Full frame vs APS-C/Four Thirds sensor. Better IQ ?

[shokeen25]

Hello all,

It is a simple question which might have discussed it her brief, but I might have missed to understand it. A full frame sensor is better in low light, it will give a shallower depth of field and it will capture bigger part of frame while taking picture (It will cover more area). These are three major advantage of full frame sensor in comparison to APS-C or four thirds sensor. What may be other major benefit to use expensive full frame camera ? If it is broad daylight, will full frame produce significant better picture/IQ also ?

 

[Suhas Sudhakar Kulkarni]

I have used all the formats, and I can say that if you are looking for highest technical quality - Full frame has better IQ

My 5D mark II produced better IQ, when used carefully. The dynamic range of 5D mark II was not good (even I found my Panasonic GH3 better in that area). However, overall IQ was the best.

 

[Alphoid]

Christof21 wrote:
This will be the absolute limit for noise. That's why I don't think that the difference between sensor format will shrink, it will tend toward the theorical limit, which is for instance 2 stops between m43 and FF. No miracle possible...

That makes two presumptions:

• Lens technology will stay constant.
• Razor-thin depth-of-field is okay.

Smaller sensor/wider aperture will almost always be much smaller for the same image quality. That's the magic trick behind the RX100III. Amazing optics means you get APS+kit lens quality in point-and-shoot form factor. f/1.4 on full frame, at least for most of the shots I do, just isn't all that useful. Once we see APS f/2 zooms of sensible image quality, FF may be dead to me.

 

[Wally626]

Hello all,

It is a simple question which might have discussed it her brief, but I might have missed to understand it. A full frame sensor is better in low light, it will give a shallower depth of field and it will capture bigger part of frame while taking picture (It will cover more area). These are three major advantage of full frame sensor in comparison to APS-C or four thirds sensor. What may be other major benefit to use expensive full frame camera ? If it is broad daylight, will full frame produce significant better picture/IQ also ?

If you have perfect lenses you can get equivalent images from all sizes of sensor, at least in the center of the envelope. For instance a image taken on a 16 MP FF sensor with a 60mm f/2.8, ISO 400, shutter 1/100 second will be identical to a picture of the same subject taken from the same distance if you use a 16 MP sensor, a 30mm lens and a f/1.4, ISO 100, shutter speed 1/100 second with a m4/3 camera (a slight difference due to different aspect ratio, 3:2 vs 4:3). Shutter speed and noise are also pretty close as the larger aperture allows more light to enter so the 1/4 the ISO can be used for the same shutter speed which balances the difference in noise at a given ISO level

As you get to the edges of the envelope you can no longer get equivalence, there is no m4/3 camera and lens combination that will match a 36 MP FF sensor using a 50mm f/1.4 lens at this time, but a 25mm f/0.7 lens is possible if unlikely ever to be built, a 36 MP m4/3 sensor probably will show up someday. The inverse is also true as small sensors can get large depths of field not possible on a FF camera without using very small apertures not found on commercial lenses.

My first statement referred to perfect lenses, for every increases in sensor size the worse the lens can be in terms of absolute resolution and still produce a good image for the same number of total pixels. A help for the smaller sensor cameras is that as the image circle gets smaller it is easier to build the lens and get high resolution.

The various sensor sizes have advantages and disadvantages, If you need the equivalent of FF 36 MP, f/1.4 then FF or medium format is your choice as smaller sensors at this time will not work. If you need a camera with the largest possible sensor that will fit in tight jeans, then a 1-inch sensor is going to the the answer. If you budget is $400 and not $2000 FF is also not very useful.