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Which Quality setting should I choose?

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picnut

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Ken Rockwell says the best quality setting to use on today's high-res digital cameras is the one that is about 1/3 to 1/2 of the highest resolution. If I understand him correctly, this will still be more than enough for any computer screen and normal size prints. He says this setting will yield better results because in a camera with a Bayer sensor only half the pixels are green and a quarter each in red and blue. I think he's saying the effect of the lower resolution will be the combining all three colors in each "pixel" being output as opposed to each pixel being only one of the colors when the camera is set for the highest resolution jpegs.

Can anyone shed more light on this subject? I have a Sony a7R II set to arrive tomorrow, so I will have plenty of pixels to play with.
 
picnut said:
Ken Rockwell says the best quality setting to use on today's high-res digital cameras is the one that is about 1/3 to 1/2 of the highest resolution. If I understand him correctly, this will still be more than enough for any computer screen and normal size prints. He says this setting will yield better results because in a camera with a Bayer sensor only half the pixels are green and a quarter each in red and blue. I think he's saying the effect of the lower resolution will be the combining all three colors in each "pixel" being output as opposed to each pixel being only one of the colors when the camera is set for the highest resolution jpegs.

Can anyone shed more light on this subject? I have a Sony a7R II set to arrive tomorrow, so I will have plenty of pixels to play with.
Click to expand...
The quality settings only apply to JPGs, if you are using such a high-end camera, I would suggest shooting RAW and sorting out qualiof JPGS later.

If you do shoot JPGs, shoot the biggest and best quality you have space for on your card or computer - although it is true that higher levels of quality give diminishing returns, so a 70% JPG, may get you 90% of the quality but with a far smaller file... however the 100% JPG will always be the higher quality file.
 
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I agree with Bob - always shoot the highest resolution and lowest compression unless you have a real problem with memory card space (in which case increase the compression before reducing the resolution).

Who knows what you might want to use the photo for in the future and what resolution you might require. You can always reduce resolution in post processing but you can recapture detail that has been destroyed.
 
picnut said:
Ken Rockwell says the best quality setting to use on today's high-res digital cameras is the one that is about 1/3 to 1/2 of the highest resolution. If I understand him correctly, this will still be more than enough for any computer screen and normal size prints. He says this setting will yield better results because in a camera with a Bayer sensor only half the pixels are green and a quarter each in red and blue. I think he's saying the effect of the lower resolution will be the combining all three colors in each "pixel" being output as opposed to each pixel being only one of the colors when the camera is set for the highest resolution jpegs.

Can anyone shed more light on this subject? I have a Sony a7R II set to arrive tomorrow, so I will have plenty of pixels to play with.
Click to expand...
I recommend setting your photo info sources to the highest quality level and pay no further attention to Ken Rockwell.
 
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

Loading…

www.kenrockwell.com
 
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is a link to a nine year old article on Bayer interpolation. I am not sure what it has to do with the original post.
 
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
 
picnut said:
Ken Rockwell says the best quality setting to use on today's high-res digital cameras is the one that is about 1/3 to 1/2 of the highest resolution. If I understand him correctly, this will still be more than enough for any computer screen and normal size prints. He says this setting will yield better results because in a camera with a Bayer sensor only half the pixels are green and a quarter each in red and blue. I think he's saying the effect of the lower resolution will be the combining all three colors in each "pixel" being output as opposed to each pixel being only one of the colors when the camera is set for the highest resolution jpegs.

Can anyone shed more light on this subject? I have a Sony a7R II set to arrive tomorrow, so I will have plenty of pixels to play with.
Click to expand...
Always use the highest quality and/or raw. There's no need to throw away your camera's resolution from the start. Disk storage space is cheap. You can always throw away the extraneous pictures later.
 
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
 
picnut said:
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
Click to expand...
But that article has absolutely nothing to do with selecting a particular quality setting on a camera. It is just an explanation of how Bayer resolution works and points out the difference between a digital image file and one from a scanned negative or transparency.

That was nine years ago when film scanners still existed.
 
Chris R-UK said:
picnut said:
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
Click to expand...
But that article has absolutely nothing to do with selecting a particular quality setting on a camera. It is just an explanation of how Bayer resolution works and points out the difference between a digital image file and one from a scanned negative or transparency.

That was nine years ago when film scanners still existed.

--
Chris R
Click to expand...
 
picnut said:
Chris R-UK said:
picnut said:
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
Click to expand...
But that article has absolutely nothing to do with selecting a particular quality setting on a camera. It is just an explanation of how Bayer resolution works and points out the difference between a digital image file and one from a scanned negative or transparency.

That was nine years ago when film scanners still existed.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
picnut said:
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
Click to expand...
When de-mosaicing a bayer filter the algorithm used needs to guess the actual colour of light hitting a particular photosite - for this the algorithm can use the light detected at that pixel (which will be green, red or blue), but will also look at the photosites around it for further clues... so in effect the algorithm is guessing at the correct colour, which might sound worrying.

However, the algorithm is very good at guessing the correct colour, so there is no problem with accepting its guess at the highest resolutions available - the effect of reducing resolution just reduces the risk on an error but also reduces the resolution available by a factor of 4 - a big loss to reduce a risk that was tiny and not a problem in the first place.

Whether you would miss those pixels depends on what size you are are viewing at - if a print is small or if a picture is viewed at web resolutions you might not notice any less quality from the lower resolution shot, but it could never be better quality than the higher resolution shot.
 
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
Click to expand...
When de-mosaicing a bayer filter the algorithm used needs to guess the actual colour of light hitting a particular photosite - for this the algorithm can use the light detected at that pixel (which will be green, red or blue), but will also look at the photosites around it for further clues... so in effect the algorithm is guessing at the correct colour, which might sound worrying.

However, the algorithm is very good at guessing the correct colour, so there is no problem with accepting its guess at the highest resolutions available - the effect of reducing resolution just reduces the risk on an error but also reduces the resolution available by a factor of 4 - a big loss to reduce a risk that was tiny and not a problem in the first place.

Whether you would miss those pixels depends on what size you are are viewing at - if a print is small or if a picture is viewed at web resolutions you might not notice any less quality from the lower resolution shot, but it could never be better quality than the higher resolution shot.
Click to expand...
I understand. Thanks. When my new camera arrives I will experiment with the jpeg quality settings for a first-hand look at the results. I suspect you are right about the accuracy of today's camera's algorithms.
 
picnut said:
picnut said:
Chris R-UK said:
picnut said:
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
Click to expand...
But that article has absolutely nothing to do with selecting a particular quality setting on a camera. It is just an explanation of how Bayer resolution works and points out the difference between a digital image file and one from a scanned negative or transparency.

That was nine years ago when film scanners still existed.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Chris R-UK said:
picnut said:
picnut said:
Chris R-UK said:
picnut said:
Bob Janes said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
That is not his idea, that is just how a bayer filter works - and he is not claiming in that article that you should shoot with lower resolution because of this.
Click to expand...
I think the concept he explains would apply to today's sensors as well as the 9 year old ones. My original question might have been better put if I asked if anyone had experimented with different jpeg quality settings and found the lower ones to be as good or better than the higher settings?
Click to expand...
But that article has absolutely nothing to do with selecting a particular quality setting on a camera. It is just an explanation of how Bayer resolution works and points out the difference between a digital image file and one from a scanned negative or transparency.

That was nine years ago when film scanners still existed.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
picnut said:
Actually, that quote is from another article about fixing unsharp images. http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/unsharp.htm If you scroll down to the section called Bayer Interpolation the quote is the last thing he says in that section.
Click to expand...
IMHO that is a typical Ken Rockwell article which demonstrates why he has such a poor reputation for accuracy. He has cut and pasted part of the older article into this one and then added that comment at the end, forgetting all that he has said further up the page about always viewing at 100% and the effect of downsizing.

I may be wrong, but let's see if anybody else agrees with what he says.

As an aside, both of those articles are very out of date - for example almost all computer to monitor connections nowadays are digital not analogue. VGA cables have been replaced by HDMI (or DVI-D).
 
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
The information in that article about how Bayer demosaicing algorithms function is just flat out incorrect. Rockwell is, in classic Rockwell fashion, spewing misinformation.

Interpolation of the Bayer array does not reduce the original raw file pixel resolution.

Do not read Ken Rockwell unless you already know how cameras work and are looking for a laugh.
 
Ysarex said:
picnut said:
Well, all your feedback is the same as what I currently do now. However, I found Rockwell's ideas interesting and wonder if you've seen them, too. Here's what he has to say: (Looking forward to hearing your thoughts after reading this.)

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bayer.htm
Click to expand...
The information in that article about how Bayer demosaicing algorithms function is just flat out incorrect. Rockwell is, in classic Rockwell fashion, spewing misinformation.

Interpolation of the Bayer array does not reduce the original raw file pixel resolution.

Do not read Ken Rockwell unless you already know how cameras work and are looking for a laugh.
Click to expand...
He does have a good sense of humor, but this isn't the first thing I've read of his that didn't quite compute. That's why I put out this feeler.
 
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