[filmscanners] Re: Digi, film and scanning in movies

["Arthur Entlich" <artistic-1@shaw.ca>]

I stated that I would not further this discussion because of the tenor
it is taking, but I will make a few more brief comments.

David J. Littleboy wrote:
> If you read my comments fully, you see that I concede that
> the Foveon chip in its current format, is probably best suited to
> mid-level consumer cameras, which, by the way, are exactly the ones
> which this thread started about, (The Canon G3).
> <<<<<<<<<<<<<<
>
> The Foveon sensor is much too large to fit in a consumer camera.
>

Foveon has indicated for some time they intended to split the chip size
considerably for consumer grade cameras.

>
>   Frank Paris was
> expressing his displeasure with the G3 and it's lack of full color
> gradients in small things like tree branches which led to a flat look
> rather than the rounded nature of the branch which was depicted on film.
> <<<<<<<<<<<<<<
>
> The pixels in the consumer cameras are tiny, and the noise levels at any ISO
> above the lowest are a major disaster.
>
>
> I stated that this may well be the result of the limited color
> resolution provided by that camera in spite of its 4 MP image sensor,
> <<<<<<<<<<<<
>
> But Frank wrote: "Most of my shooting has
> been performed indoors at ISO 50 of a Rose-breasted cockatoo, using my
> Metz 60 CT-4 flash turned backwards and bouncing off the wall behind me.
> I have gotten beautifully sharp images with wonderfully soft lighting of
> my bird shooting this way."
>
> Since he _is_ getting good images _some_ of the time, your theory here is
> clearly quite wrong.
>

Hardly, the subject matter can alter whether a specific fault will show
up or not.  His complaint was with higher contrast fine lined elements,
like tree branches.


>
> and the fact that the G3 is considered one of the better consumer
> cameras out there.  I believe one reason for this problem is the Bayer
> filter pattern.
> <<<<<<<<<<<<
>
> The G3 images are just fine at ISO 50.
>
>

Yes, under optimum conditions for that camera.  However, it falls apart
as the ISO goes up, and lighting conditions become more harsh.  This is
where cheaper and less processing algorithms may introduce greater
artifacing and problems?


> Yes, decent Bayer interpolation cameras are appearing in the lower price
> ranges now, but it took years to get it there.
> <<<<<<<<<<<<
>
> Did it? People were very happy and had a lot of fun at the 2MP level. The
> F707 makes lovely A4s at ISO 100.
>

Yes, and many people love the G1, G2 and G3 cameras.  And also years ago
high end digicams were very costly due to the processing required for
quality algorithms.

>
> Who knows what the next
> generation of Foveon color sensors will look like or cost.
> <<<<<<<<<<<<<<
>
> My problem with Foveon is the excessiveness of the hype combined with the
> decision to not include an antialiasing filter. It looks like the intention
> was to falsely claim "higher resolution" and then provide what look like
> sharp images to fool people who don't understand sampling theory.
>
>
> On the consumer digicam end, I still believe the Foveon chip will prove
> to have advantages not easily corrected in lower priced Bayer systems.
> <<<<<<<<<<<
>
> You still haven't shown a problem to be solved. The 4 and 5MP cameras do
> produce quite nice images at their lowest ISO, with luminance resolution at
> about 70% of the Nyquist frequency. They're a disaster at higher ISO levels.
> But the Foveon technology doesn't speak to the noise problem; it's noise
> levels are roughly the same as the other dSLRs, which have smaller pixels.
>

The noise levels appear lower to me with the Foveon chip, (especially
with the new firmware) and I prefer the color rendition and the
transitions between colors.  Again, this is a very early model, the
first is a starting point.



Art


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