Seeking advice: dSLR capable of large prints

[diane_rose]

I decided to try talking to a person, so I just called Nikon tech support. (I was impressed Tech Support was willing to take a pre-sales call!... but I digress...) I asked them what they would recommend for making saleable 20x30 prints. They recommended one of the Coolpix 8000 series because they're 8MP and not the D70 since it's only 6.1MP. They told me that for printing high quality large prints the megapixels are the most important thing and that the sensor size didn't really make a difference.

 

Thanks everyone for all the helpful input.

Diane

[chris_patti1]

It's actually possible to compare yourself: Buy a CF card (you'll need one whatever camera you eventually get) and a card reader (cheap and ditto). Go to your local shop, load the card into a 8000 series (or any of the 8 mp digicams, for that matter) set the camera at its top JPEG quality, and take some shots. Do the same with a D70. Bring the card home, load the files onto your computer and print a crop (say 1/3 length by 1/3 width) of a shot from each camera at 8x10 (about equal a 20x30 for the whole image). See which one you like best. A rough test, but should give you some idea whether there is a difference and which camera it favors. I'd be surprised if it's the digicam, but maybe the Nikon tech guy is right.

[eric friedemann]

"Nikon Tech Support told me that for printing high quality large prints the megapixels are the most important thing and that the sensor size didn't really make a difference."

 

 

It is just this sort of idiocy that makes Nikon Digital Tech Support a joke in the industry. Usually Nikon Digital Tech Support simply can't provide even basic information (e.g regarding my LS 8000 scanner and D100s). But for NDTS to tell you that megapixels are more important than sensor size in making big prints is unbelievable.

 

 

When working at the outer limits of digital cameras' resolution, sensor size trumps megapixels- period. I sell and have shot D70s and the new 8400. It is absurd for NDTS to state that, let's say, the new Coolpix 8400 with a 6.6x8.8mm chip is capable of the same resolution as a D70 with a 15.5x23.7mm chip.

 

 

I wouldn't want to make a 20x30 inch print from any Nikon camera currently available. But I certainly wouldn't want to make a 20x30 inch print from an image shot with a Coolpix 8400.

[diane_rose]

>I wouldn't want to make a 20x30 inch print from any Nikon camera

>currently available. But I certainly wouldn't want to make a 20x30 >inch print from an image shot with a Coolpix 8400.

 

Would you make a 20x30 from a Nikon N70 and ISO 50 or 100 slide/film?

[eric friedemann]

"Would you make a 20x30 from a Nikon N70 and ISO 50 or 100 slide/film?"

 

 

If I knew I were going to make a print over 8x12 inches, I would shoot medium format. Under the best of circumstances, it is difficult to make what I would consider a professional-quality 20x30 inch image from any 35mm piece of film. Enlarging a piece of film 20X is not optimal for resolution.

[jtk]

"Resolution" isn't a measure of an image's visual worth. If it was an important measure we wouldn't be impressed by Cartier Bresson's work, or Ansel Adams'.

 

Interpolation to gigantic murals, far beyond 30X40, can be very effective from very small formats...depends on printing skills and the absolute visual worth of the image.

 

Color subtlety/intensity, Dmax, the right contrast, and the value of the image itself *to viewers* are all more important than "resolution".

 

Qimage (color) and QTRgui (B&W) both offer better printing engines than does PS. Qimage provides an assortment of interpolation tools.

[eric friedemann]

John, I'll allow this, we bought an Ilford/Epson inkjet turn-key system for our store. The interpolation software is excellent and you can get decent-looking poster prints from relatively small files.

 

 

Even so, if I'm making a posrter-sized print, I'd rather start out with a 500MB scan from a 6x7cm neg than start with a small piece of film or a small digital image. Rezzing up has its limits.

[phyrpowr]

I'm a little late on this thread, but I just saw a 20x30 portrait made with an Olympus E-1, shot in JPEG, and it was just great, so basically yes it can be done

[eric friedemann]

Jack, with all due respect, if you thought a 20x30 inch print made from an E-1 was "great," you've never seen a great, large print before.

[webin_manzana]

It may be a good advice to stay away from Olympus Digital Cameras, unless you want to throw away good money. My C-5050 had CCD problem in just 18 months, and when your CCD goes poof, your camera is dead.

[phyrpowr]

damn

 

I'd better call the Ansel Adams gallery in Yosemite, and tell 'em they got crap all over their walls

 

can someone else call the Weston gallery in Carmel? and MoMA in NY? thanks

[dean_g]

Thinking within the film paradigm is not always very useful when considering digital capabilities. The resources such as noise reduction and interpolation software available in the digital domain can expand possibilities far beyond any one to one correspondence with film experience.

 

While sensor size is quite important, the degree of enlargement is not linearly proportional to it. Big pixels on a sensor are preferable, but the number of pixels is still significant, and with well done post noise reduction, surprising results can be obtained from the smaller sensors. I haven't done any 20X30" prints from the KM A2 I recently got, but baseed on what I've seen from ISO 64 and 100 printed at 13 X 19" it's not inconceivable to me that a very acceptable 20 X 30" print could be done. This all depends, as mentioned, on what results you are looking for, but it seems to me that "sharp" is certainly possible, especially if you can live with some noise/grain. I guess I wouldn't rule out the Nikon 8700, it's worth the experiment.