Sony's sensor roadmap includes a 150MP medium-format chip for 2018

First off, being that these will appear in the cameras like the Fuji GFX and others, I think that it's going to be geared towards the medium/high-end market, so perhaps 1/2 to 25% of the the photography market won't be affected, as your average hobbyist consumers are probably not going to spend $4,000+ on a camera body. I think where these will crop up are in the hands of professionals or serious enthusiasts, as well as industry and for other non-photography purposes as mentioned. Second, I think they are releasing this to generate hype, as I think Sony is trying to breathe new life into their sensor line-up. It's just like in most tech industry (computer industry, for example)... many companies will publish their roadmaps for the next 12-18 months to generate hype. Yes, this will cause some people to wait, and they may lose customers along the way, but on the whole, it gets people's attention, and that's what they want.

Cause Sony is not simply Sony.
The sensors-department is vastly independent from the camera department. They need to sell their sensors to the market and not hide them just for their colleagues in the camera-company sharing the same owner and name.

Sony is not even selling cameras with these sensors... they are used by Phase1, Hasselblad, Fujifilm and Pentax.

@Petroglyph: Now that would be very interesting if Pentax released 55x41 in an updated 645 model, or even a brand new camera for that matter. If they can package and sell a 55x41 sensor with 100+MP for under $10k, then Hassy, Fuji, and even Phase One should be very worried.

I think Pentax already worried the market in 2014 with the 645z - For sure the Pentax Flagship is one of the reasons why we have 3 "affordable" MF cams right now.

Manfred, agree about prime lenses, I use only primes and I never crop (ever). This is talking about my personal work - when I worked for clients I used some 2.8 zooms, and would crop to their liking.

Editors will crop, but as 16mp will print a double-page spread with no interpolation (254dpi), that's a moot point when talking about 50mp sensors.

Will be interesting to see if that income bracket responds as "dutifully" to fast, new introductions of better cameras as levels below it seem to. Or, will they determine it's not enough of a gain to spend another $10k on a body while keeping their old one or losing $3000-$4000 by selling it used.

I'm dismayed that the 48x39 format is getting the shaft. It strikes a great balance, especially in that it allows ample movement with modern medium format wide angle lenses from Rodenstock.

No OlyPent you're wrong

You could be right. We could be for practical purposes be at a performance ceiling as far as resolution goes on cameras. Maybe more effort should go into DR?
But I know wildlife shooters who would like to be able to do a 1/4 frame crop and get fantastic resolution.

Actually, they already announced that september 8th 2015.

I thought if it after... Time flies. However, it's not going away, canon has been demoing it at every show since.

2015 was 250MP sensor.
Back. 2010, Canon show cased 120MP sensor, which never see the light.

They did a press release that a DSLR was in development with 120mp, and they have been demoing it at every show since that announcement, so... Not the same.

http://global.canon/en/news/2010/aug24e.html

so? are you having difficulty reading? for starters it's not the same as what I'm talking about. canon did a press announcement as Troj mentioned in sept 2015 stating that a 120MP dslr is now in development.

so no.. they didn't "advertise" this for ages, and they already stated it's in development. not "going to be developed" or in your case "an R&D announcement with no future products associated with it".

"Featuring a resolution of approximately 120 effective megapixels, the SLR camera now being developed will incorporate a Canon-developed high-pixel-density CMOS sensor within the current EOS-series platform"

http://global.canon/en/news/2015/sep08e2.html

it take around 3 years for canon to turn out an DSLR. so do the math.

What I told is that canon does this kind of announcements and we never see the results in real life. They announced 120mp on APS-H 7 years ago. Which means >200mp on FF. Where is your 3 year math?

you are clearly having issues.

canon has NEVER done an announcement stating that they are developing a DSLR and not delivered.

read my linked announcement. your's is meaningless and wasn't even the point being made.

I promise to enter this thread next year(your three year math) and prove that you as well as Canon, are just involved in cheap talk

yeah because official press announcements mean nothing in the world of stocks and securities.. (eyeroll).

Well, the DOF changes based the viewing distance. So does the dynamic range, resolution, contrast etc etc.

But regardless of that, the standard to evaluate all that etc is based to "normal viewing distance" what was 8x10" print viewed from 12" distance by a person who had normal vision (20/20).

And then there is always things like this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/08/technology/08pogue.html

The same can be repeated and repeated and the results are similar.

But today the gameplay likely would be different if we talk about 5Mpix vs 16Mpix vs 200Mpix (Hasselblad).
But still, we talk about very extremes.

The typical viewing distance is where the viewing is natural.
If a person has slight nearsight and looks print without glasses, they naturally lean forward to see things sharply. If a person has glasses, he looks from normal distance.

If I have a 1x1m print on the wall, no one goes to look it from 30cm, but stays at 1-3m distance (natural being about 1.5x of the diagonal)

Those who are looking at pictures on a screen can use all the resolution they can get, unless they never learned that screen images can be zoomed in to any power.

Yes, sorry I meant "typical." As in, you wouldn't stand 3 feet from a 30ft x 50x billboard. And yes, higher resolutions will mean more cropping room to work with, but I think at some point, technology will exceed the human eye. I thought it was determined that the human eye can only see about 25 st ops of dynamic range and something like 575 megapixels. At the rate sensors are evolving, we aren't too far off from that (give maybe another 10-15 years, and since human eyes don't evolve quite as fast--or at all for that matter, we may see a point where the camera will be able to capture the same as the human eye--although I don't believe it will ever be 100%, but it will be VERY close probably).

true sirhawkeye, however the image quality improves with the oversampling. the more mp's you have simply the better the resultant image will look if you are oversampled.

I would love to be able to crop even more for my wildlife photos. I think it will put even greater pressure on the optics manufacturers for perfection though.

I think until we reach at least 5 more stops colour range (dynamic range) and about 300mp, I think there's a *lot* of room yet to grow in the digital photography realm. We haven't even remotely begun to reach the point where 150mp can't be put to very, very good practical use. All photographers aren't printing on paper. 100, 150 or even 200mp isn't exactly a gobsmacking amount of pixels when you're printing on a 30x80in glass pane.

I'm thinking it'll take 200-300mp to equal a good 4x5 scan, and hoping such quality will be achieved in a medium format form factor (albeit larger sensors). I see 150mp as a far-more-useful *practical* jump in resolution as opposed to the piddly incremental changes that we've come accustomed to being spoon fed.

My question is the projected price of the colour version. Good to see Sony doing something other than sitting on its haunches.

I'm not saying that the technology in the photography world will stop in the foreseeable future... I'm just saying that I think we will reach a point where cameras will exceed what the human eye can perceive/see.

@sirhawkeye64... that's many years away; so many years away that many of us will be dead by the time that happens. ;)

The problem with the higher resolution is that you really need to stop up your camera holding methods. Really need to get the camera to be super stable at 150Mpix to get anything well in sharp so you could go in and crop.

Sure the cropping is always the interesting thing. But consider this.

100mm 150Mpix would turn to be a like a 200mm 37.5Mpix when cropped by 50% (1/4 of the area).
100mm 150Mpix would turn to be like 400mm 9.37Mpix when cropped again by 50% (1/16 of the area).

So now the question, how much it would benefit over the situation to carry ie. Olympus 12-100mm f/4 in the first place with the 20Mpix sensor?¨

At the same field of view as the 100mm would give on that 150Mpix sensor, it would blow over the 20Mpix. But crop to 200mm and the 150Mpix isn't anymore so benefitical at all (compare ie 16Mpix vs 36Mpix). And then crop even more to the 400mm and....

Then would be the WA end 12mm vs 100mm on both formats where other just gets the WA shot when other needs to stich

@Tommi K1... that's what people we're overly concerned about when the 12mp Nikon D2X came out ((chuckle)). The bottom line is that it's relatively simple to find your personal demarkation line between required shutter speed (or fast flash/cut-off) and blurry photographs.

If a 200mp photograph yields a near 40mp result after cutting off 1/2 the photograph. What would a 36mp file give you after doing the same? Stitching simply expands the view of a given "scene"; stitching does nothing to increase detail and size of that same scene.

Reality says I wouldn't use a 16mp today with a 400mm lens (or w/any other lens for that matter). A realistic situation is being able to shoot a bit wide, and having the latitude to crop down and still get various 11x17" compositions, etc.. from far less work and post processing. Too many real-world benefits to recount here.

When using a FF or APS-C is more beneficial over MF... then I pull such out of my camera bag.

The real world benefits are that we are talking now a 150Mpix MEDIUM FORMAT sensor.
So if you want that "400mm" lens then you would be carrying that big 100mm anyways.
You are anyways better then with Nikon 1 70-300mm for most cases as you can just zoom in and out and you get the reach and a lot of details to crop even if wanted.

Everytime you start copping a image, you are putting compromise to image quality vs same with optical magnification.

You can already use a 16Mpix and get extreme quality various 20-25" prints with a 100-400mm that combo offers what wanted. Or get something like 50-200mm if really wanted the wide side.

The Nikon 36Mpix D800 already put many experienced to trouble by its high resolution. Canon 5DS is same. Sony A7R Mk2 is same. And we are talking 36-50Mpix sensors.
So you can very well forget taking shots handheld with 150Mpix and come off with better details than 42Mpix Sony.

The physics is biatch, 100mm 150Mpix turns to 200mm 37Mpix. Nothing special.

Not if you take photos at 1/2000th of a second, which is not uncommon in wildlife photography.

@Tommy K1.. actually physics doesn't tell the whole story any more than a published 0-62km time; you'd benefit looking at the whole as opposed to the parts. The bottom line is that no matter what lens you slap on a Nikon 1, the result will not usually look like that of a Sony CMOS 33x44 (or larger) sensor. You'd be cropping the detail from a Nikon 1's sensor. Likewise, the results from a Canon 5Dsr aren't the same as the Sony 33x44 CMOS irrespective of what lens is used. You're too busy "equating" that you fail to realize that the images being captured aren't of the same quality from the start.

It's like trying to argue that a 70-300 lens gives the same angle of view for a lot less money as a 300 f/2.8. The bottom line is that they don't even look the same at 300mm .

"Everytime you start copping a image, you are putting **compromise** to image quality vs same with optical magnification"

((sigh)) ... the irony of using a smaller sensor.

The smaller sensor designed for specific set of lenses (and otherway around) makes the sensor full frame, a native sensor for given image circle.

Digitally cropping image is worse than using optical magnification to get there in the first place.
You are arguing that you can take this MF 150Mpix sensor with a 100mm lens and come home with a better quality photos than a Nikon 1 with 70-300mm that has framed the whole bird at the distance to full frame with 300mm.

Put it to equivalence so you really understand it:
What is the field of view with this 150Mpix using 100mm lens?
And what is the field of view with Nikon 1 using a 300mm lens?

Now, how much you need to crop that 150Mpix sensor image taken with 100mm to get the same field of view as the Nikon 1 300mm got with 20Mpix?

300mm is equal on 35mm sensor to 810mm.
100mm is equal on 35mm sensor to 79mm.

Nikon 1 gives 20Mpix on that.
Your Medium Format gives ultra nice 2.34Mpix.

If you think that your MF will resolve better...

So to remind. A thought that 150Mpix is very useful in the wildlife photography where a 500-600mm is often wanted on 35mm cameras. It puts requirement to have a like 800mm on MF to get that 600mm field of view.

37.5Mpix crop is 50% crop from 150Mpix and it is like having MF lens of 200mm. Equal to 160mm.
So how many wildlife photographer out there doesn't feel limited with 160mm on 35mm camera?
And at that moment it is 37.5Mpix vs 42Mpix or 50Mpix at the best 35mm sensors.

How about when these others put the 200-500mm zooms, what will the MF user do? Crop more of course! It is after all easy and nice to just carry that 100mm lens and just crop! After all that MF sensor isn't anything like Nikon D500 with 200-500mm zoom. Right?!

@Tommi K1... I did not bring up focal lengths. You did. Again, you keep trying to equate a school bus to a sedan. When 'others' pull out a 200-500 zoom, most MF photographers will keep shooting with a 24, 35, 80, 100, or 120mm lens because those focal lengths (and thereabout) are the focal lengths that most MF photographers will use when doing actual paid work, which historically is the single most reason why a significant number of people purchase or use a digital MF camera. (1) My statements remain irrefutable; to date, there are no small sensors that give the same overall performance as a 33x44 and larger CMOS sensor (2) Currently there isn't a small sensor that gives the same cropping latitude & quality as MF, at typical MF working focal lengths.
(3) APS-C, FF, etc, are different tools that excel in their respective lanes. (4) If a MF shooter wants to shoot small birds, they use the appropriate tools to begin with like experienced photographers typically do.

(cont.) If I wanted to shoot a snowy owl with a snowy background and have a choice between using 70-300mm lens on a Nikon D810 or a 400mm lens on a Pentax 645Z, I'm picking up the MF camera.

@ Teila Day
You have not read what was said:

"fedway wrote:

Think of the cropping possibilities as the article alludes to. How about bringing a small 100mm prime to safari? Just shoot bursts at the whole scene then choose the framing later and even have multiple frames from one image. "

I didn't bring up the focal length. I didn't even bring it for the safari (birds, landscapes, big animals at long distances etc) and the simple fact still is that even on a FF 300mm is often too short and you need to have something like 500mm.
Not everyone serious about safari drive in a jeep next to lion walking on the road or next to elephant.

And how about AF? A running gepard/lion/antiloupe/wild hog/etc. Or a bird landing, flying etc? GOOD LUCK with MF!

In nature photography mobility is the key and so is the focal length changes. With three lenses on ILC camera like 7-14 + 12-100 + 100-400 allows you to get far more and faster than any MF camera and you get 20Mpix or 80Mpix depending scene

Sure I could take a 150Mpix MF for couple day in a park times like you can see tourists being taken. (Drive next to elephant, sit there in a car for 5min and then move on). A MF with a 50mm lens would be like shooting all day with 50-200mm lens on MF if you are ready to go from 150Mpix to 9.8Mpix. That is btw 40-160mm eq.

Now hands up everyone who has gone to month safari with a private guides as part of the work and has been using a 70-200mm and wished that they had longer focal length? And then us who had longer zooms with us, how often did you use longer focal length than 200mm?

Nikon D800 with 70-200mm vs such 150Mpix MF with 50mm is that Nikon user gets every time a 36Mpix on the target, from 70-200mm.
MF gets 150Mpix at the 40mm eq. 37.5Mpix at 80mm eq, 9.8Mpix at 160mm eq.

And then we don't even talk the usual problems ie. heat waves that will destroy typically every benefit of that 150Mpix compared to 36Mpix in most cases.

So shooting a Tetrao urogallus from 2m is great in a snow. http://imagecache5d.allposters.com/watermarker/76-7686-UBH1300Z.jpg

Definetly that would be place to use a MF for better details. Totally agree with you.

But lets get serious. The idea to use a MF for a wildlife photography with a single wide angle or short tele lens and just crop from 150Mpix to 2-4x zoom is just not good idea.

Especially when IQ difference between 200Mpix (Hasselblad) and a 42Mpix is already non-existing in the most use cases, that it just isn't worth it!

Zooms allows flexibility to get to perspective that is wanted and then frame the wanted composition. And every time you get the same max sensor resolution on the subject.

In advertising 150Mpix will become handy. As you really can do exactly that using WA lens and then shoot and crop. You just saved time on scene with hundreds dollars billing every minute as you don't need to take 2-3 shots and guide models every time. You have one and that is it.

And so that we are clear one thing.

Everytime you crop digital file, all the benefits are going down vs full sensor.
Do you want to take a 42Mpix 14bit image or a 9.75Mpix 16bit file?

In most cases you don't see the difference. In most cases you will not even benefit from the MF.

Lets put the requirement for the IQ:
Lets target to three kind photographs IQ magazine requirements.

1) Full opening, that is a A3 size.
2) Full page, that is A4 size.
3) Half-Page to details, that is A5 to A7 size.

http://www.papersizes.org/images/a-series-paper-sizes-1-full.jpg
(Not the exact magazine sizes but you get the point).

The typical magazine printing can be anything from 150 DPI to 600 DPI. So lets just keep in the "universal" 300 DPI.

So much does that 150Mpix really benefit on the most photos on the magazines over 42Mp? The most photos are printed at A5 size, few are at A4 and couple A3. How about when paper is matte or glossy paper?

@Tommy K1 .. Obviously you don't even need 20mp for a double truck print... but that's not the point of wanting the large file from a DMF (CCD or CMOS); and those real-world reasons are what you need to focus on as opposed to what doesn't matter to the photographer/client. The public doesn't care if a magazine page was from my old 4mp Nikon D2hs or from a 20mp FF Canon... which has nothing to do with why people shoot FF or want/need more resolution/pixels or why MF is often preferred in media. Stop with the red herrings.
You don't have to make degradation "clear" to me. It was clear to me more than a few decades ago cropping/enlarging. I also read "Fedway's" post; However it wasn't material to my initial response to you. I recommend addressing who you're speaking to if it's Other than who started the thread.

Any more on this subject just PM me.

I don't care what some gear head or pixel peeper say somewhere in the "making of", the bottom line is always what you can produce and how does it look in the final required output.

If someone does for living a postcards... They really don't need more than a smartphone if focal length isn't restriction.

If someone does highway ads, they don't neither need any different sensor than smartphone offers.

But then there are always those who want "experience" of using very special tools like MF or a FF or a crappiest smartphone there is.... Regardless what is required as output.

The idea to just go shoot with MF and come out with photos without need for longer focal length than the one in camera, it works for that 2-3x. Always has. But when talking about photography areas that doesn't really be done with 50mm, but more likely 500mm, then the idea of the cropping isn't same as on street photography and using a 35mm lens.

I didn't bring up the "red herrings", I only answered to them.

I didn't think this had anything to do with MF. The OP we all responded to was simply talking about megapixel counts and that it becomes pointless after a while. I guess if you bring medium format into it (such as it is now) the only use for more megapixels is if you want to print a massive banner for a sports stadium ;).

We actually lost the MP to be pointless after 6-10Mpix. That really is the borderline where resolution increase lost its meaning in daily photography requirements, even with serious cropping.
For decades humans has enjoyed from far lower resolution for movies, TV-shows and even for paintings (talking about centuries). And even on film era the resolution was low in most photography areas (not "what film perfectly could deliver" but "what usual photography was about").

Increasing MPix does have the opposite sides for more often.
1) Management efforts changes by file sizes (not storage space, but management)

2) Handling the camera is totally different by increased shake and motion effects.

3) More demands for the post processing (to really downscale and crop every image you want to take).

4) Addition to techniques as it is easy to think "I just crop later" like primes puts you to do.

5) In most situations no visual benefits to photographs.

Such sensors has their places, always.

In reality, I think it really depends on the output format you plan to use. For screen viewing, 150 MP in my opinion, is a "waste." Yes it gives you more room to crop and you do technically have higher resolution images, but you've probably exceeded the capabilities of most viewing devices (monitors, tablets, phones, etc). Now , if you're printing (and printing large prints) then 150 MP may be useful, but for everyday users (and probably even some enthusiasts) 150 MP is a bit much, not to mention I can only image what a camera of this magnitude will cost (haven't looked at prices or even preliminary pricing). Either way for me, 24-36MP for me is plenty. I don't do nature photography (mostly landscapes though, with portraiture mixed in) so the 150 MP wouldn't be as much of a big deal for me. And partially because my target medium for my images is on-screen viewing and perhaps smaller prints (11x17 or less) so 24-50MP is plenty for me.

@PeteQuad, you're partially correct. (1) If you use a 20mp FF Canon + 100mm macro lens to photograph the human eye, it will not look as detailed, as 150mp MF + 120mm lens whether printed 30x40" or viewed on a 12" Macbook. People incorrectly assume more megapixels don't matter unless it's a large print, which is incorrect.

(2) It also matters shooting wide in a confined space. Shoot 175 high school band members using FF (you can generally only get so close and shoot so wide). Shoot the same scene with roughly the same angle of view using a 150mp sensor (still not a whopping amount of pixels) can make a practical difference in facial detail when viewed on a computer or print. Ever see large school group pic (online or print) depicting tiny poorly detailed faces?

300mp or more for under $20k would be a boon to business for a lot of photographers.

That's just scraping the very top of *practical* uses for a lot of pixels & resolution.

@Teila Day, Tommi K1

...and there's me happy shooting with my Olympus E-1

@Wye Photography. That is the thing, you don't need 150Mpix. It is always fun to dream it, like owning a Porsche with 320kph top speed...

Indeed, too bad Olympus couldn't have gotten one of those for the E-M1 II

I think the new fuji lenses can already exceed 100mp. They built that camera system more for the 100MP BSI sensor Sony will sell them than the current one IMHO.

Lot of mythology out there on just how much Sony has done. Most of their IP is licensed or from companies they bought. 99.99% of us more concerned with when the A7RIII and A9 will be announced and if they can be bothered getting of their ass and deliver more APS-C lenses.

Dudes, they are grinding-down medium-format sensors for BSI in volume production! That they can get practical yields doing that is amazing... and only a couple of years after making FF BSI economically viable. I'm very impressed.

Does this mean sensor tech has reached a stable point? NO -- and that's why this is so exciting: Sony is making very significant hybrid fab improvements in a time where the big digital chipmakers (e.g., Intel) are kind-of stuck.

All of a sudden the wait is over.

If you really have interest in such things than the lens line-up is the real expense (along with flashes, triggers, studio backgrounds, tripods, whatever). All those things work fine when you just upgrade the body later on. The current 50mp with middling DR (no better than a D810) is just a placeholder supporting all that gear with a more competitive sensor down the road.

There will but in this case I think the wait would be much more merited as you talking a big increase in resolution that is going to highlight the advantages of the format a lot more than the current sensor which is only marginally getting than FF DSLRs.