidera
Senior Member
no text
Not a JBOD array, just a bunch of disks, and make backups (a good backup strategy trumps RAID almost all the time. Servers should use both.)
Linux software RAID is pretty good from what I've read, but let's face it, most of us aren't willing to go there.
My experience with inexpensive RAID cards (
Never had an issue with 'real' RAID cards.
--
Primary equipment:
7d, EF-S 10-22, 17-55 f/2.8 IS, EF 50 f/1.4, 70-200 f/4.0L IS, 70-200 f/2.8L, 580EX, and an HP B9180
Linux software RAID is pretty good from what I've read, but let's face it, most of us aren't willing to go there.
My experience with inexpensive RAID cards (
Never had an issue with 'real' RAID cards.
--
Primary equipment:
7d, EF-S 10-22, 17-55 f/2.8 IS, EF 50 f/1.4, 70-200 f/4.0L IS, 70-200 f/2.8L, 580EX, and an HP B9180
MM1
Senior Member
Heh, right. My RAID1 is occasionally rsync -ed to USB drive of the same size. That's a good strategy for a data paranoic ;-)
It is. Currently, I have one RAID1 array and one RAID5 array (less redundancy than mirror, but more economical use of the drives).
It's all question whether there's someone who could set-up a "headless" Linux server with RAID and Samba on the network to act as a storage space for a Windows machine...
Personally, I work on Linux directly, as I have ideological problem with Windows. ;-) The only Windows I ever use is Vista that came with my notebook, and only when I need to set up Personal functions in my 1D.
They're called "fakeraid", because all they are is just a special SATA controller with some small additional circuitry/BIOS and windows driver which creates the RAID device.
--
Cheers,
Martin
Years ago I used to fix SMD's (removable pack disc drives) and it took two of us to lift a 40mb one. Later on we got the first "Winchester" drives in. I think they were 10mb and about half that had to be bad tracked out so they probably ended up as 5mb. Still later one of my customers ran a multi million £ business on an Amstrad pc with a 20mb drive. Yesterday I saw an add for a 32gb CF card.
How times have changed...
How times have changed...
So, correct me if I'm misunderstanding you, but are you saying that you suspect Canon's sensor only delivers 11 bits of data per site?
You say a 9bit raw 'came close' to a 12bit/14bit raw file. What method did you use to determine that? I'm left wondering if you understand what advantages a greater bit depth offers.
I'm pretty sure this is a wild-arsed guess your making here.
Perhaps, though there are other things that I would prefer ahead of a CF I'd personally never use ;-)
Andreas Helke
Senior Member
DSLR dynamic range measurements end up with about 9 or 10 stops of dynamic range. In a raw file you need one bit to encode each stop of dynamic range. Having 2 bits extra is probably a good idea. But having 4 bits extra is just a waste of storage and raw buffer space. Some people made a hobby out of analyzing DSLR sensors and RAW files. One of them wrote a program that allows to shift the bits in a raw file. So you can discard the least significant bits. I used this program to turn a 14 bit raw file into a 12 9 and 8 bit raw file. I could see no difference between the 12 and 14 bit version. The 9 bit version looked different but came very close to the look of the 14 bit version. The 8 bit version looked totally wrong and was clearly insufficient to encode the actual raw data.
So, correct me if I'm misunderstanding you, but are you saying that you suspect Canon's sensor only delivers 11 bits of data per site?
You say a 9bit raw 'came close' to a 12bit/14bit raw file. What method did you use to determine that? I'm left wondering if you understand what advantages a greater bit depth offers.
I'm pretty sure this is a wild-arsed guess your making here.
Perhaps, though there are other things that I would prefer ahead of a CF I'd personally never use ;-)
I think your missing the point of what 14bit brings to the table. It's more about increasing flexibility in post and when moving between colour spaces.
Have a read of this :-
http://www.earthboundlight.com/phototips/nikon-d300-d3-14-bit-versus-12-bit.html
It explains the advantages of 14bit over 12bit. They aren't huge, but they are there.
I'm quite happy to provide the extra space it takes to record in 14bits. Storage space is very cheap and I find this whole 'file-size is too big' argument ridiculous. It's staggering to me that someone would spend so much money on a 7D and good glass and then complain about the (comparatively insignificant) cost of storage!
Similar threads
Keyboard shortcuts
- f
- Forum