[Steve.Ledger]

I still can't get my head around 'manufacturing' 1 million microscopic photosensors on a tiny chip let alone 50 million !!
A technical and manufacturing marvel to be sure. Seems a waste to me when the human eye only really equates to 7Mp at the point of acuity

You Tube

You Tube

[goubejp]

It's a good thing that memory prices are going down and memory density going up. At this rate the 2 memory slots of the K-3 will be inadequate and obsolete; its FF successor will need 4! Or perhaps a built in hard disk... solid state, of course.

I have 2 32 GB SD cards on my K3 and I must say, I have never wrote anything on the second slot. SD card capacity is not an issue. May be write speed is. The interest of such a high pixel density is to avoid moiré issues on these AA filterless cameras. I have sometimes experienced moiré on birds Feather with the K5iis (and a high quality prime as the FA*600), never with the K3

[normhead]

Sony has made sensors before that Pentax wouldn't buy into because of poor performance, let's see what type of image comes from this product before we start going all crazy.

[Dario79]

It wouldnt make any sence to produce FF camera with same MP count as your flagship MF beast. I don't think people in Ricoh/Pentax would like to see 645z sale numbers going down the hill.....

[disconnekt]

I would get it if they had a Foveon-type sensor in the FF camera, then I could see it being at 50MP or so.
As I see it, having a 50MP FF camera would cut into their sales of their 645D/645Z.

[Rondec]

Sony has made sensors before that Pentax wouldn't buy into because of poor performance, let's see what type of image comes from this product before we start going all crazy.

It isn't new sensor tech, though. Basically, they are taking K3 sensor tech to a full frame level, just as they did taking K5/D7000 sensor tech to the D800. It isn't hard to extrapolate performance based on that. Slight worse DR than the D800, slightly worse high iso performance from the D800, more resolution. I wouldn't take the trade off personally -- not on full frame. As I said before, the reason to go with the K3 over the K5 doesn't have to do with the sensor (which is fine), but the other things that the K3 does better than the K5.

[RonHendriks1966]

I have 2 32 GB SD cards on my K3 and I must say, I have never wrote anything on the second slot. SD card capacity is not an issue. May be write speed is. The interest of such a high pixel density is to avoid moiré issues on these AA filterless cameras. I have sometimes experienced moiré on birds Feather with the K5iis (and a high quality prime as the FA*600), never with the K3

Well since the pixels of these 50mp are bigger then K-3, the output can be cleaner. Time fot UHS-II writespeed and bigger cards.


To be honest, I'm not waiting for this thing.

[altopiet]

I cannot open the link...

For one reason or another if I copy and paste the link, part of the link disappears, but it is at __

[altopiet]

Probably full link: www(dot)photographybay(dot)com/2014/10/12/sony-50mp-full-frame-sensors-coming-in-2015/

Yes, for some reason the name of the site disappears when you post it, doesn't matter if in a link or just the name alone....

[normhead]

Well since the pixels of these 50mp are bigger then K-3, the output can be cleaner. Time fot UHS-II writespeed and bigger cards.


To be honest, I'm not waiting for this thing.

One you get to 50 MP on APS-c your diffraction limit is getting up into the blue spectrum, and you're already going to be experiencing serious diffraction in the red yellow and green spectrum at ƒ5.6. Your diffraction limit will be ƒ4... it will be interesting to see what the effect of such a sensor might be... but I'm not sure it will be all good. I'm not sure going to 24 MP has been all good.

[dakight]

50 mp on a FF sensor means a pixel density roughly equivalent to 20 mp on an aps-c sensor. The pixel density is not a serious issue really. It will put more stress on processing and memory capacity but I doubt that's a serious limiting factor. Other issues of performance will determine whether it's worthwhile or not. The SR technology that Pentax uses may not scale well to Full Frame and the may be other issues such as heat that will have to be addressed. My guess is that these are the things that have thus far held up the introduction of the FF Pentax, not a lack of suitable sensors.


As other have alluded, there are also marketing issue. Pentax does not want to disturb the market niche of the 645 medium format product which is by all accounts a bright spot for them. They will be very careful how, where and when they insert a FF body into the lineup. To drop in a full-featured, high performance body at a lower price point could very well damage the higher tier 645 market and there would be no point in trying to sell it at or near the same price. The technical issues are relatively minor compared with the marketing issues..

[normhead]

After feeling less than excited after going from 16-24 MP, I simply an not going to pay for 50 MP. I will pay for better noise reduction, better Dynamic range, better low light performance. 24 Mp is not noticeably better than 16 MP for everything I've done since I bought the K-3. Trying to sell me a 50 MP camera that doesn't have the low light capacity of a 645z is simply not going to be a go, whichever camera company it is. Image size will definitely not be a factor in my next purchase.

At some point Sony has to realize, before you start selling 50 MP camera, there have to be output devices that can take advantage of it.

[ElJamoquio]

It's a good thing that memory prices are going down and memory density going up. At this rate the 2 memory slots of the K-3 will be inadequate and obsolete; its FF successor will need 4! Or perhaps a built in hard disk... solid state, of course.

I get 64GB cards now for about the same amount of money I was paying for 8 GB cards in 2010 or whatever year it was. So I guess I should have a 8*16 = 128 MP camera.

---------- Post added 10-18-14 at 10:04 AM ----------

Trying to sell me a 50 MP camera that doesn't have the low light capacity of a 645z is simply not going to be a go

Hopefully it'll be a K-mount camera, so it will outperform the 645Z in low light.

[RonHendriks1966]

After feeling less than excited after going from 16-24 MP, I simply an not going to pay for 50 MP. I will pay for better noise reduction, better Dynamic range, better low light performance. 24 Mp is not noticeably better than 16 MP for everything I've done since I bought the K-3. Trying to sell me a 50 MP camera that doesn't have the low light capacity of a 645z is simply not going to be a go, whichever camera company it is. Image size will definitely not be a factor in my next purchase.

At some point Sony has to realize, before you start selling 50 MP camera, there have to be output devices that can take advantage of it.

I don't think that going this route would be very succesfull. With larger pixels, like 645Z sensor (30,7 megapixel on FF) or K-5 (38,2 megapixel on FF) you get more then enough pixels. If you want to go the route of "as many as possible" then I guess that you wil have a very niche camera.

[jsherman999]

After feeling less than excited after going from 16-24 MP,

Within aps-c

...I simply an not going to pay for 50 MP. I will pay for better noise reduction, better Dynamic range, better low light performance.

What if you buy better noise performance, better dynamic range and get 50MP as a bonus?