The Presidential Portrait Goes Digital 295
alphadogg writes "Barack Obama's election to US president has already brought a string of firsts, and on Wednesday there came another. The official presidential portrait was shot on a digital camera for the first time. The picture was taken by the White House's new official photographer, Pete Souza, and issued by The Office of the President Elect through its Web site. It was taken on Tuesday evening at 5:38 p.m. using a Canon EOS 5D Mark II, according to the metadata embedded in the image file."
photoshop all the easier... (Score:5, Funny)
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You guys should read the strobist thread [flickr.com] on it. I'm in a bunch of photo-geek forums and the comments have been really entertaining...
"His shoulder is cut off. It doesn't flow!"
"The loop lighting is too subtle."
"Why'd they use an octabox???"
"Couldn't afford a hair light what with the economy and all, eh?"
"Taken with the new Canon 5D-MkII...nice!"
"Who did the color charting? Skin tone is way orange!"
I thought they were hard on my photos when I post 'em...
I seldom simply rant... (Score:4, Insightful)
...but this. Come on. I get this being newsworthy at Gizmodo etc. But Slashdot? Seriously... Cool, yes. Newsworthy? Not buying it. ;)
Re:I seldom simply rant... (Score:4, Informative)
slow news day?
or VERY SLOW news day?
You decide.
There's an idle tag, but honestly, I think this is below the bar, even for idle.
Re:I seldom simply rant... (Score:5, Insightful)
Despite what its tagline says, slashdot long ago ceased to be any sort of news site. It is a discussion site. You've been here long enough that you should know that.
This story certainly isn't breaking news, it's trivia at best, but human beings (especially nerds) are very good at talking about and arguing over trivia. Throw in politics, and the never ending debate of the merits of film vs. digital, and I think there's plenty to discuss.
Re:I seldom simply rant... (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree. It's hard to think of it in such terms, but a lot has changed in technology since Bush took office. Obama is not the first to be shot with a digital camera because he's so tech savvy (as the summary implies), but rather because in the last eight years, digital film has almost entirely replaced film photography.
To put this into perspective, when Bush took office only early adopters had digital cameras. I got my first one (VGA resolution, even!) about the time Bush was sworn in. High resolution cameras capable of replacing film were simply impractical and too expensive for even professional photography. Fast forward eight years and a 'friggin cell phone can take multi-megapixel photos. The professional gear is just as affordable, if not more so, than the analog stuff and can produce resolutions that are more than comparable to a good film. The advantages of the new technology (e.g. zero film cost, easy manipulation, digital transfer, quick reproduction, etc.) are too numerous to fully name. In result, there are very few photographers who still use film-based cameras.
Thus my point is simply this: This is a whole lot of non-news. ;-)
Cool? (Score:2)
Jeeeez...
In what kind of a backwater-hillbilly-hicktown do you live and work if "takin pichers de-je-telly" is considered cool?
Does your modem come with a cradle for your telephone handset?
Do you have to "crank-up" your telephone before going online?
Is the monitor you are reading this on black and white?
I mean... come on.
I can understand going old-tech as a part of "geek pride"-thing, but there ARE limits.
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Canon is wasting their money if they paid for such a slashvertisement. Far as I can tell, photographers are already salivating worse than Pavlov's dogs over that camera.
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>Especially not at a street price of ~$2500-3000. No thanks.
The cost of the Canon system is in the lenses, and for many professional photographers, this camera is in the territory of "the only serious choice." But if you're freaking on the camera body price, you really don't want to know what the glass costs in this system.
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The pro can spend $5000 on a lens or a camera body and not feel the first pangs of sticker shock.
Interview with Mr. Souza on NPR (Score:5, Interesting)
5:38 pm (Score:4, Funny)
And here I always thought he looked his best at 5:39.
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The secret of Obama's popularity. (Score:2, Funny)
He's the first hipster President.
Re:The secret of Obama's popularity. (Score:4, Funny)
He's also the first President with ears that large. At least we've finally broken the glass ceiling that kept Ross Perot out of the White House ;)
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He's not the first black President. He's the first hipster President.
Clearly you're forgetting the presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes.
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Everyone knows that Thomas Jefferson was the first black President. [google.com]
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I voted for him as the lesser of two evils, and frankly if he was our nations first tentacled, robot president with the same platform I would have done the same.
Sad (Score:2)
No more negatives. I've recently gone back to film and hand processing. Yes it's a real pain but there is a distinctive film look that digital just doesn't create.
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is there really a difference in the result ? analog AND digital pictures are of such a high quality that YOUR EYE is the weak link.
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I'm sure somebody said that during the advent of the DVD.
And then Blu-Ray came out.
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I'm sure somebody said that during the advent of the DVD.
Then that someone was quite uninformed, as the limits of human vision are quite well known and both DVD and BD are still far from reaching them.
Don't confuse marketing with science.
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That's not really a very meaningful point... even 10MP digital cameras have much more resolution than Blu-Ray, and most people like photos to be smaller than they like their TV to be.
If you do want to enlarge photos to ginormous sizes (and look at them close up) you cannot do that with 35mm film. At that scale you need a larger format.
Re:Sad (Score:5, Funny)
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I beg to differ. There is a noticeable difference between digital and film, especially when it comes to tonality in larger formats. That and there's nothing as beautiful as an 8x10 transparency.
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No more negatives. I've recently gone back to film and hand processing. Yes it's a real pain but there is a distinctive film look that digital just doesn't create.
You just need the right algorithm.
There's no such thing as the impossible to digitalize color, or look, or feel. If a human being can distinguish digital from analog, there's a problem with the equipment or with the image treatment software.
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There are *lots* of ways to "slow exposure time"
And these are just the ones that I can
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And I would guess that a presidential photos should be on medium or large format film instead of a low res digital photo.
Come on, first black president and we shoot it with a crappy 5D? (yes it IS crappy compared to a decent medium format camera) Why not a nice large format or medium format to get insane detail. I'm hoping they at least used a nice L series portrait lens.
Digital has it's place for 98% of photography. but the important stuff, you gotta use the real cameras.
P.S. my cheapie used Medium for
5D Mark II... Sweet! (Score:5, Funny)
The 5D Mark II is amazing.
Re:5D Mark II... Sweet! (Score:5, Informative)
Mod it funny if you want, but he's right. It's the first SLR still camera to take full high-quality 1080 24p video footage. Given the camera's incredible sensor and lens selection, it's a still camera that threatens to cannibalize Canon's entire prosumer video line - which is why they had to artifically hamper some features, like disallowing manual exposure in video mode.
I work with video every day, and I have a hard time not using our 5D mkII over our $8000 Sony XDCAM on many shoots.
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5D Mark II
The picture was taken by the White House's new official MECHWARRIOR!, Pete Souza,
Had to correct it.
but... (Score:2, Interesting)
This is news how? (Score:3, Insightful)
Um, I've been using digital pictures/cameras for near over a decade now. I think that it is more news that this hasn't already been done the last ten years rather than this one new guy is "the first" to use it.
What next? The first president to create his own daily you tube channel, blog, website/forum, on-line poll asking the public who he should pick for cabinet positions, or owning/using his own PDA/Cell phone?
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What next? The first president to create his own daily you tube channel, blog, website/forum, on-line poll asking the public who he should pick for cabinet positions, or owning/using his own PDA/Cell phone?
No, the first speaker of the house doing a rickroll [youtube.com].
Virtual President (Score:3, Funny)
At least we've still got a physical human being for a President.
Next step, the Virtual President [wikipedia.org]. Sims expansion pack, anyone?
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Hah. Have you actual DNA from this President? For all we know he could be an alien. They are still arguing whether he has a fake birth certificate.
Polaroid (Score:2)
If I
You used the metadata? (Score:2)
There is no Office of the President Elect (Score:4, Insightful)
Why does everyone keep calling Obama's position as the Office of the President Elect? He doesn't have any power yet or anything, he's just the president elect... yeesh.
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Re:There is no Office of the President Elect (Score:5, Informative)
5D != 5D Mark II (Score:3, Informative)
The article states that the "5D" camera used for the photo has 12.8mp and costs $2K. This is true for the 5D, but the 5D Mark II has ~21MP and costs considerably more than $2K. If it cost $2K I'd get one!
The What? (Score:3)
The Office of the President Elect
And what, the heck, is that?
It isn't an official portrait, it's a picture of the guy who's gonna be president by his made-up official sounding transition team. The official portrait is taken of ACTUAL presidents, period.
Sing with me everybody! (Score:2, Funny)
What next, report on Presidential toilet paper (Score:3, Insightful)
Please don't create a post when Obama is the first Pres to use a specially recycled toilet paper made from a process that doesn't create any global warming gases or pollute our rivers and streams. I'll have to look elsewhere for my tech news...
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indirect links (Score:5, Insightful)
Is anyone else sick of getting the links 2nd, 3rd, or even 4th hand?
Here [change.gov]'s the direct one for those interested.
Re:Looking to dabble into a bit of photography mys (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.dpreview.com/ [dpreview.com]
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I'm no photographer but I paid a bit of attention to digital cameras over the past decade and I think I can safely say that by picking a popular model by either Nikon or Canon within your price range you can't go wrong.
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Looking to dabble into a bit of photography mys (Score:5, Insightful)
Careful with that line of reasoning. A lot of what a camera with better manual modes does is simply make you aware of what is happening. As you try to make your photos look better, awareness of things like aperture and focal length and shutter speed will help. I'm aware that for many people, goal-directed learning works better -- but for some, especially geeky types, just paying attention and observing the differences between (eg) comparably exposed shots with different aperture settings will be very helpful. It's not (so much) that there are things the SLR can do that the P&S can't; it's that you'll be more aware of what the camera is doing.
So, if he wants to take better pictures, and is willing to put effort in, a more manual camera is a good investment early on. Having to fight with the camera is a big turnoff. Of course, the more expensive camera isn't better if you don't use what it gives you. It's *part* of how you learn about photography, and it certainly won't teach you by itself.
Does anyone make a (reasonably priced...) digital equivalent of the old standard learning camera -- fully manual, no gobs of features, just shutter, aperture, focus, and an exposure meter? Probably SLR, though not required, and ideally with a fixed length lens in the basic package. It seems these days the designers observe they have a microprocessor available and pack everything in, and it's hard to find that older elegant simplicity.
Re:Looking to dabble into a bit of photography mys (Score:4, Informative)
Not specifically, but any decent base model DSLR run in manual mode will do the same thing. You can pick up a Nikon D100 for next to nothing. I've had one since 2004, banged the crap out it, gave it to my stepdaughter, had her bang the crap out of it an it still works.
I'm partial to Nikons if for no other reason that the lower end machines have spot metering (Canon, what are you thinking?) and Mirror Lock Up functions.
But DSLRs are great ways to 'learn' photography. You can take thousands of pictures without additional cost. You can take a whole series of pictures changing the aperture of the lens to see what affect it has on exposure time and depth of field. Sure, you could have always done that with film, but it would have cost you - both in time and money.
And best of all, you can retire to your basement and spend hours with your computer fiddling with the pixels.
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It's not (so much) that there are things the SLR can do that the P&S can't;
I disagree.
There are two big things P&S cannot do:
1) Low light photography
2) Getting a decent bokeh (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokeh)
Besides, lens on most P&S are lower resolution than the sensor itself, your mighty gazillion megapixel P&S has a lens that resolves to only 3 megapixel.
All this has a lot to do with sensors on P&S, they are about the size of the nail on your pinky finger.
Canon EOS 1D Mark II on the other hand has a 35mm full frame sensor. You will make about 10 P&S senso
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Those features aren't that important for the early learning. Learning about taking pictures involves getting an intuitive feel for what shutter speeds and apertures do, learning about framing, what makes a good background, what sort of lighting will look good in the final version, etc. These are not things that demand a top of the line image sensor or lens. They do, however, require you to be aware of what is going on inside your camera.
Eventually, yes, you'll want those things. And there's certainly so
Couple important things (Score:5, Informative)
1) Get a tripod and use it, even if you dont think you need to! Even the cheapest POS camera can take okay stuff if you have a tripod.
2) For got your tripod? Use a rock, a stick, a mailbox. Use something besides your body to stabilize your camera.
3) *Learn The Rule of Thirds*!! Most. Important. Thing. Ever.
4) Visualize what the picture will look like before you take it. Move yourself and your camera until you like what will show up in the final result.
5) Move! Get that damn kid out of the way. Move until an annoying shadow is out of your shot. Look out for that wire that will show up in the middle of the mountain shot. This is #4 restated. Think about what you compose.
6) Dont use Photoshop. At least until you take good stuff without using it.
A good camera isn't important. Knowing how to compose a shot is the most important.
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fast autofocus?
change lenses?
decent manual focus?
high iso modes?
real time picture preview?
there are lots of things that speak for dslr.
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Depth of field manipulation, high-ISO quality, RAW, better exposure latitude, better build quality, more precise manual focus, easier to manipulate manual controls, higher quality optics, prime lenses, battery grips (vertical shooting), wide-angle/fish-eye lenses (below 28mm equiv. focal length), long telephoto lenses (above 300mm focal length), dual memory card support, higher frames per second count (10+ on newer models) and interchangeable lenses.
Maybe I've missed a few things.
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every time obama wipes his arse?
Eh, I've been disillusioned with him ever since FISA but I'm still rooting for him in a way. I think most people are. I'll oppose him where I have to but our problems are too big to be rooting for the failure of our President. I think all the media coverage (/. included) has more to do with the hope that comes with any new administration. It'll take a few months for that to wear off and for us all to go back to being the cynical SOBs that we usually are ;)
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"but our problems are too big to be rooting for the failure of our President."
Isn't that the way it should always be?
I think Obama's Nuclear policy is a disaster as is his space policy. Do I hope that changes, of course I do.
But as I said isn't that the way it should have always been?
Should we ever be cheerleaders for the success of failure of any President?
That is what I hated about Obama in the election. The freaking cheerleaders.
I too hope he does well.
Re:do we really need an article here on /. (Score:5, Interesting)
Should we ever be cheerleaders for the success of failure of any President?
I dunno. It seemed to me like half of the country was rooting for the failure of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush from the moment each one of them took office. I suppose this probably had a lot to do with the fact that Clinton never won a majority of the popular vote (in 92 he only got 43%) and neither did Bush the first time around (plus the Florida mess).
A friend of mine who is a staunch Republican said something to the affect of: "I wish it had gone the other way but I'm glad that the margin was as big as it was". For better or worse nobody can dispute that the majority of the American electorate and states wanted Obama as our next president.
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I don't think it's so much about opposing him as it is about all of these "historic firsts" being heralded as signs from heaven that America has redefined itself and grown up.
For the first time a woman is giving the inaugural sermon. Meh - Wouldn't it be a bigger sign of progress if that wasn't news?
For the first time the president had his picture taken with a digital camera. Meh - So the White House is catching up with most of the other major photographers.
For the first time we have a president (elect) t
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They talked up the George Bush firsts, too. They just have to do something when there is no real news.
"George W Bush is the first...":
"... little league player to become President."
"... who will not get lifelong secret service protection."
"... with an MBA."
"... sitting President to attend a foreign Olympics."
"... to have a criminal record."
"... born in Connecticut."
"... to have run a marathon."
"... to have been governor of Texas."
It goes on... that's just from the first page or two of Google. I seem to reme
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only if his blackberry is involved in that...
Re:do we really need an article here on /. (Score:5, Insightful)
do we really need an article here on /. every time obama wipes his arse?
The article... Or, at least the summary, since I didn't RTFA... Is more about the fact that the picture was taken with a digital camera for the first time ever.
This is slashdot. We get a story every time somebody releases a shiny new phone or installs linux on their toaster. We get stories about libraries digitizing their books. A digital picture being taken for the first time is at least as newsworthy as any of that.
We just had an "Ask Slashdot" about managing SD cards, with a few professional photographers chiming in about how they manage their huge collections... We've had dozens of stories over the years about preserving digital data over the years... Surely someone's curious how they're going to preserve this presidential portrait over the years, right? Regardless of whether you like Obama or not, he is the President Elect, he'll be going in the history books. We've got cave art and oil paintings that have withstood the test of time... How are they going to ensure that this photograph last at least as long as more traditional prints? How are they going to ensure that the digital file they open next year is the same one they just created? That it hasn't been altered or photoshopped or something?
Re:do we really need an article here on /. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:do we really need an article here on /. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:do we really need an article here on /. (Score:4, Informative)
How are they going to ensure that this photograph last at least as long as more traditional prints?
I probably assume too much, but I assume whomever is in charge of archives related to the President has a decent backup policy. The LoC is digitizing all of the FSA Project photos specifically because the negatives/prints are getting old and they want to be sure they are preserved.
How are they going to ensure that the digital file they open next year is the same one they just created? That it hasn't been altered or photoshopped or something?
I am guessing with an OSK-E3, since he was shot with a Canon 5D (or at least that is whay they want us to think). I'm amazed the official photo was done with a consumer grade camera, I figured they'd use something a little more presidential.
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"I'm amazed the official photo was done with a consumer grade camera, I figured they'd use something a little more presidential."
Are you serious? Do you actually know anything about the 5D Mark II? It is most definitely _not_ consumer grade!
21.1 Megapixels
Full Frame Sensor
Digic 4 Image Processor
1920x1080 HD Video Capture
Over $3000!
I'm not at all sure why you think it's consumer grade.... you must be thinking it's part of their "Rebel" line since it has the EOS in the name..... but that is just not the cas
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Re:do we really need an article here on /. (Score:5, Funny)
I don't even see the pixels anymore ... All I see is blond, brunette, redhead. Hey uh, you want a drink?
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Just get an Android phone and be done with it.
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The flag is a little annoying... but that stray hair about an inch below the flag is what really throws me!
Re:Public availability (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Public availability (Score:4, Informative)
Is the posted 1916 x 2608 version [change.gov] not sufficient?
Re:Public availability (Score:5, Interesting)
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Such as?
Shooting in RAW is great, and I do it all the time, because it helps me adjust exposure, white-balance, etc.
I'm not quite sure why you'd want to any of those things to a professional portrait that's already been through post-processing.
Re:Public availability (Score:5, Funny)
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My side doing/not doing same thing = ignore
Re:Something lost (Score:5, Informative)
Only to a point. The particles on the film that actually compose the picture are effectively pixels, and you can only attempt to remaster to some maximum quality before the limitation becomes apparent.
"As we move towards digital photography, the limitations of the format are going to become apparent as the technology progresses to the point where today's 16MP shots simply don't have enough detail to compete with 8x10 sheets of Kodachrome."
Except that digital photography can and does compete with film quality. The film photographers I know do not dispute that, they have moved on to claiming that there are things that can be done to photographs with film that cannot be done digitally; while they are correct, the techniques they describe are not common needed, and are not technologically impossible with a digital camera.
Digital formats will prevail in the end, simply because they are more versatile. It is easy to store digital photographs, easier to make copies, easier to print, and altogether less expensive and less polluting. This is not like film-vs.-tape, this is more like film-vs.-painting.
Re:Something lost (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Something lost (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm all in favor of digital, but the archival problem is far from trivial. Good quality prints on good paper can be expected to still be good quality prints in decades or even longer. Storing digital data for that long requires more than simply storing the print in a cool dark room with temperature and humidity controlled to reasonable levels. You have to be sure you can read the media, and also the file format. There are original photo prints well over 100 years old; books can be even older. Storing digital data that long in a usable form will take work.
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Popular files, like say.. a presidential portrait, will be stored on many computers and passed along.
There are now open source jpeg, gif decoders, and many other image formats as well. It is really unlikely that images will be lost as long as people take the precaution of, every time they buy a new computer, moving the big "all-my-pictures" directory to the new machine.
Programs like Picasa and iPhoto are making it even easier to store all photos under one big directory, by allowing tagging and other databa
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Tiff works too. As long as whatever format you use for archival purposes isn't taking any information away. For any quality camera and any picture shot as "RAW", a JPEG is taking a hell of a lot of information away. Ditto with PNG. TIFF works fine, as does PSD (though TIFF is more standard).
Great point! You just made a good case against my suggestion archiving using the RAW. Will something be
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8x10 what? millimeters? While there is something to be said for the artistic aspects of film photography, you really won't win any arguments saying that film (of any modern sort) captures more details than modern, high end digital cameras. Videography is probably the only field not completely run by digital technology, and with some of the new advances in high definition, high speed sensors the days of that are numbered too.
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There aren't all that many photographers running around with 8 x 10 view cameras and using Kodachrome. I doubt that Kodachrome is sold in 8 x 10 sheet format, but I certainly could be wrong. The digital vs. film argument is endlessly debated in more knowledgeable forum
Re:Something lost (Score:4, Interesting)
Unless you get an eye upgrade or suddenly make it an habit to "browse" photographs with something akin to Google Maps, then no, 16 MP will always be enough. The human eye has at its best (a cone of vision of about 2 degrees of arc) a resolution of about 28 seconds of arc. Do the math to find out how much resolution you really need depending on the size of the photograph and its distance from your eyes.
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Aren't we talking about the camera in question used to shoot Obama? Sure, el cheapo cameras kind of suck (for more reasons that you mentioned, the worst mentions would have to go to sensitivity and dynamic range) but I mean, if they didn't suck they wouldn't be low end ;-).
By the way, what's the "it" in "It's enough for basic point and shoot needs"? Are you talking about 16 MP??
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Yes. The 5D is still considered "prosumer," albeit high-end.
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This reminds me of something I notice whenever showing my digital images to someone used to consumer P&S cameras... They're always blown away at the clarity and detail of the image, even on ones I don't think anything special of.
Then I realized that the modern P&S world has conditioned people to accept abysmally poor quality as the norm. I never realized this because I've never really owned a P&S camera (since elementary school, anyways), and didn't even go digital until I was able to get a de
Re:Something lost (Score:5, Informative)
Film resolution is measured by granularity of the crystals used. In other words, MOLECULES. Digital resolution is measured in pixels. Molecules are more granular than pixels.
Actually the grains in film are much larger than individual molecules. Film grains, even in very good films, are around 2 microns in size. This is MUCH larger than the size of the individual molecules that make up the grain. Now the pixels in a good digital camera are around 6 microns, not that much larger than film grains. The big difference is that the digital sensors can detect multiple levels of light whereas a film grain is either exposed or not exposed. It actually takes a bunch of film grains (on the order of a couple of dozen) to accurately represent the levels of light that one digital sensor can represent. This means that digital cameras can actually have higher resolution than film.
The other thing to remember is that digital sensors can also map the intensity of light over time, all that film can do is measure the cumulative amount of light that it is exposed to. This means that with the right software a digital camera can use the minute vibrations of its mounting to produce an interpolated image with far higher resolution than a film image.
Color saturation of prosumer image capture devices are about an order of magnitude worse than good film.
Saturation is a difficulty with both film and digital photography but digital is more sensitive to it. With the proper use of lighting, filters, and decent software you can pretty much eliminate any problems in both film and digital photography. This is especially true of a controlled setting such as a presidential photograph. In that situation you control everything, it's not hard to produce a properly saturated image.
Longevity. What's the longevity of a pixel on digital media? I have lots of negatives and slides, over 100 years old, which still produce very nice prints.
The longevity of digital media is far better than that of film. At its worst you can just reproduce your digital image onto film and store it that way. At its best you can pay to have the digital information engraved on some sort of durable physical media, such as a metal disc. Although you may not notice it, film degrades quite a bit over time. It loses contrast and fine details and it gets brittle. The thing is that you don't have a reference to compare it against so you don't notice the degradation until it's too late. Digital information is protected by the fact that it's easy to make several perfect copies, protect them with checksums and other methods, and compare each against each other for degradation. Yes, eventually all information will degrade but it's much easier to keep a digital photograph pristine than it is to keep a film photograph pristine.
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That's completely true. Sure, 16 megapixels is GREAT today, but I remember a time when the 1-megapixel camera I bought was considered overkill.
Oh c'mon, doesn't everyone print out their pictures from Walmart on posterboard with their 16MP cameras?
Overkill? Bah. No way.
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In the white house? What will it be used for now? Maybe they will put a picture server in there for all the digital pics they will be taking of the Obama. At least when they photo shop the Halo around his head it will be a lot easier as they won't have to scan the picture in from the Negative, just upload the pic from the memory stick.
I'm certain that some intern will find some use for the Dark Room. Or should I say the "Light-Arrested Room", we certainly don't want to impose any racial slur here...
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