How important is sensor size in your camera-purchase decision-making? This week, we highlight a selection of stories about cameras featuring very different sensor formats. We hear directly from someone who paid hard cash for a new four thirds camera. And he’s not the only fan of this diminutive format. We also hear from a famous owner of Leica’s flagship full-frame camera. To round off the week, we’ve even included some information on how these sensors, big and small, actually work.
When it comes to sensor size, small can be beautiful
The recent burst of new camera launches has brought the subject of sensor size to the fore. Consider the Leica D-Lux 8 (4/3), the Fuji X100VI (APS-C), and the Lumix S9 (FF). All launched within the last few months, they represent a decent chunk of the sensor size spectrum currently available. It looks like all these formats are in rude good health.
In case you would like to better understand how differences in sensor size impact photography, we have a video for you. Tom Calton not only describes how ‘crop-sensor’ cameras behave, but demonstrates it using his camera collection. Even photographers familiar with the subject might enjoy this user-friendly overview.
Signs of hope for the camera market – regardless of sensor size
It must be a relief of the camera industry. After years of shrinkage and doomsday scenarios, business is improving. And cameras of all sensor sizes seem to be in demand. DPReview brings it to the point in their story, “Camera sales hit the highest level for three years, driven by mirrorless and a compact rebound”. The included figures and graphs show that more cameras were sold in the first five months of 2024 than in the same period of 2023 and 2022.
That’s remarkable because many statistics refer to revenue. And revenue can go up either due to more cameras sold (which tended not to be the case in recent years) or due to a higher price by item (that’s what the strategy of the industry was). In so far, news of more sold cameras is exciting because this could mean that the basis for “real camera photography” is widening again.
While it is not surprising that mirrorless cameras are drivers in the market (there are not many SLRs still in production, after all), the significance of compact cameras is interesting. Sony’s RX100 series, the Ricoh GRIII models, the Fuji X100 and many more (even the exclusive Leica Q3) prove that the concept of a good camera with a built-in lens is successful, regardless of sensor size.
Micro Four Thirds: Small sensor size does have advantages
The bigger, the better? The old question when it comes to sensor size. We at Macfilos agree that you can shoot magnificent images with almost any camera; yes, even with your smartphone. However, the size issue is a constant topic for discussion. An intriguing contribution comes from Kai Wong. In a 19-minute YouTube video, he lists “nine reasons to love Micro Four Thirds”. No spoiler here, watch yourself:
One thing that is indeed often forgotten: Smaller sensors need smaller lenses. While the camera bodies may not differ all that much (remember the Panasonic S5 Full-Frame vs. GH5 Micro Four Thirds size discussion), lenses can be made much more compact in “smaller” systems. You can see this in Fuji’s line-up but much more obviously in the Olympus/OM System MFT lines. The OM 40-150/2.8 (an 80-300mm in FF terms) is small, lightweight, yet fast, and optically excellent.
Compact size plus great results is a combination that also appeals to many in the Macfilos community. We know from many of our readers who prefer the “small” system. Furthermore, our author Jörg-Peter Rau uses Olympus cameras for many journalistic assignments. He says he particularly likes the combination of the OM-1 the 12-100/4, and an old Panasonic 20/1.7 if speed is needed. His most frequent use case? Whenever he expects to get dirty, wet, or spend a long time carrying equipment. Or, when there is no time or opportunity to change lenses…
Leica D-Lux 8 arrives: Is its beauty only skin deep?
It’s here at last. We collected our D-Lux 8 from Red Dot Cameras in London earlier today.
Mike has been jotting down his first impressions. He’s in no doubt that this is a gorgeous little camera. But is its beauty only skin deep, he wonders.
This is something we will be finding out over the following weeks. But Mike already has some mixed views.
On the one hand, this is a stunning little camera at first sight and there is a stack of interest from potential purchasers. It looks like the camera could be in short supply for a month or two, if not for longer. Some buyers who know nothing about the history of the D-Lux range — and even less about sensors — will see this as a mini Q. Experienced Leica hands, however, are keen to see just what improvements have been made to an already popular camera, the D-Lux 7.
The photo-creation machine is virtually identical to that of the D-Lux 7. Only the OLED viewfinder and denser LCD screen are significant improvements, sufficient to make you rush to buy this camera. And Mike is disappointed to find at least two notable omissions: The much-loved stepped zoom feature (24-28-35-50-75) has disappeared without trace. The operation lock facility has also been deleted. We’ll reserve our judgment, but Mike says that these omissions look like pure vandalism with no reciprocal benefit.
Furthermore, the customisation of the few physical controls is limited. For instance, there appears to be no way of changing the function of the Q3-style twin buttons on the back of the top plate. They are fixed to EVF/LCD (left-hand) and Video (right-hand). [Update: Yes, they can be re-assigned by holding the button down and choosing from the menu]
Could it be that, apart from the improved screens, the old D-Lux 7 is actually the more enjoyable camera to use? We will cover all this in our forthcoming review of the D-Lux 8.
Full-frame flagship — the Leica SL3
To paraphrase Jeff Beck, here’s someone who knows his way around a camera. Steve McCurry, world-famous photojournalist and war correspondent, recently made a photographic trip to one of his favourite places: Myanmar. The camera he took with him was Leica’s top-of-the-line L-Mount camera, the SL3. Steve doesn’t spend much time discussing the camera’s attributes, but he certainly shows us what it can do. Aided by the stellar Leica 24-90mm SL zoom lens, he practises the portrait photography for which he is famous.
Despite the size and weight penalty of full-frame autofocus lenses, some photographers are not prepared to compromise and employ smaller formats. It seems Steve McCurry is one of them.
Types of image sensors, and how they work
If you would like to dive deeper into the nuts and bolts of camera sensors, here is a helpful overview. After studying it, you’ll be able to impress your friends by explaining the difference between CCD and CMOS sensors. That’s ‘charge coupled device’ and ‘complementary metal oxide semiconductor’ by the way. I already read the article. You will also know all about micro-lenses, Bayer filters, and mono versus colour-pixels.
Or, if you would prefer to watch and listen rather than read about it, here’s a lecture on the subject. Note that “complimentary” in CMOS (below) should be “complementary”. Or, perhaps, is the Metal-Oxide Semiconductor is just a very polite bit of technology?
Leica appoints chief of operations and technology
The Supervisory Board of Leica Camera AG has appointed Dr Ronny Fritsche to the position of Chief Operations and Technology Officer (COTO) with effect from September 4. He will join the company’s executive board alongside Chief Executive Officer Matthias Harsch, and Chief Finance Officer, Michael Grimm.
Dr Fritsche will be primarily responsible for operations and the supply chain, engineering and development. He assumes control of these functions from Matthias Harsch who was looking after them on an interim basis.
Born in Gera in 1980, Dr Fritsche is a business informatics specialist and production engineering graduate. He has had many years of experience in the areas of production, logistics, supply chain and development, and their value creation chains.
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Looks like the entire zoom interface is unchanged from the D-Lux 7 (as in, it hasn’t been converted even into a Leica style typeface) so I guess features like stepped zoom may be coming in a firmware update? This is one benefit of the D-Lux 8 as even with the lens and sensor the same, there is the possibility of additional software features. Looking forward to the full review.
Types of image sensors, and how they work; herewith some “anorak” thoughts.
One of the most confusing things about digital cameras is the concept of pixels. They are confusing because some people think they are a quantifiable entity. But here’s the thing, they aren’t. Sensors don’t really have “pixels”. They have an array of cavities, better known as “photosites”, which are photo detectors that are commonly (mistakenly?) referred to as pixels.
With Bayer filters, a group of four photosites (two with green filters and one with a red and one with a blue filter) provide the information to make up one pixel. In camera, or on a computer for RAW files, a process (algorithm) of demosaicing or interpolation takes place. As adjacent pixels (each of four photosites) share photosites, so each photosite participates in nine different neighbouring pixels. This process of demosaicing is to smooth out the information across pixels.
At the edge of the sensor there aren’t nine neighbouring pixels, so for this and for other reasons, we get the term “effective pixels” for a sensor.
A video or an article with illustrations is perhaps the only way to explain these concepts.
Foveon sensors are worth a mention. They use tri-colour depth colour filters instead of side-by-side tri-colour Bayer filters. However the clever Foveon sensors never had a commercial success for several reasons including that CMOS sensors now can have a high photosite (pixel) density.
If anybody thinks I have got my understanding wrong then please do correct me.
What you’ve written, Chris, is generally true and accurate.
But Fujifilm has generally bucked the normal trend and gone their own way, first of all with their eight-sided lozenge-shaped ‘SuperCCD’ sensors – in, for example, their old ’40i’ pocket camera, offering only 2.5 megapixels – the separate photo sites of which were ‘interpolated’ or blended together – just as you describe – to give 4.3 megapixel (equivalent) images.
(Here’s one, next-to-the-very-bottom – the woman’s portrait – on this page: https://www.edituk.com/Photos.html ..look at the detail, especially around the edges of the glasses ..that was shot with a 2.5 megapixel Fuji 40i camera ..so who needs 60 megapixels?)
Fujifilm then went on to use ‘X-trans’ sensors, also of their own devising, in their APS ‘X’-series cameras, which have a six-by-six photo site arrangement, using vertical and horizontal columns and rows of separate Red, Blue and Green photo sites, but with blocks of four Green photo sites together, bordered by those columns and rows of R,G and B. The idea of that arrangement is to minimise the ‘false colours’ which may be generated when adjacent photosites of normal 4×4 sensors get ‘blended’ together.
(The in-camera processing of data to generate these larger virtual ‘pixels’ – or the picture-defining algorithms of photo-processing software which deals with these ‘unusual’ arrangements of photosites – can require more energy than for processing ‘traditional’ 4×4 pixels, and popular photo-processing software has generally lagged behind the introduction of several Fujifilm cameras until software writers have managed to work out how best to process the extra data from these unusually-shaped ‘pixels’.)
But that’s just Fujifilm ..most other sensors do work just as you’ve described.
David, thank you for the information on how Fujifilm bucked the normal trend with their sensor design.
Thinking about camera sensor design more generally, I wonder what the Macfilos’ predictions are for the development of camera sensors say over the next five/ten years. Do we need more pixels? Perhaps no. But on the other hand greater light gathering performance for sensors and more efficient data processing would seem to be welcome trends.
Unless of course there is a new technology waiting in the wings.
The simplest ‘new technology’ for more light gathering is what Sony did with the A7S series: reduce the overall pixel count – I mean photosite count – (to 12.2 megapixels) thereby allowing each photosite to be LARGER ..so each one gathers more light per fraction of a second.
Hence the highest ISO of the original A7S (small Sony digital SLR) was (deep breath) 409,600. One could – I have done! – shoot handheld by moonlight with that camera, and its subsequent versions. (Sample photo at the bottom of the page at edituk.com/Skyros_2015.html. I couldn’t see anything – without looking thro’ the finder – except the face, as everything else was utterly pitch black to human eyes ..but the photo came out OK – besides the low-light speckle in the sky, you can also see the stars.)
There is, of course, more new technology waiting in the wings, but if I tell you what it is you’d have to kill me (..er, have I got that right..?)
No, I wouldn’t want to do that as you are a sage and an entertaining writer.
I’m a sage in need of an onion.
On the appointment of Ronny Frtische, wasn’t Stefan Daniel Operations and Technology as well? Does Frtische replace Daniel or is Daniel now reporting to Frtische?
Fritsche…
I should add – take a look at the under-hyped Sigma FP – tiny body, 60Mp, glorious colour.
*** The only things missing:
-Tilt screen – possibly answered by USB-C connected App – if only Sigma would release a more comprehensive SDK!!
-IBIS – easily answered by OIS prime lenses (after all Sigma is churning lenses by the day)
-better AF – easy!
*** It already has:
-External recording to SSD
-CinemaDNG (I absolutely love that concept) – which works like butter in Resolve
-Great Colour Profiles (not JPG looks)
I could keep going.
I just wish Leica would take some clues from the above.
John M
I think what we’re seeing here is not so much the sensor size but the real need for small factor cameras. The sensor discussion is really a case of justifying sensor size for the real demand of a small factor Camera. I have always had the Lumix LX100ii it is as good if not better than the D Lux 7 and then I’ve just put up with low resolution and poor AF. Camera company certainly know how to make small cameras but I think there’s an unfortunate perception that big and heavy as a brick is what people want- Seriously is time to rethink that.
Interesting article Jason
I have dabbled with MFT on and off over the years, but last weekend I did my biggest annual job (The Ladies Tractor Road Run) using an Olympus OM-1 ii and their 12-100 f4 lens. It’s a long day’s work, starting shooting at 7.30, finishing at 5.30 then an evening processing pictures for the press officer to get them to the papers for Monday morning. Still a lot of work to do with about 600 of the 1500 images still to process and put on line! It isn’t like a wedding where you need a couple of hundred images – 90% of them will be used as all the ladies need them for their fund raising. As my wife says – it’s like shooting a wedding with 195 brides!
Basically there are 4 places where one needs to get at least one good shot of all 200 of the ladies on their tractors. I was expecting to use the OM-1 for one of the sites (the first one) but it worked so very very well that I ended up using it for everything except the group shot (M11 for lots of pixels).
David is probably right about the lighter elements meaning faster focusing, but the focusing on the OM-1 was nothing short of miraculous – on a number of occasions I swung around from 50 metres to 1 and grabbed a shot. The human recognition (and eye) just works. I don’t think I had more than 10 out of focus shots in the whole 1500 – brilliant performance.
I was worried that the reduced resolution (20mp instead of 60) was going to be an issue, but it isn’t, because there is no need to crop – with the 12-100 (ie 24-200mm in FF terms) you can fill the frame whenever you need to. For most of the press I was sending jpgs reduced to about 8mb – but the 20mp is also fine for a magazine front page (for instance).
I think there is a very hard psychological problem – it’s so easy to think that “more is better”, when, perhaps, the truth is that “enough is enough”!
I’m really pleased with the system, and the 8-25 f4 (16-50) and the 40-150 f2.8 (80-300) are wending their way from OM Systems in Germany.
All the best
Jono
In case anyone is interested, here are links to a couple of the galleries which I’ve completed:
https://adobe.ly/4cyPCbC
https://adobe.ly/4ePCznT
It’s hard for me to wrap my head around the work (and professionalism) these required. And– if I may — there are some very lovely portraits in there!
Ooh! Thank you Kathy, it’s an honour to do it, but it is quite a lot of work too!
There are some fantastic photos your collection. The same ladies drove past my front door last Sunday and I used an OM-5 and a Leica MP to gather some images. The digital files have been downloaded, but I await the development of my film… Somehow, with all the vibrancy involved, it seemed inappropriate to use the Q2M!
Bravo Jono. Galleries look terrific. Lots of hard work there, and no issues to write about!
Welcome to the Olympus family, Jono! Ditto everything you say.
What do you want your camera to do? Or perhaps better: what are you planning to do with your images? Everything in photography entails a trade off between one parameter versus another- speed, image quality, DOF, etc.
To answer for myself it is, on one hand, a version of “f/8 and be there”, and on the other a studied need possibly to crop or alter my image in post processing to get what I want. Hence today I have two systems: an iPhone 15 pro to always be there; and M10s and an M11 with a plethora of lenses for the other. With the last I can crop 3/4 or more of the images away and have an outstanding result at 11×14 “.
Still, if I had to chose just one end of the spectrum with one camera, I’d go for something like a Q3. I feel I need the pixels.
Just my 2 cents. Thanks for the article!
Thank you, Ed. As you say, it is very much a personal choice. But it is important to understand the differences and to make an informed decision, especially when deciding on a system — for instance, MFT or FF.
I’ve always wondered about the term “crop sensor.” As I’ve been taking pictures for almost 60 years now (I started at 12), I have seen and used many a camera type: from a Kodak Instamatic to a 6×6 Balda, a Rolleicord lllA, which was only 3 years younger than I, a Leica lllA (1939), a number of Prakticas, a whole bunch of Leica DSLR’s, a Zeiss Ikon 6×9. Then digital photography emerged, and after several years the term “crop factor” was introduced.
Despite the fact that there were countless film formats before that time, the term did not exist. Every camera existed in its own right. And, of course serious photographers very well understood the – quality – difference between a Rollei and a Kodak Instamatic and between a Linhof 4×5 and a Leica.
The cause for the term is the fact that the same lenses may frequantly be used on various cameras with different sensor sizes. But is it useful to talk about a “crop factor”. Again, as Gregrory Bateson would say ‘every schoolboy knows’ that the larger the negative of sensor the better image quality one gets. But the same ‘schoolboy’ should know that the standaard lens of a camera is almost always the diagonal of the film or sensor format, which gives us the most ‘natural’ perspective.
That is why a Rolleiflex 6×6 had a 75mm or a 80mm lens, and a Rolleiflex 4×4 a 60mm lens.
Nowadays, many treat these difference as something novel – which it isn’t. And moreover, there seems to be a lot of confusion about sharpness, depth of field, according to sensor size, and what have you.
Sure, we can be glad about the fact that many, many lenses, even vintage ones, can be used on modern – digital – cameras. Who, indeed, could have thought that a lens from the thirties – like f.i. my Old Delft 3,5/35 mm LTM can be used on a Panasonic GX? Only the engineers at Leitz/Leica perhaps, as this venerant brand was sometimes described as a factory which made primarily all kinds of adapters and a couple of cameras every now and then.
I agree to an extent. The “crop sensor” concept is really just a reference point in relation to FF which, for no very convincing reason, has become the standard or benchmark. Life would be simpler if we had a universal and comparative way of describing sensor size. One-inch, Four thirds, APS-C, APS-H, Full Frame and Medium Format lack consistency and a common base for description.
Gerard.. “..the larger the negative of [or] sensor the better image quality one gets”.
Er, I don’t necessarily agree: it’s the lens which provides the image quality. A lovely black Bakelite Box Brownie taking 127 film won’t, in my experience anyway, give “better image quality” than a smaller 135 film cassette in a 35mm camera with a good lens on it.
And the same goes for 120 (or 220 or 620) film in my experience, too. A poor lens on a 4×5 camera – and I used to own a Plaubel 4×5 – won’t necessarily give sharper, or “better”, results than, say, a great Olympus lens on a little micro-four-thirds camera – see Jonathan’s comment, above.
A bigger film (or sensor) means that less enlargement – if any – is generally needed, and so you don’t really lose much quality in enlarging the photos. But a big negative that’s used with a simple lens which isn’t really up to the job won’t necessarily give great pictures ..as I’ve found with all sorts of cut film and large-ish format roll films in a variety of old-ish cameras.
My folding Kodak Super Bantams (with a couple of different lenses on them) look very nice, but their results don’t hold a candle anywhere near to photos taken with my teeny 1″ sensor Sony RX100MkVI and its terrific modern lens (and lens coating) ..or to micro-four-thirds photos with the brilliant Olympus lenses. Or to any camera using, say, a modern Leica lens on it.
You may not seeany faults in a photo taken on 10×8″ film at first glance, because it’ll look pretty sharp at its natural size. But 10×8 pics taken with an old lens (Heinrich Schliemann’s photos of Troy, for example, of the 1870s or 1880s) are not necessarily of the same “image quality” as, for example – because we’ve been talking about it – micro-four-thirds.
Those are my thoughts and experiences, anyway. But ‘Your Mileage May Vary’, of course!
Largely agree, David BUT my BBBB 127 does take some good quickie street photos and has the facility of multiple exposures 😉(Forgetting sometimes to wind on🙄)
Mmm ..I’ve been trying to find a suitable high quality lens to put on the front of my BBBB 127 (..the only time since schooldays that I’ve ever needed to use Pythagoras’ theorem to find the right focal length ..as Gerard says (above) “..the same ‘schoolboy’ should know that the standaard lens of a camera is almost always the diagonal of the film or sensor format”).
So, after checking the film frame’s height & width, I reckoned that the diagonal would be about 80mm, so I’m looking for a slightly wider – 60mm? – small lens which will cover the 127 frame size, but won’t destroy the great looks of the camera!
Sure, you’re right, the lens determines a lot of the quality of the pictures. I’d guess that readers would understand that my remark about the format was made ceteris paribus, of course.
“…every schoolboy knows…”
Thanks for your comments. But aren’t you just as surprised as I, when looking at razor sharp 19th century B&W photographs?
However, during the age of of film photography, after Leitz introduced its 35 mm camera, lenses fot the minitiature format were much better than those used on sheet film and glass plate cameras because the last ones did non or hardly any enlargement.
The focal point of a lens for 35mm is even smaller – sharper, as well – than that on a 6×6 or 6×9 (analogue) camera, let alone compared to the lenses of 4×5 and larger formats.
This is one of the reasons why 35mm and Leica became so succesful.
Hi, yes Gerard – sorry not to have replied sooner – I am, or initially was (..the first time that I saw such photos..) surprised at the ‘razor sharpness’ of old photos shot on 10×8″ glass plates.
But, as I think we both now agree, the ‘sharpness’ is down to not having to enlarge the photos in order to make prints from them. The lenses of their time were ‘sharp enough’ so that many of the photos do look really knife sharp when just made as straight contact prints from those negatives.
Then, as you say, lenses for the miniature [35mm] format evolved into being much better than those used with old sheet film and glass plate cameras.
So we agree that “..it’s the lens which provides the image quality”.
Although this article – thanks, Jason – often mentions the size, and sometimes weight, of micro-four-thirds lenses being less than similar ‘full-frame’ lenses, I seldom read about the results of that ..rather than just the look or appearance.
As the smaller mft lenses have smaller and thus lighter pieces of glass inside, their focusing motor(s) – with less weight to shift during focusing – can focus much faster than bigger lenses using heavier, chunkier pieces of glass.
Think of the Canon 85mm f1.2 ..takes a while to focus because of the weight of glass needing to be shifted. Olympus mft lenses focus pretty much instantly (the little 45mm is equivalent to a 90mm for most intents and purposes) because there’s much less ‘heavy lifting’ to do.
Another advantage of mft.
Valid point, David, and thanks for mentioning it. Jason