Ken Rockwell appreciation society

[Bacardi]

..........Or not. Or a long winded opinion on why I think his opinion amounts to horse do dos.

Ok, I thought I'd start a new thread rather than hijack the 'WHICH DIGITAL SLR UNDER £1000' any further as this has nothing to do with recommending cameras.

simpo two said:

I agree that Ken can be very opinionated, and you probably view him with scepticism as he's pro-Nikon, but in this instance you can't argue with the maths surely?

I'll have a go .

I'm not 'anti' Nikon at all and I'm not sceptical because he is pro Nikon. Although, he does come across as 'defender of the faith'. I can't help thinking if Nikon brought out a 20mp camera tomorrow he would shouting about the superiority of it from the roof tops.

Whilst I agree that you can't compare Apples to oranges and there are more factors than merely counting pixels; However, all things being equal, more pixels means more detail, more resolution. whether it's 20 or 40%, more, more is more...... period. Unless of course you are Ken Rockwell and shoot Nikon.... in which case it doesn't matter.

kenrockwell about 1ds mkII said:

If you have $8,000 it's got 16MP. As you can read here it's only marginally different from 8MP.

Really? Why does every Pro Nikon user I know have a D2X on order? Should I tell my studio partner to cancel his two as the difference between 5.5mp and 12mp is 'marginal'? Cobblers. A good big one is better than a good small one.

kenrockwell said:

I find that it takes about 25 megapixels to simulate 35mm film, which is still far more than any practical digital camera. & Of course I use much bigger film than 35mm for all the pretty pictures you see at my website, so digital would need about 100 megapixels to simulate medium format film

I have read on Mr Rockwell site that he is independent and doesn't get pay back from manufacturers like other review sites. Maybe he's talking about Mr Reichmann? I don't know but Mr Reichmann also states that his site "is completely non-commercial......The site is not affiliated with or beholden to any company or organization." So if you believe Mr Reichmann, a 1ds (11mp) will give medium format a run for its money:

www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/shootout.shtml

Even if you think his conclusions are wrong (I don't), I don't believe anyone could argue that the close up digital crops of the building with 'York' on are very far behind the drum scanned 6x7 file. And this is only 11mp compared to 6x7......... 6x7 FFS! Well short of Mr Rockwells 25mp comparison to 35mm film.

I would also question Mr Rockwells comparison to 5x4 film

In it he says

kenrockwell said:

We all know there are other websites showing how some big name digital SLR looks better than film resolution. Baloney, you may not realize that those sites are actually sponsored by those camera companies and the guy running it doesn't really know how to get good results on film and compare them properly. Here we go. These are two crops out of this image, one shot on a brand new digital camera and the other on a cheap film camera:

.....followed by two samples. and then

kenrockwell said:

The digital camera image is the same crop from a brand-new multi-megapixel digital camera made by the same company that keeps seeding some photography websites to pimp it as being better than film.

Multi-megapixel? How many? more than three I guess but he doesn't tell you. What camera? Jpeg or RAW? What processing software? Zoom or Prime lenses? Mr Rockwell seems to be as economical with the facts as Alistair Campbell or Michael Moore.

5x4 film has much more detail than a 1dsmkII. No argument. But according to Mr Rockwell a digital camera would need to be about 500mp [Gulp] to match it. For another opinion by a Pro who's done a side by side test with 5x4 and a 1dsmkII, with it's hopelessly inadequate 16mp, click here

kenrockwell said:

Digital does not replace film. Just look here for why a magazine like Arizona Highways simply does not accept images from digital cameras for publication since the quality is not good enough, even from 11 megapixel cameras, to print at 12 x 18.

clicking the link gives us:

Arizona Highways said:

Consider this scenario: An 11-megapixel capture made with a top-of-the-line digital camera is roughly equivalent to a 31-megabyte digital file. When Arizona Highways prepares a 4x5 transparency for reproduction in the magazine at 300 dpi, the film is scanned on a drum scanner, and a digital file is created at about 75 megabytes for a 12x18-inch reproduction, about the size of a two-page spread in Arizona Highways. A simple comparison here is made much more complicated by press profiles and variables such as file-size conversion and red/green/blue (RGB) conversion to cyan/magenta/yellow/black (CMYK) color mode. But simply stated, digital-capture with even the latest camera equipment does not contain enough information for large magazine reproductions at 300 dpi, not to mention the complicated steps of preparing captured digital files for submission according to the prescribed profiles for magazine printing.

The 300dpi quoted resolution for scanned film is a standard res. That's fine. However you can't compare digital to scanned film using the same equation. He seems to be quoting the generally accepted 'maximum' optimum' size and quality from a given film size. Trouble is you have to scan a lot of silver halides to extract the detail. Here is a real world example that I have quoted before from Melvin Sokolsky, a well known (in the business) fashion snapper:

Melvin Sokolsky said:

For the past year I have been shooting for various magazines, - Vogue… Harper’s Bazaar…Vibe – with the Canon 1D and recently with the 1Ds. I was told by the math-bound technocrats that I could not print a double page spread with the 1D. - a Vogue spread is 11x17 - only to prove them wrong by printing a Kodak Approval print for the 1D file against the 6x7 film 200mg file drum scanned on a Crossfield. When I asked the printer to pick the Kodak Approval he thought was best; he picked the 1D Kodak Approval. No contest! .... It is my experience that the 1Ds images appear to be almost grainless and sharper than 6x7 film. Compare prints — any size — from each format and the 1Ds print is chosen every time. — Melvin Sokolsky

The 1D is only 4mp.

So who should one believe? I'm sure the Arizona Highways mag is wonderful with it's 5x4 scans but as for the opinions of Mr Rockwell..... Hmmm....

kenrockwell said:

I do photography for love, not money

I think I'm going to have more respect for the opinions of a seasoned photographer and Vogue's printer.

(Actually, I've been reading some more on his site and the bias to Nikon is really quite breathtaking!)

dcw@pr said:

I happen to agree with Mr Rockwell on this issue, and it has been backed up by what I have seen in my experience. I seem to remember Bacardi taking issue with this standpoint on another thread? Looks like we will have to agree to disagree.

I guess we will

dcw@pr said:

But have you never used a medium format digital back? The resolution you get off a 3MP digital leaf back is quite stunningly more detailed than the 5.5 from my D1X, the 8 from a 1D MkII or any other DSLR file I have experienced.

I use a digital back 90% of the time. It's only a 6mp one but I prefer the quality of the files to my 11mp 1ds. The 1ds has more resolving power, higher resolution, but the back is in another league. According to Mr Rockwells math:

kenrockwell said:

For instance, for a fairly decent 8x10 you need [8" x 300 DPI] x [10 x 300DPI] or 2,400 x 3,000 pixels, or 7,200,000 pixels, or 7.2 megapixels.

The problem with his math doesn't explain why my digi back will produce excellent results up to A2 (litho printing) and larger with a little careful interpolation? For the next two days I'll be shooting for a magazine which regularly crops the shots down and prints as double page spreads, surely impossible according to Mr Rockwell and the Arizona Highways. The results are miles better than when I used to shoot on 5x4 film, although, to be fair, the printing process has improved as well.

My 5x4 now sits in a cupboard, unloved, until I get round to having a go at making Tin Types

Finally, if Mr Rockwells right and I'm talking horse do do's, why have you sold you film cameras and bought inferior digital?

The above all in my very humble opinion. No offence intended to Mr Rockwell, I'm sure he's a nice guy but, from my personal professional experience I think his 'facts' don't hold up in the real world.
Cheers

[srider]

Bacardi said:

..........Or not. Or a long winded opinion on why I think his opinion amounts to horse do dos.

stuff snipped

Bacardi said:

The above all in my very humble opinion. No offence intended to Mr Rockwell, I'm sure he's a nice guy but, from my personal professional experience I think his 'facts' don't hold up in the real world. Cheers

Sadly, this is the latest "holy war". No-one will ever conclusively win the argument bc it's subjective.

FWIW, I went to the Nature Photographer of the Year gallery at the Natural History Museum on the weekend, and made some observations about the different formats used. There was a mix of print film, slide, MF and digital shots, displayed on fairly big rear lit projection screens. I'd say the pecking order went 35mm print, 35mm slide, 6mp digital, then the 11mp 1Ds and MF, with MF just winning out on a couple of shots. Exactly what I'd expect.

The 35mm shots simply had more grain, and less detail than the 6mp digitals (mostly D60s and D100s, not even the lastest genertation which are several stops better).

IMHO, 35mm will die soon(ish), MF film will be around for a while yet, but only in specialised areas.

At the end of the day though, it's all about the PICTURES, not the equipment.

[CVP]

srider said:

Sadly, this is the latest "holy war". No-one will ever conclusively win the argument bc it's subjective.

Too true It's like people arguing over the differences between various brands of sports cars, RWD, 4WD turbo, normally aspirated etc all different. I just know I'd rather be a passenger with a good enthusiastic driver in somehting more humblelike a classic 205 GTi than a complete numpty in a Murci, we'd certainly have more fun.

srider said:

At the end of the day though, it's all about the PICTURES, not the equipment.

Absolutely. You can make cracking images on any equipment. I tend to read some of these review sites with a great degree of skepticism as some folk always try to justify their own choice with a baffling array of "reasons". I regularly photograph wildlife and see quite a few other people out there, all of us using a real mixture of kit. Do we worry...no we're all just having fun trying to make the best images we can, more camerdarie than anything else.

The person behind the lens is the key component of any image, and I think we'd all agree on this one.

Chris

[ThatPhilBrettGuy]

Bacardi really said said:

I'm not sure what he's like in real life, but I'm guessing he's just another American that loves the sound of his own voice, and after 30 minutes in his company you'd want to see if his 400 F2.8 makes a good club.

I've just spent the morning spinning through his website.



I suggest if anyone else does, they leave the About page to last.

>> Edited by ThatPhilBrettGuy on Monday 7th February 13:43

[gravymaster]

Ken is a tool. www.kenrockwell.com/bizarre.htm

Matt "The Intellectual" Watkinson

[fatsteve]

srider said:

FWIW, I went to the Nature Photographer of the Year gallery at the Natural History Museum on the weekend, and made some observations about the different formats used. There was a mix of print film, slide, MF and digital shots, displayed on fairly big rear lit projection screens. I'd say the pecking order went 35mm print, 35mm slide, 6mp digital, then the 11mp 1Ds and MF, with MF just winning out on a couple of shots. Exactly what I'd expect. The 35mm shots simply had more grain, and less detail than the 6mp digitals (mostly D60s and D100s, not even the lastest genertation which are several stops better). IMHO, 35mm will die soon(ish), MF film will be around for a while yet, but only in specialised areas. At the end of the day though, it's all about the PICTURES, not the equipment.

Interesting point. I was invited to a company do recently that had a load of Olympics photos (Getty) displayed. Even with my limited eye, you could tell that they were all digi (halo's tend to give it away, together with the un-subtle grainess; ie pixilation vs graininess - if that makes sense). However, they were absolutely astounding images that captured the moment - duh!, like they were intended to.

I think the film vs digi will be one of those never ending debates, rather like the cantankerous old farts that still instist the Vinyl is king.

Lets evolve or shall I bin the DSLR and get my old Brownie 125 out!

[_dobbo_]

Bacardi said:

A good big one is better than a good small one.

That's true of so many things

[dcw@pr]

Bacardi said:

Whilst I agree that you can't compare Apples to oranges and there are more factors than merely counting pixels; However, all things being equal, more pixels means more detail, more resolution. whether it's 20 or 40%, more, more is more...... period. Unless of course you are Ken Rockwell and shoot Nikon.... in which case it doesn't matter.

whilst I can't argue that point, saying "all things being equal" is a cop out. All things being equal, more horseower makes a faster car. all things being equal, the further you can drive a ball in golf, the better player you are. I think the point with KR's article is that he is trying to explain why MPs are not as important as everyone thinks they are - you know as well as I do that the majority of the time this is the single thing that cameras are judged on. there are several cases where the same camera has in fact been made worse by increasing th MP count (even though all other things are equal). I am referring to some of the compacts where they moved up from 5 to 8MP sensors. Even though the res is technically greater, the larger noise (blah blah preaching to the choir) makes the picture noticably worse.

This is in fact the main area where KR tows the party (Nikon) policy to ridiculous lengths. If you have a look around the site watch out for the justification of the DX sensor size. Even though he acknowledges the Boltzmann constant and how you cant really use more MPs than the D2x has, he still holds onto it as a good thing. This when he spends the rest of the site saying how large film is sooo much better because of its use of lenses, less noise etc...

anyway bacardi, the length of your post has stunned me into submission and I cant bring myself to reply to the rest of it. Seems like you are talking sense mostly - the techniclal resolution of an image has little to do with its overall quality

[GetCarter]

From his site...

"La Jolla is just north of of San Diego and is the most beautiful place on earth with high-speed Internet access and direct international airline service to interesting places".

[V6GTO]

Question:- I take a photograph with a 3MP camera. I then put the lens onto an 11MP camera, transfer the CF, and take the same picture again. The two images are then printed at, say, 12"X18". Which one will be best?

Answers on a £5 note to:-

Martin J....
.....
....
Spain.

[ThatPhilBrettGuy]

V6GTO said:

Answers on a £5 note to:-

Ah, but in Ken's world the numbers don't matter, so I can send you the answer on a 2 pence coin and still get the same result.

[simpo two]

V6GTO said:

Question:- I take a photograph with a 3MP camera. I then put the lens onto an 11MP camera

I believe the point Ken was making was that to achieve a *significant* increase in picture quality, you need to double the pixels. No one is disputing that an 11Mp image will be better than a 3Mp one.

The debate centres around, say, 6Mp vs 8Mp. At that level, the difference is small and other factors count too, eg ergonomics, will your lenses fit, etc.

If Nikon brought out an 8Mp DSLR tomorrow that was the same as the D70 in all other respects, would I rush out and buy it? No.

[V6GTO]

ThatPhilBrettGuy said:

V6GTO said: Answers on a £5 note to:- Ah, but in Ken's world the numbers don't matter, so I can send you the answer on a 2 pence coin and still get the same result.

And I bet he thinks it doesn't matter that he has a little willie!

Martin.

[dcw@pr]

simpo two said:

No one is disputing that an 11Mp image will be better than a 3Mp one.

*cough*

some people might

[gravymaster]

My Phase One Milk Bottle has amazing detail in the distortion.

[V6GTO]

And another thing...if anyone still thinks more MBs don't equate to better quality then check this out

www.gigapxl.org/gallery.htm

Martin

[Bacardi]

CVP said:

srider said: At the end of the day though, it's all about the PICTURES, not the equipment. Absolutely. You can make cracking images on any equipment. I tend to read some of these review sites with a great degree of skepticism as some folk always try to justify their own choice with a baffling array of "reasons". I regularly photograph wildlife and see quite a few other people out there, all of us using a real mixture of kit. Do we worry...no we're all just having fun trying to make the best images we can, more camerdarie than anything else. The person behind the lens is the key component of any image, and I think we'd all agree on this one. Chris

Chaps, I totally agree with your sentiments. When it comes to the 'art' of photography it doesn't matter what you use. The first rule of photography is, 'there are no rules'. (or is it ' there is no spoon')

I wasn't joking about trying Tin Types. The process absolutely fascinates me and I would love to have a go (lethal chemicals and blow torches appeal ). It's getting back to the magic like when you see a B&W print appear in a dev tray under the glow of a red safe light.... you just don't get that with digital. You can watch some movies about making Tin Types here, if your interested. This is about as far away as you can get from digital, so don't get me wrong, I'm not anti film.... or tin.

My long post above was aimed solely at technical issues at a practical level from personal experience..

fatsteve said:

Interesting point. I was invited to a company do recently that had a load of Olympics photos (Getty) displayed. Even with my limited eye, you could tell that they were all digi (halo's tend to give it away, together with the un-subtle grainess

I'll give you pixilation but the halos are down to over sharpening, equally possible with film scans.

fatsteve said:

I think the film vs digi will be one of those never ending debates, rather like the cantankerous old farts that still instist the Vinyl is king.

err..... that's me , at least I think my LP12 sounds better than my Micromega

dcw@pr said:

whilst I can't argue that point, saying "all things being equal" is a cop out.

I'll agree that it is difficult to make all things equal when comparing different camera makes. However, when you can make all things equal, say, by using different resolution Phase One backs on the same camera, Sinar, Hasselblad, using the same lenses and software to process the files, Guess what? You can see the differences between a 6mp, 11mp, 16mp & 22mp which is contrary to Mr Rockwells point that the difference between 8 and 16 is marginal and not worth bothering with, that was my point.

dcw@pr said:

I think the point with KR's article is that he is trying to explain why MPs are not as important as everyone thinks they are - you know as well as I do that the majority of the time this is the single thing that cameras are judged on. there are several cases where the same camera has in fact been made worse by increasing th MP count (even though all other things are equal). I am referring to some of the compacts where they moved up from 5 to 8MP sensors. Even though the res is technically greater, the larger noise (blah blah preaching to the choir) makes the picture noticably worse.

Yes, it's the same when computer manufactures sell on Megahertz. Maybe he is trying to explain that it's not just about MP but he doesn't mention other factors. No mention of bit depth... none that I could see anyway (haven't read his whole site, I would go ). I have no experience with the compact sensors so can't comment.

simpo two said:

I believe the point Ken was making was that to achieve a *significant* increase in picture quality, you need to double the pixels. No one is disputing that an 11Mp image will be better than a 3Mp one. The debate centres around, say, 6Mp vs 8Mp. At that level, the difference is small and other factors count too, eg ergonomics, will your lenses fit, etc.

I agree that the difference between 6 & 8 isn't worth bothering about. Using prime lenses, shooting Raw as opposed to zooms and jpegs would easily eat up any difference. Even using different software for processing Raw files can make a big difference, like using another camera. All these things are links in the chain, as are more MPs, which will go into determining the quality of the end result. But he dismisses the difference between 8 and 16 which, IMHO and all those other things being equal , is incorrect.

Sorry for the long first post, but the more I read on his site the more I was reading twaddle, got carried away.

Oh sh!t! I just read a bit more:

kenrockwell said:

The JPG processing in the camera can be better than what you may be able to do later in software from RAW

I'll give up

>> Edited by Bacardi on Tuesday 8th February 00:00

[ThatPhilBrettGuy]

Bacardi said:

.... No mention of bit depth... none that I could see anyway (haven't read his whole site, I would go ).

Ah ha, he does! 'Interesting' arguing that JPG's 8 bits are better than RAW's 12.

I've found the site very educational. Not, I suspect, in a way Mr Rockwell intended though.

[CVP]

Bacardi said:

Chaps, I totally agree with your sentiments. When it comes to the 'art' of photography it doesn't matter what you use. The first rule of photography is, 'there are no rules'. (or is it ' there is no spoon') I wasn't joking about trying Tin Types. The process absolutely fascinates me and I would love to have a go (lethal chemicals and blow torches appeal ) My long post above was aimed solely at technical issues at a practical level from personal experience..

Wow Tin types - that's sure to be a fascinating process to learn. I'm sure we'd love to see the results.

I think we are agreed that Ken's site contains more horse st than the local stables

Sometimes these folks completely lose the plot to make the "facts" suit them, so let's get back to our favourite subjects then, for me....herons

No I'm trying to back away from the birds for a while and after reading Gravymaster's most excellent Murci images review I've arranged a photoshoot with a couple of mates for a few weeks time. Hoping for a new CSL plus either a very late Ghibli Cup or a cracking older Ghibli to be available. I'll report back if any of the images are any good

Chris

[ehasler]

V6GTO said:

And another thing...if anyone still thinks more MBs don't equate to better quality then check this out www.gigapxl.org/gallery.htm Martin

It's not quite the same though, and in fact, this is actually produced by scanning in an image from a film camera (albeit a huge, modified ex-military reconnaissance camera).

So does this mean that to get really large digital images, we need to go back to scanning in film?

What I find funny though is the amount of effort people put into justifying why they have this camera, and why it's better than that one etc...

Just take the picture!!