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CS2 16bit = 15bit + 1? Why?


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Ok im sure this is addressed elsewhere - but a search for '16 bit cs2'

did not help.

 

In martin evening's book on photoshop he regularly states it is

actually only using 15 bits per channel - but so far I have not seen

why this is the case. Does anyone know the technical reason behind this?

 

Does CS2 use a structure like

struct{ signed short Red, signed short Blue, signed short Green} Pixel;?

 

Having programmed 16 bit image processing algorithms for machine

vision I find the short coming a little strange.

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Marc

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The high-bit representation in Photoshop has always been "15 1" bits (32767 (which is the

total number of values that can be represented by 15 bits of precision) 1). This requires 16

bits of data to represent is called "16 bit". It is not an arbitrary decision on how to display

this data, it is displaying an exact representation of the exact data Photoshop is using, just as

0-255 is displayed for 8 bit files.

 

Andrew Rodney

http://www.digitaldog.net/

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So in other words when you take the raw format and convert it into a picture the maximum number which can be generated for any one colour channel is <32768? (ie 15 bit). That would imply therefore that most of the CCD sensors are not reporting true 16 bit per colour (12 bit?). Does anyone know the exact sampling range of the new CCD's / colour (e.g. for EOS 20D, EOS 5D). I suspect it is written on a website somewhere....

 

Im not too worried (or bothered) - it was more an anomoly which did not seem to be well documented.

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