Canon going 24X36--why not Nikon?

[andrewdawsongallery]

Apparently Canon has announced that future pro DSLR's will

use a 24X36 sensor, but for price reasons the consumer ones

will use the smaller sensor. Nikon is reportedly sticking with the

smaller "APS" sensors for all DSLR's, saying it would not "make

a difference in picture quality". The PopPhoto site mentions this

<a

href="http://www.popphoto.com/article.asp?article_id=766&secti

on_id=5&page_number=3" >here</a>, although I've seen

similar statements elsewhere.

 

 

Excluding any other major changes in the technology, how can

both sides be right? With what little I know, the larger sensor

can only mean better quality as far as noise level, resolution etc.

The full-frame sensor also means Canon won't have to develop

more lenses specifically for use with DSLRs, the approach that

Nikon is taking.

 

As someone who uses Nikon with extreme wide lenses, I was

dismayed to see this is the direction Nikon is going. Yes, I know

about the 12-24DX, but it doesn't solve everything. Maybe it's just

another Nikon conspiracy...

[NetR]

OK Andrew - you are a pro nature photographer with a lot of great shots posted, who could really use a full frame Nikon DSLR and make great art with it. Too many of these questions come from sideline amateurs who feel emabrassed that someone else has got one bigger, longer and with more pixels than theirs.

 

Unfortunately, Nikon seem to have decided that their customers are happy with the smaller chip and want greater functionality, such as the D2H provides. And with the Kodak on the market, with firmware improving every month, the potential market for a full frame Nikon DSLR has been roughly halved.

 

FWIW, my view is that Nikon look at selling not only camera bodies but also lenses - the whole photo market. The capability to use a 1961 105mm f2.5 lens on a D1X is not putting food on the table for Nikon shareholders. Why should they develop a body that you can use your existing lenses with, when they can develop a D2H that will encourage you to buy a 200-400 VR to use with it?

 

Canon are doing it both ways but Nikon are sticking with the smaller chips. That is what makes competition.

 

I think it needs people like you, Nikon users and credible customers for a full-frame Nikon DSLR body, to lobby Nikon directly. And often.

 

I don't think that heartfelt pleas in fora like this will work.

 

Regards, Ross

[ShunCheung]

The reason is very simple. *IF* you can get the same job done with a $4000 small-sensor DSLR, why build a $8000 full-frame DSLR; it is simply not cost effective. You can buy a lot of nice lenses with the $4000 difference. If there is any conspiracy, it is the company that makes you pay $8000 for a DSLR. Keep in mind that the Canon EOS 1Ds has been out for over a year but the price hasn't dropped much. Those who are waiting for full-frame DSLRs to be "affordable" will be waiting for a long time.

 

The real question is whether you can get the same job done with a small-sensor DSLR.

 

In any case, if you want a full-frame DSLR, I suggest you switch to Canon.

[mike r]

I seen that article too. I don't think it's a conspiracy, just big business. It did say that Nikon would be studying the "full frame" sensors, which leaves the door open somewhat. Right now I think they realize from a marketing standpoint that the cost of full frame sensors is simply well beyond the means of most of us, therefore that's not where the money is. Nikon, just like any other big business, has only one goal - making money for its owners. They will take whatever approach they feel will bring in the most revenue, and at this time it's going with the smaller sensors and selling everyone their DX lenses to go along with them. As long as people keep buying them up like there's no tomorrow, they are going to continue making and selling them. If and when people begin demanding and are willing to pay the price for full frame digital SLRs, I'm sure they will take that approach. It all comes down to where the market is. In a lessen from the past, if people are perfectly content with their VHS format VCR's, why try to sell them Beta or Super VHS? I am like you, as a Nikon shooter I would like to see a full frame sensor at a decent price someday so all my lenses could work as I intended them to when I bought them. Until that happens, I have little interest in digital for my type of photography. It amazes me when I hear people say that digital effectively turns their 300mm lens, for instance, into a 450mm lens. You could do the same with film, its called cropping.

[andrewdawsongallery]

Shun--with the numbers you're using, Nikon's strategy makes

more sense. I guess I'm finding it a little hard to believe that a

full-frame sensor is the only reason for the higher price category.

I have no doubt the larger sensors cost more, but do they really

inflate it to 2X the price? Could be true for now, but what about in

a year or two?

 

Like you said, the real question--and the intent of my original

question--was if 24X36 will get the job done better in the long

run. It just seems like Canon's approach implies that it will. My

impression is when it comes time to make DSLR's in the 10+

MP range, that will be alot easier to achieve with a larger sensor.

Isn't Nikon painting themselves into a corner with the smaller

sensor route? I understand the economics of their pricing right

now, but if computer evolution is any guide, cameras with much

higher MP will be the future.

[peter_zwiers]

Mike...

 

RE: "It amazes me when I hear people say that digital effectively turns their 300mm lens, for instance, into a 450mm lens. You could do the same with film, its called cropping".

 

For us amateurs without a lot of knowledge of the difference between digital and film SLRs, this has to be the best two line description I've seen of the digital 1.5x effect - without graphics even! I think Nikon's website spends about 2 or 3 pages trying to explain this concept - and I was still somewhat confused afterwards!

 

Thanks!

[chuck___3]

"The full-frame sensor also means Canon won't have to develop more lenses specifically for use with DSLRs"<p>

 

Yes, they do. They only went the full size route with only one professional body, the EOS-1ds. Even its professional near twin EOS-1d uses a subframe sensor. You can check the comparative sales numbers of these two body to see which is Canon mainstay. It's one of those two, and it ain't the full framed one.<p>

Their advanced amateur/low tier professional DSLR body, The EOS-10D, also has a subframe sensor, and that has yet a difference size and proportion to the subframe sensor on the EOS-1D.<p>

Their amateur DSLR, whiling having the same sensor size as EOS-10D, has a special lens line for it that works on neither the EOS-10D nor the EOS-1D.<p>

And you are looking to Canon for future direction?<p>

The conspiracy seems to be no matter how screwed up Canon is, some die hard Canon freak would always be there to bash Nikon and push Canon as living embodiment of foresight.

[ShunCheung]

Andrew, kind of like diamonds, the price for large circuit chips goes up exponentially with size. This problem has been around for decades. The larger the area, the easier you can have impurities and the more samples you need to throw away. Somebody needs to pay for all the bad sensors that don't make it into DSLRs. Those who understand this problem should not be surprised that the price for the 1Ds hasn't dropped much after over a year and would not expect it to drop very quickly in the future. Meanwhile, small-sensor DSLRs are getting cheaper rapidly.

[melvin_bramley]

Am I out of line here? As a NON digital but wannabe photographer;full frame equates to a bigger & better viewfinder! Am I wrong? To me the viewfinder makes a big difference to my abilty to photograph a subject.Nikon are unfortunatley way behind Canon with DSLR's.Canon & Kodak lead the way with full frame & like the product or not Kodak have reduced the cost of buying into a full frame system.With "demand" full frame will become an affordable reality but as long as buyers are content with second best! thats what will be sold.

[umd]

As of today Canon has 3 different sensor sizes, last camera they introduced has the smallest sensor size they offer and they released a cheap wide angle zoom that fits only this camera, they still don't have satisfactory wide angle solution for their subframe cameras. That makes me think Canon isn't sure about where to go, seems like they are caught unprepared for digital SLR business and trying a sheer brute force approach in the product development and marketing. Nikon has a more consistent strategy and seem to believe subframe is here to stay, alone or as a cheap alternative to full framers.

[ilkka_nissila]

Melvin, have a look at the D2H, it has an enlarged view.

 

With the 4.1 MP D2H, Nikon has demonstrated that image quality can be considerably improved even within the small sensor / moderate MP count category. Nikon seems to feel that the artifacts that occur when wide angles are used on full-frame cameras are too much, and it's better to use a smaller sensor and design wide angles specifically for it. Time will tell.

 

I don't understand why making these large chips is so difficult. I mean, the area is roughly double to that of a DX chip. So you need two clean DX chips (or 4 4/3 chips) to make one full-frame chip, stick them together. If you can test the chips before gluing them together, the price of the chip should be roughly 2-3 times that of the DX chip, and that sure doesn't explain a $4000 difference in price. However, I think Canon is just pricing the camera high based on the expected value in the eyes of the customers. Many people like the idea of being able to use all the same lenses from 35mm film cameras. Also, there is no competition to push the price down; medium format 36x36 backs cost 50% more (without the actual camera body!!!) and only deliver a slight increase in image quality, and no wide angles available!! As far as I know, the 1Ds and 14n are the only digital cameras with true wide angle compatibility/availability and high resolution.

[rubens_abboud]

Digital sensor size has a direct impact on the choice of lenses that go along with the camera. Although I can understand the fear of those holding off the purchase of a Nikon camera with a 1.5x cropping factor knowing that a major competitor has chosen a full frame format, in my view one needs to take all the facts into consideration and analyze them objectively before coming to a conclusion.

 

The facts:

 

All Nikon digital cameras have a cropping factor. Nikon has released professional-quality lenses that address the digital market, from very wide-angle all the way into telephoto range -- today. Nikon has formally announced that it will maintain the cropping factor in its cameras for the future. Professional Nikon cameras can be bought today for significantly less than professional full-frame Canon cameras.

 

Neither I, nor you nor Nikon can predict the future. But technology can go many different ways and full-frame is not necessarily the holy grail of high-resolution and lower noise.

 

While maintaining it's cropping-factor sensors, Nikon has progressively increased the quality and resolution of it's digital cameras just like other cropping-factor camera makers. So, it may be realistic to expect that in two years, sensors from Nikon will be of even higher resolution and lower noise than they are today without necessarily being full frame.

 

And at the current price points, it is reasonable to expect that Canon will be selling fewer $8000 full frame professional cameras than Nikon with its cropping-factor professional sensors.

 

So, to make a historical comparison, look at 35mm vs medium/large-format today. Despite its lower resolution, technologically 35mm has evolved by leaps and bounds simply because it was accessible to the masses whereas other formats have lagged in technical advancements.

 

This being a Nikon forum, I'm quite sure that we are largely 35mm image makers today, despite the availability of high resolution with larger, more expensive formats.

[ShunCheung]

Melvia, have you ever seen an Olympus E-1, the first 4/3 system DSLR? I have played around with one at a local expo. When I looked through its viewfinder, the image looked large and bright. But when I turned the camera around and removed the lens, I was surprised to see how tiny the mirror was. And of course the 4/3 system's sensor size is 17.4 x 13.1mm, which has a so called "2x multiplying factor." In other words, the 4/3 sensor is much smaller than Nikon or even Canon's small sensor but its viewfinder image looks large and bright. I also shoot medium format 645, but there is no inherent advantage of its viewfinder image either.

 

We have posted here over and over that the 6MP D100 is fine for a lot of applications, including wedding portraits blown up to 20x30 inches (50x70mm). In a couple of years, people will get used to the small sensors and their advantages: (1) less expensive, (2) smaller file sizes, and (3) less demand of expensive long lenses. For example, in sports photography with film, the 300mm/f2.8 (over $4000) was a very commonly used lens. With Nikon digital, a 200mm/f2.8 or most likely a 70-200mm/f2.8 ($1500 after rebates) can get the same job done.

 

In other words, you not only save in the cost of the DSLR, you can save big time in long lenses also. Of course large sensors have their advantages also, but we'll leave it to those who need to make huge prints for protraits and landscape to spend on those $8000 DSLRs.

 

What Nikon needs to produce now is a small-sensor D2X with 8 to 10MP at $3500, in the same range as the D2H. That resolution should satisfy most of its high-end customers. A few people will continue to demand full frame, but a lot more people will be happier with the $3500 price tag.

[astcell]

The Nikon D100 is 6MP, but the Canon 1Ds is 8MP, but full frame? I think the point would be the DENSITY of the pixels. As long as lenses are wide enough to cover what you need, the size of the frame is a non-issue.

[ilkka_nissila]

The size of the sensor is very much an issue. A 2x cropping factor with the same megapixel count produces roughly twice the noise of a full-frame sensor. This is clearly visible in noise tests made on the Olympus (e.g., at dpreview.com). Obviously software tricks can be used to reduce noise but the price we pay is in artifacts.

 

In terms of exposure time, a full-frame 10 MP camera at iso 800 produces roughly the same noise as a "2x crop factor" 10 MP camera at iso 200, but the full-frame still has higher resolution and contrast with high-quality prime lenses since it doesn't push the lenses as hard.

 

I would have long ago switched to medium or large format for my landscape photography if it weren't for the extremely high prices of digital backs for these, and lack of wide angles (due to the sensor size). Basically landscapes are by and large still film territory, and will stay so until full-frame 35 mm sensors become more accessible.

[ShunCheung]

First of all, the Canon 1Ds is a 11MP camera and the Kodak 14n is 14MP. Actually sensor size does matter. Those who haven't read it should find <A HREF="http://www.photo.net/equipment/digital/sensorsize">this article by Bob Atkins</A> very informative. Bob has a PhD in optics and is an overall moderator for photo.net.

<P>

The main problem with large sensor is cost. The Kodak digital back for medium-format cameras is a 36x36mm square, 16MP one at over $10K. Since most people crop it to make rectangular prints, once you crop, its advantage over the 1Ds is pretty limited. And as Ilkka points out, since the Kodak sensor is much smaller than the 645 frame, wide angle is an issue just like the Nikon D1, D2, D100 and Canon 10D, 300D, etc.

[andrew_funderburg]

There is no relation to the size of the viewfinder and the size of the sensor.

 

The Nikon D100 has a small viewfinder because they just cropped the F80 viewfinder.

Go to the store an pick up a D100, a D1X and a D2H and all of the viewfinders are

slightly different, with the D2H being larger. It is just a large as an F5. Viewfinders

have magnification glass in them and the camera maker can make them as small or

large as they wish.

 

Ever look through a tiny point and shoot film camera? Wow those viewfinders are

small, and guess what? They take the same size film as the F5. Hmmm.

 

AF

[rosty_vygovsky]

I was amazed after reading this lengthy discussion that nobody brought up another serious flaw of the smallish sensors - higher noise at high ISO settings. And this drawback is getting even more evident when we are speaking about high density multi- MP sensors...

 

If I had not have a nice set of Nikkor lenses and film bodies I would have switched to Canon in a heartbeat...

[ofey_kalakar]

Canon uses CMOS sensor. Clearly a cheaper and inferior technology. Nikon uses

(CCD).

[chuck___3]

D2H uses a very CMOS-like sensor.