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Gadgets Seitz 6x17: 160 Megapixels of Goodness
Tim Thorpe (Blog) - September 22, 2006 12:13 AM
Print E-mail del.icio.us 19 comment(s) - last by scavoman.. on Sep 24 at 12:44 AM

Hey! Where's the flash?
The Swiss release a 160MP digital camera for photographers

Seitz has released a new camera capable of snapping an impressive 160 megapixels creating an image with a resolution of 7,500 pixels vertically and 21,250 pixels horizontally. The camera is capable of ISO ranges from 500 to 10,000 and a shutter speed of 1/20,000th of a second. Each image uncompressed takes nearly 1GB to store.

The camera is no slouch when it comes to speed either, Seitz claims that the image storage speed is comparable to traditional digital or film camera’s, this is made possible by the camera’s ultra high read-out speed of 300 MB per second.

The camera features a 640x480 LCD color screen on the back of the camera for image viewing and editing. The camera will retail for around 27,500 Euro or $35,000 USD without a lens.  Boy we’d love to take this thing to CES with us.

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pron
By Lazarus Dark on 9/22/2006 11:10:27 AM , Rating: 1
there, I beat the immature people to it.




RE: pron
By Lazarus Dark on 9/22/2006 11:15:50 AM , Rating: 2
but, really could someone please give me an idea what this is useful for. I can't think of any reason to really need this much. I suppose a few circumstance could take advantage, but surely you could still get by on say, 30 megapix


RE: pron
By klingon on 9/22/2006 11:19:36 AM , Rating: 2
Good for billboards, large hoardings...etc...etc


RE: pron
By Misty Dingos on 9/22/2006 11:28:24 AM , Rating: 2
Life size pictures of aircraft carriers!


RE: pron
By Souka on 9/22/2006 11:39:25 AM , Rating: 2
...PLAYBOY...


RE: pron
By ksherman on 9/22/2006 11:30:11 AM , Rating: 2
Im thinking more along the lines of georgous landscape pictures.


Have you ever seen a large-format film print?
By johnnyMon on 9/22/2006 12:05:28 PM , Rating: 2
If you have, then you'll know what this camera is for. If you haven't, the first time you do, you'll realize.

Large format film (such as 4x5" or 8x10" for the film itself) allows you to enlarge prints to poster size while maintaining fantastic levels of detail. Much more detail with much less noise than any current digital camera (except maybe this one) is capable of. Done right, they can be stunning.




RE: Have you ever seen a large-format film print?
By s12033722 on 9/22/2006 12:31:30 PM , Rating: 2
Noise has nothing to do with resolution. It has to do with the full well capacity of the pixel, the dark noise, the readout noise, the video channel noise, and the accuracy and resolution of the A/D converter.


By gotincon on 9/22/2006 2:00:59 PM , Rating: 2
Noise has nothing to do the full well capacity. Bring the tech on where you saw that. Indirectly pixels with larger wells are larger in size and have greater dark noise/time due to the larger volume contributing. However I can bias a CCD to have a very low well capacity while still having a large dark noise component.

I've never heard of "Video Channel Noise" in this context.

The accuracy and resolution of the A/d converter don't contribute to the noise directly. You could have a inaccurate low res digitizer that has much less noise than a 24 bit digitizer.

You left off the most fundamental noise of all, Poisson noise.


In general the noise can be assumed to be a combination of the shot noise, the dark noise, and the readout and typically one dominates all the others.



By johnnyMon on 9/22/2006 2:03:57 PM , Rating: 2
Perhaps I was using the wrong terminology. Change "noise" to "grain." Film grain, when visible at viewing distance, can be quite acceptable. Digital grain, in contrast, is always unpleasant to look at. In my head, I call that digital "noise."

And in a sense it is noise, because it displays the camera guessing at sensor values where the sensor doesn't have enough information. Cram 10MP onto a pocket digicam and that camera is going to guess a lot as to the light values. Just like it does at high ISO. Is that not noise?

The real point is that people think their Canon 1Ds2 or their Nikon D200 or whatever is the last word because the photo can be enlarged to 16x20. But look at a 16x20 enlargement of a 4x5" piece of film, or a 20x30 enlargement of an 8x10" film, and you can easily see that they're not in the same league. Not even close. You must see the large format print to understand what I'm saying.

Have you seen one in person? If so, your post is not necessary, because you already know what I'm saying. If you haven't seen one, then your post is just quibbling. Go see some large format photos and get educated as to what's possible. :)


Vital information left out...
By gdillon on 9/22/2006 11:39:22 AM , Rating: 4
Just a few extra tidbits for you to put this into perspective.

Anybody who knows anything about cameras knows that those specs are really weird. The news article is failing to mention that this is a scanning back camera -- it works like your flatbed scanner does with a progressive imaging device. The shutter speed mentioned would be for just one line of resolution. The high sensitivity ISO is so that it can be handheld because exposures will still be longer than you're used to with a regular camera, maybe on the order of 1/2 second.

Re: usage -- when you're talking about a 48 bit file that's almost a gigabyte in size, you're definitely not talking about snapshots of your backyard BBQ. It's for fine art, science, large group photography, etc. Mostly, commercial photogs who need serious quality because their client needs serious quality and is going to pay to get it. Oh, yeah, did I mention it costs about $35k and requires large format lenses, which also are serious bank?

http://www.roundshot.ch/xml_1/internet/de/applicat...

Cheers,

~g




RE: Vital information left out...
By darkfoon on 9/22/2006 2:03:36 PM , Rating: 2
From the link you provided, it looks like the camera uses a Mac Mini for a storage device.

Indeed an ISO from 500 to 10,000 is very odd. With my 35mm SLR I use 400 ISO film, which is pretty "fast" film and has quite some grain to it, but this camera starts at 500, very interesting.

I'd say that this camera with a wide angle lens would take magnificent panoramas with 1 photograph.

I wish I could just use one of these for a day. That would be so neat.


What's the deal...
By jskirwin on 9/22/2006 3:25:01 PM , Rating: 2
With the lens - body ratio?
Wouldn't you need a large body to hold the larger surface area of the sensors, and a larger lens to bend the light to reach them?

The lens looks completely out of proportion to the body.




RE: What's the deal...
By johnnyMon on 9/22/2006 4:25:49 PM , Rating: 2
If you scroll down this page, you'll see a bunch of lenses meant for a piece of film (eqivalent to a sensor) that's 5x7". The lenses look quite small for the piece of film they project onto:

http://www.largeformatphotography.info/camera-bag/


RE: What's the deal...
By johnnyMon on 9/22/2006 4:27:33 PM , Rating: 2
But perhaps there's more space between the lens and the film on the large format film cameras than there is between the lens and the sensor on the Seitz, so you may be right.


Yeah... but
By darkfoon on 9/22/2006 2:07:59 PM , Rating: 2
Sure, 160 megapixels is great...
until you've seen 1 gigapixel
http://www.gigapxl.org/




Finally!
By Ralph The Magician on 9/22/2006 3:23:21 PM , Rating: 2
Finally I can put that giant wall made up for 40 30" Apple Cinema Displays to good use!




160 mpx camera
By scavoman on 9/24/2006 12:44:32 AM , Rating: 2
Hey, anybody heard of FILM?!?!?
My Sinar 4x5 will get the job done and guess what??
It's paid for!





Bigger zooms
By greylica on 9/22/2006 9:54:04 PM , Rating: 1
Hhehheeeh, open your mouth, I can see a bachteria !!!!




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