The advanced digital/film debate is of course well into the area of
true religion [tm] :-).

Various people (Mainly Olin and Lee and me ?) said...

> Canon is aware of noise issues. =A0The EOS 5D Mark II at 21 megapixels
> has photosites that are nearly the same size as the 5D's 12 megapixel
> sensor. =A0Canon reengineered both the silicon masking and the microlens
> array to shrink the interlens gap and reduce the space taken up by
> traces on the photosites.

My (and other people's) pixel peeping indicates that Nikon is somewhat
ahead with the D700 in noise at a given ISO. Not utterly vast, but
reasonably vast [tm] - enough to allow me to start off thinking that
the 5DMk2 was what I'd like and then deciding that the D700 was
noticeably superior.

>> It's also not clear that the D700 and even the D3 have the same
>> brick outhouse construction of the F3T. =A0That's a important feature
>> when most of your shots are outdoors in unpredictable conditions
>> with some physical abuse expected on the way out and back.
>
> I can't speak for the Nikon line (lack of experience) but the
> higher end Canon equipment I use has that construction now.

All professional level cameras tend towards very substantial
environmental sealing and rugged construction. But simplicity helps
ruggedness. I dropped a Minolta 7D off the door sill of a car
(stupidity, etc ...) and it fell maybe 400mm to concrete and the
antishake mechanism died. As film cameras tend not to have a mechanism
that waves the film around to combat vibration that part of a film
camera wouldn't have die. I dropped a Minolta 5D (essentially the same
inside) about 800mm to a wooden floor (you could hear the gasp from
the whole room) and it caused no damage. (In that case it was
tiredness and stupidity and rushing and ... - carrying several cameras
and swapping to another and assuming the first was on its strap around
my neck (as it ALWAYS [tm] is, and it wasn't. Those are the only two
camera drops that I've managed in the better part of a million photos
taken.

>>> Full frame sensor and "only" 12 MP. =A0Better results than an F3 -
>>> but it took a long time for that to be true.

>> Yes, the D3 is probably the first camera that can seriously make
>> that claim for any reasonable price, and that was around 25 years
>> after the F3. =A012Mpix if each pixel is real is better than film for
>> most cases. =A0It's certainly better than I get with my scanner now.
>> To put this in context, consider a 35mm frame at 50 lines/mm. =A0That
>> would be 36 x 24 mm with 100 pixels/mm, which comes out to only
>> 8.6Mpix. =A0Good lenses do get you more than 50 lines/mm, but you're
>> not going to get twice that.

If you want pure lpm and don't care about high ISO noise then most of
the full frames will do better. The execrable Sony A900 is arguably
the market leader - as long as you don't want to use it over say
ISO800.

> And scene contrast. =A0With film, a high contrast scene (_no_ haze),
> solid support (big, beefy tripod), and top notch lenses, you can
> get about 100 lines per mm. =A0But it's really tough to do so.

Digital are beginning to cheat to gain abilities that the basic
technology lacks relative to film. eg high dynamic range.
The new Sony A500 and A550 and maybe A850 have multi shot in camera
HDR (high dynamic range) integration of multiple images. My A700
hasn't, but it can take 3 or 5 shots at exposure spacings of 0.3, 0.5,
0.7 or 2 EV.
At +/- 2EV you get  vast amount of dynamic range if the images are
combined in post processing. Best for tripod shots, but software that
will reasonably meld almost identical images is available.
>
>> The 12.1Mpix of the D3 and D700 comes out to 59 lines/mm in 35mm
>> terms. =A0I'd much rather have a solid clean 59 lines/mm than a
>> noisy 80 lines/mm.

I also. But if you don't mind low ISO shooting then all the top
cameras are very low noise - even the terrible Sony A900. (note that
people who love A900's love A900's.)

> Scanned film picks up all 3 colors at each pixel location. =A0So it
> takes roughly 2-3 times the resolution of a digital sensor to match
> the _color_ capture capability of 35mm film -- my opinion is that
> 20'ish megapixel digital finally beats 35mm film. =A0Which we now have
> available (though not afordable) in the EOS-1 & EOS 5D Mark II.

I suspect that the 'only' 12MP D700 (and D3) is essentially as good in
that regard.
D3s will be interesting.



              Russell

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