That's right. The pixels I'm talking about, the ones currently in use in the
Nikon 990, are about 3.5 microns or about 7 times the wavelength of light.
And even though they are noisier than the ones in the D1 or D30 for
instance, they are quite good, and when printed at 300dpi the noise is
practically invisible.
Also, The pixels don't need to get any smaller since at 3.5 microns you can
get about 30 million of them in a chip the size of the one currently used in
the D1 or D30.
As far as getting the wires out, that shouldn't be a problem either,
especially if the imaging device was CMOS since the data can be multiplexed
on-chip.
I think it's just marketing, but time will tell.
--Bob
> -----Original Message-----
> From: B.Rumary [SMTP:brian.rumary@virgin.net]
> Sent: Wednesday, January 31, 2001 12:31 PM
> To: filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
> Subject: Re: Future of Photography (was filmscanners: real value?)
>
> In <75655197BF9ED311871900508B91A4AC012AD32A@usbgrexch17.us.abatos.com>,
> Clark
> Guy wrote:
>
> > WHY?
> > because we are already approaching the limit of how small a single pixel
> can
> > be. It can't be smaller than a wavelength of light, and we are
> approaching
> > this limit even now. On top of that, the smaller they are the more
> noisy
> > they become, so that creates a limit on size as well.
> >
> I think you are way off here! Present pixel sizes are nowhere _near_ the
> wavelength of light; in fact I don't think it would even be possible to
> manufacture anything remotely that small with foreseeable technology.
>
> As for the resolution needed to equal 35mm film, I think I have seen it
> quoted
> that it would need about 8-10 Megapixels. I imagine they are talking about
>
> mid-range print film here, such as Kodak Gold 100. Fine grain emulsions
> like
> Kodachrome would obviously need more pixels.
>
> Brian Rumary, England
>
>
>
