The Villages Loc: The Villages, Florida

Please help me to better understand -

There are 2 sensor sizes, Full Frame and Crop. These are set sizes...they don't expand or contract. Megapixels (MPs) are contained within. Full Frame cameras are thought to be better because the sensors are larger, thereby allowing more light to surround each MP, which in turn gather light (better for low light shooting). So for example 20 MPs in a Full Frame camera function better because there is more space, vs. 20 MPs in a Crop camera where things are tighter.

BUT, now the manufactures are continuing to increase the MP count, so MPs in that Full Frame camera are getting tighter and tighter...which doesn't allow light to circulate to the same degree.

Will Full Frame eventually be operating the same as a Crop senors because (say) 50, 60 or 70 or more MPs are jammed into the sensor?

Thank you in advance for your responses.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

I think it will continue to matter. I recently saw a documentary about the photographer who worked with Howard Carter on King Tut's tomb. He used 8x10" glass plates, and they are still used a reference because of their excellent resolution.

Time will tell.

toxdoc42

I agree that the move to digital is a natural progression of Technology, perhaps as life changing as movable type, but will digital ever achieve the resolution and "staying power" of film? That remains to be seen!

James Wood Loc: Midland, Virginia

It seems to me that ultimately a full frame camera is capable of producing a clearer picture because the image projected on the sensor is larger. So megapixel amounts will increase but sensors in cheaper consumer cameras will probably not increase in size. IMHO

pecohen Loc: Central Maine

There really are more sizes than just those two https://digital-photography-school.com/full-frame-sensor-vs-crop-sensor-which-is-right-for-you/ . Full-frame refers to a sensor that is the size of the old 35mm film; crop frame refers to anything smaller and there are a lot of different choices within that description. However, among the crop-frame sizes the APS-C is by far the most popular alternative to Full-frame among serious photographers.

Noise is the primary consideration with sensor size, but what is important in determining noise are two factors. One factor is sensor technology and of course that is always improving. The other factor is the sensor area. This means that for a given sensor technology a bigger sensor is better and that is not apt to change, so there will probably always be a premium on having a bigger sensor.

Of course there is a price premium on larger sensors and you also can take into account the question of how good is good enough. As sensor technology improves, smaller sensors may well become so very good that no one can see the improvement with the larger sensors. Small sensors use shorter lenses for the same field of view as well so that is another factor to consider. There probably are other factors as well.

Bison Bud

I do remember a good while back some discussions, especially about APS-C sensors, about the pixel density getting too high. I think the density does directly affect the overall resolution, but as stated above it may well affect the low light performance and noise levels as well. In any case, sensor technology has improved a great deal since then and I trust that the design engineers are well aware of this and many other factors that affect overall performance. Therefore at this point, I think that the growing sensor sizes in MP is probably a good thing, but who knows just what limits might be encountered as sensor technology continues to evolve. Good luck and good shooting to all.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

A 50mm lens on a Canon crop sensor will work like an 80mm lens.
Yes, it matters.

The Villages Loc: The Villages, Florida

Thanks. Guess I hadn't taken the improving technology into consideration...doing more with less.

Mac Loc: Pittsburgh, Philadelphia now Hernando Co. Fl.

Manufacturers are adding more and more Mps to sensors, but I think that is just a sales gimmick. If you look at both Nikon's and Canon's pro cameras, they are both 20mp, for the low light reason you mentioned and for better color rendition. The manufacturers will keep making higher mp cameras for the people who erroneously think that more mps are better.

rmorrison1116 Loc: Near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania

The 1DX II and D5 have 20 megapixel sensors partially to help achieve the high frames per second both cameras are capable of. The more megapixels a sensor has, the more data it gathers. The more data gathered, the more data that needs to be processed. Processing large amounts of data takes time. The more time it takes, the slower the camera. My two Canon 5D models, the SR and the MK IV, one is 50mpx and one is 30mpx. The SR can barely do 5 fps and the MK IV is capable of 7 fps. There are other factors that determine speed but how fast the processor can process the data is one of the big ones.

Pegasus Loc: Texas Gulf Coast

Actually the image is the same size on the sensors, providing you use the same lens, of course.

With the advent of the D850, the pixel pitch difference between the APS-C and the FF sensors is very small, both hovering around 4 micron. The pixel pitch in the smartphones is closer to 1 micron. I would guess that over time, the PP of the APS-C and FF sensors will shrink to 1 micron. Not sure if it will get any smaller. At that time, lens resolution will be crucial. The lenses in smartphone, like my Note 8, are amazing devices in their own right.

boberic Loc: Quiet Corner, Connecticut. Ex long Islander

Aside from marketing, there are only 2 differences that make a Full frame better than an APS-C for the overwhelmin number of shooters. Print size and cropping. FF allows far more agressive cropping, as well as the ability to print much larger. But if you never print larger than 16X24 FF offers no real advantge. I know that this will generate a lot of disagreement. Cost is also a consideration as top of the line FF cameras are twice the cost of TOL crop sensors.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

First off FF refers to 24x36 format. All camera shoot full frame (FF) for convenience sake I will not change this terminology here.

1) There are more sensor size than that...
2) Correct, the sensors are hardware, not software yet some manufacturer use logarithm in order to boost 'the pixel count' - basically resizing the image in camera with disastrous results (opinion)
3) 'FF' sensor arrays sensors are indeed larger in some cameras, not all. Check out the FF camera offered by Canon (50MPx), Nikon (46Mpx) and Sony (???) (among other to verify)
4) The camera sensor array that do not use a high pixel concentration perform better as you suspect yet the new technology has narrowed this gap quite a bit.

To answer your question, they basically already are. The smaller format technology is such that the difference is already blurred. The D5 and D500 have different sensors size but the quality between the two is really marginal unless you use a benchmark. The D850, FF, is what we can expect to come out in the next generation in the pro area.

A new technology that may become another game changer is the curved sensor, patented not long ago. (I do not recall who did that). This orients the sensors 'well' toward the lens curvature. In turn this may have limited application as not all lenses have the same curvature. Advantage? Reduces diffraction, better rendition of the image as seen by the camera... Among other things.

Another question is when will the lens be unable to deal with such precision? (There is a long way to go for this to be a real issue).

There is another question much more critical, in my opinion, but ignored by most folks.... When will folks realize that the the rush for more pixels create a motion blur problem when shooting? The smaller the pixels the more prone to record minute motion...

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

It will, but full frame cameras are usually better for two reasons - larger photosites to capture more light, and 50% less magnification to get to a given print size. As far as noise is concerned, I've had great success using downsampling to reduce the number of pixels in an image, resulting in the averaging of noise across adjacent pixels and a lower noise level.

srherrmann Loc: Baton Rouge, Louisiana

" BUT, now the manufactures are continuing to increase the MP count, so MPs in that Full Frame camera are getting tighter and tighter...which doesn't allow light to circulate to the same degree."
The new Nikon D850 uses a Back Side Illuminated CMOS sensor. More light hits the photocathode layer because the wiring has been rearranged. The realized increase in light is from 60% light capture to over 90%. It's not new technology. Sony used it in 2015 in the FF a7Rll. It could be the future of sensor technology. One of the problems with using more MP's is time to download the information thus reducing the frame rate. As that problem has been lessened, i.e. D850 7-9 FPS, I would think other manufacturers will increase the MP count in future cameras. I don't know all the advantages of the FF over the APS-C camera but, I think dynamic resolution and Bokeh are two.