why 16mp sensor is enough..for everyday used

[Kumsal]

Eye AF is much better than face AF.
We would not have to discuss that at all.
Sony turns circles around m43 when it comes to AF ...
The facts can not be talked away, but I like the m43 system and use my Panasonic G9 as often as possible.

 

[Skeeterbytes]

Handsome boy!

 

[Humansvillian]

He actually liked having his picture taken, and was quite photogenic. Here he held still for a low light picture.

Because of the magic of Olympus cameras and Google Photos, memories of our Stroker are always closest hand.

Which Olympus camera and lens I used them, doesn’t matter at all, today.







--
Humansville is a town in the Missouri Ozarks

 

[James Stirling]

He actually liked having his picture taken, and was quite photogenic. Here he held still for a low light picture.

Because of the magic of Olympus cameras and Google Photos, memories of our Stroker are always closest hand.

Which Olympus camera and lens I used them, doesn’t matter at all, today.

Our dogs really do touch our hearts in a profound way. I lost a very much loved dog Sam when I was a teen in a similar vein to Stroker , while walking him in a field he chased a rabbit on to a road. It was one of the most heartbreaking moments of my life . Dogs are in my opinion just about the best critters on the planet.

This is my current furry friend with my daughters youngster doing what dogs do best







--
Jim Stirling:
It is not reason which is the guide of life, but custom. David Hume

 

[Kumsal]

You are right, the dogs are our loyal friends.
In this case, it seems to me inappropriate to talk about photo quality.

 

[ennemkay]

16mp is plenty.

why is 16mp 'plenty', but 12mp was not?

 

[James Stirling]

16mp is plenty.

why is 16mp 'plenty', but 12mp was not

Some have moved ever upward in the mp race from 6mp - 10mp - 12mp - 16mp and now 20mp . Who knows where they will end up

https://www.dpreview.com/members/9357984324/gearlist

--
Jim Stirling:
It is not reason which is the guide of life, but custom. David Hume

 

[JaKing]

16mp is plenty.

why is 16mp 'plenty', but 12mp was not?

Maybe because the 16 MPx sensors are better technologically than the 12 MPx sensors?

Same as the sensor in the E-M1 MkII is better than most other mFTs sensors.

 

[ennemkay]

16mp is plenty.

why is 16mp 'plenty', but 12mp was not?

Maybe because the 16 MPx sensors are better technologically than the 12 MPx sensors?

Same as the sensor in the E-M1 MkII is better than most other mFTs sensors.

yes those improvements are inseparably related to the increased light and color sensitivity per unit area = higher resolution.

 

[gary0319]

I currently have 13mpx in my LX100, 16mpx in my E-M10 II and 20mpx in my Pen F and E-M1 II. I do like the 20mpx the best, especially in low light and if cropping is to be extreme. However I am confident that both the LX100 and the E-M10 II will give me images that I can print as large as I want (small house) or display on our camera club big screen TV or projected in an auditorium setting.

When I am selecting my camera gear for a photo outing, the megapixels of the camera never even crosses my mind. I just select the lens/body combos that fits the day.

 

[mg_k]

Personally I've stopped printing more than 5 years ago.

I don't think printing is the end all be all regardless of how big the print is.

I'm no pro, and I take and view photos to please myself and nobody else.

These days I view them on my 4k 32" fully calibrated monitor. I love zooming in (pixel peep) and admire all the wonderful details (even the tiniest one).

Once you have experience with zooming into a 40+mp file you simply can't go back to a 20mp one....

Here's an example -



Full rez to Download

Yes it's a snapshot, but I LOVE being able to zoom into 100% to see things that I wouldn't be able to see with my naked eyes....not to mention the amount of shadows and highlights I was able to pull from the file is jaw dropping.

Back to my point - 16mp is enough, then again so is 8mp...

Similarly m43 is enough for some, but then 99% of all people taking photos think smartphone is enough.

So how low is too low? In these current climate when dedicated camera sale continues to drop across the board enough isn't going to drive sales and keep the smallest sensored MILC system aka m43 to stay in the game as the only people who cares to use a dedicated camera will most likely want more than "just enough", which explains why all major camera manufacturer are going mega high MP body again to keep this declining industry going.

If m43 user is content with 16/20mp then it's hard for Olympus and Panasonic to entice their existing user base to upgrade, or luring new user to buy their camera.

OP your post is a sensible evaluation, but it's also an alarming problem with m43 manufactures to keep them going especially when m43 is sitting at a measly ~3% of total market share.

--
My Getty Images

 

[George1958]

Eye AF is just composition and DoF done for you, over rated and the world has not been waiting for this innovation, plenty of images out there that were achieved with out Eye AF.

 

[mg_k]

Eye AF is just composition and DoF done for you, over rated and the world has not been waiting for this innovation, plenty of images out there that were achieved with out Eye AF.

And plenty of images out there that were achieved with MF too.

AF is so overrated.

 

[gary0319]

Eye AF is just composition and DoF done for you, over rated and the world has not been waiting for this innovation, plenty of images out there that were achieved with out Eye AF.

And plenty of images out there that were achieved with MF too.

AF is so overrated.

Focus peaking and magnification have made my use of manual focus a routine function, once again. And.....now available with C-AF in firmware 3.1 on my E-M1 II, although I have not used it much with C-AF.

 

[24thWanderer]

I would agree that 16 MP is enough for a lot of people.

I thought that I would miss the resolution when I switched from 24 MP APS-C cameras to 16 MP M43 cameras. It was one of the reasons I was so apprehensive. But I do not. I don't need to crop much because I generally nail my composition when I shoot the shot. And when I do crop, it's usually very minor. I do paid concert work, food photography, events, and more and I do not feel restricted by the resolution. Maybe if I were shooting landscapes more , I'd feel a bit differently. But for the work I do, I'm fine with it. The size of the M43 and the other advantages are much more impacting than the resolution (at least for me; YMMV).

 

[boxerman]

Not that you should just shoot from the hip with your own judgments, but sometimes a little back of the envelope calculation (aka "science") can add some confidence to judgments.

According to some random internet source, acuity of the human eye (IN THE FOVEA, NO LESS) is about 1 arc minute. That's about 3 x 10^-4 radians. I'll call that a fovean (yeah, I know, already taken with a TM).

Calibration in my house:

1. My 15" MacBook Pro at my standard viewing distance has 220 dpi, which is about 2/3 of a fovean. So, not surprisingly, that's why it's called a "retina display." It has a resolution pretty much at the limits of human perception. It's 5.2 mpx.
2. Wall art work. I just noticed that the two large art works we have on the wall opposite where I sit and work are almost exactly the same angular measure as the screen of my MacBook. So, 5.2 mpx would do there, too, to achieve full foveal resolution.
3. Just for kicks, I placed myself as close as felt comfortable in viewing that wall of art. That gives me about 3800 pixels (width) to saturate the poor fovea. Just about 4K TV resolution. That's about 8.3 megapixels.
4. Our flatscreen TV is a 65 incher, which we watch from 10 feel. How many pixels to saturate human foveal acuity? 1500 pixels horizontally, which is less than the 2K resolution our TV has. Umm...1.3 mpx.

Bottom line, I can crop a 20 mpx by factor of 2 and still more than saturate my poor fovea for any realistic usage. I doubt I'll ever make a print anywhere close in size to our "art wall," but, then, I would just use a less cropped image. Or, I suppose I could make sure to use a high resolution mode, and the I'll be completely in the pink.

Those who get great pleasure zooming image to see micro-detail, of course, will have to pay for their pleasure. Maybe... hand-held high resolution, anyone?

For me, I'm happy with 20 mpx in my camera (2x crop shown at any reasonable size). I GUESS my next TV (a bit bigger) MIGHT marginally benefit from 4K. But, then, that's it.

Caveat: You don't get full sensor color resolution because sub-pixels are mono-chromatic (Bayer arrays, and all). So, I MAY need a bit more sensor resolution to REALLY COMPLETELY saturate my foveas. Giving up my 2x crop solves that. Resolution improvements seem to me basically all gravy from now on.

 

[James Stirling]

Not that you should just shoot from the hip with your own judgments, but sometimes a little back of the envelope calculation (aka "science") can add some confidence to judgments.

According to some random internet source, acuity of the human eye (IN THE FOVEA, NO LESS) is about 1 arc minute. That's about 3 x 10^-4 radians. I'll call that a fovean (yeah, I know, already taken with a TM).

Calibration in my house:

1. My 15" MacBook Pro at my standard viewing distance has 220 dpi, which is about 2/3 of a fovean. So, not surprisingly, that's why it's called a "retina display." It has a resolution pretty much at the limits of human perception. It's 5.2 mpx.
2. Wall art work. I just noticed that the two large art works we have on the wall opposite where I sit and work are almost exactly the same angular measure as the screen of my MacBook. So, 5.2 mpx would do there, too, to achieve full foveal resolution.
3. Just for kicks, I placed myself as close as felt comfortable in viewing that wall of art. That gives me about 3800 pixels (width) to saturate the poor fovea. Just about 4K TV resolution. That's about 8.3 megapixels.
4. Our flatscreen TV is a 65 incher, which we watch from 10 feel. How many pixels to saturate human foveal acuity? 1500 pixels horizontally, which is less than the 2K resolution our TV has. Umm...1.3 mpx.

Bottom line, I can crop a 20 mpx by factor of 2 and still more than saturate my poor fovea for any realistic usage. I doubt I'll ever make a print anywhere close in size to our "art wall," but, then, I would just use a less cropped image. Or, I suppose I could make sure to use a high resolution mode, and the I'll be completely in the pink.

Those who get great pleasure zooming image to see micro-detail, of course, will have to pay for their pleasure. Maybe... hand-held high resolution, anyone?

For me, I'm happy with 20 mpx in my camera (2x crop shown at any reasonable size). I GUESS my next TV (a bit bigger) MIGHT marginally benefit from 4K. But, then, that's it.

Caveat: You don't get full sensor color resolution because sub-pixels are mono-chromatic (Bayer arrays, and all). So, I MAY need a bit more sensor resolution to REALLY COMPLETELY saturate my foveas. Giving up my 2x crop solves that. Resolution improvements seem to me basically all gravy from now on.

I think the fly in the ointment of digital viewing at it relates to MP count is the ability to zoom into 100% { or more } with no effort .

I also find that people invariably move in closer to look at the finer details of even very large prints , I have 72" wide prints on my wall and after the initial look at the whole scene most folk move within touching distance to see the minutiae . I might just have nosey friends

 

[Humansvillian]

16mp is plenty.

why is 16mp 'plenty', but 12mp was not?

Maybe because the 16 MPx sensors are better technologically than the 12 MPx sensors?

Same as the sensor in the E-M1 MkII is better than most other mFTs sensors.

Above, is wisdom.

As megapixel counts climb, engineers improve the processing engines in the cameras, and the sensors. Even the lens makers figure out tiny improvements in manufacturing lenses.

The latest and better Olympus Tough Cameras only have 10 mp resolution.

 

[George1958]

its true, the marketing people are better at capturing buyers than cameras are capturing photographs. However you can't buy success, that would be a best seller!

Olympus decided 12mp was all that was needed 10 years ago, 16 mp is more than enough.

 

[boxerman]

Fair enough, but ...

I think the fly in the ointment of digital viewing at it relates to MP count is the ability to zoom into 100% { or more } with no effort .

I consider this mostly a trick to make it easy to evaluate technical aspects of a shot. Detecting pixel-level sharpness, for example (e.g., misfocus, motion blur). You can enlarge an image to whatever zoom you want, but if the effects you see are irrelevant to real-world viewing, you're puttering beyond the useful. I'm happy to make my image pixels 2x2 or 3x3 DISPLAY pixels to get down to this without squinting, but then I know that, for my presentations, this is just a convenience for me. It's not like sub-pixel phenomena are at all relevant to viewers. So, in a nutshell, these zooms are a convenience for the photographer/image processor. Just to make SURE the image won't contain any detectable artifacts.

I also find that people invariably move in closer to look at the finer details of even very large prints , I have 72" wide prints on my wall and after the initial look at the whole scene most folk move within touching distance to see the minutiae . I might just have nosey friends

You have a good point, here, and I can imagine that. I would almost certainly do that (and I have) on some occasions. But my own curiosity is mostly technical. Like, I want to know what kind of a camera was used to take room-sized images. In admiring these room-sized images I always step back to take the image in within my range of vision in order to appreciate it. Clearly it's take a superhuman imagination to make something interesting happen in every part of a large image.

It just occurred to me that, in a decade or more, I've never walked up close to the big art pieces on our wall. I just did, and you can see some of the technique and care used in creating them. So, an artist might get something out of this, but, I've never felt the art work itself benefitted from such inspection. My lack of imagination? Or, maybe contemporary artists haven't caught on to multi-scaled art. I'll have to talk to my son the artist about this.

I can't remember a time where I found artistic value in some tiny, tiny part of a much larger work. Maybe, but I cannot actually recall any instance. I admit that this might be a lack of artistic imagination, but, still, I'm waiting until I can conceive of such a work and then worry about how to create it.

Ah, I DO remember some art where some macro scene is made out of zillions of little, bitty images you can's see from a distance. Kind of a one-trick pony, however, I think. The kind of thing a clever artist might do, and take all necessary pains to accomplish. But, hardly the kind of thing I think about doing on a regular basis.

Thanks for the poke!