Ever scanned something? General scanning orthodoxy, when it is neccessary to remove moire from a scan, is to scan said image into your computer at twice the vertical and horzontal resolution, apply a filter and downsample. buh-bye moire.
That works for half-toning, which creates moire patterns. Moire from a mosaic image sensor IS NOT half-toning and not nearly as predictable.
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If you're dealing with 4X the pixel locations, it's not that the information isn't there, it's that it isn't converged properly, hence the moire.
But the information isn't there. Green light that bounces off blue and red photodetectors is basically useless, and so forth. The information was never there and no matter what resolution you can't somehow retrieve it because it was discarded before it ever was processed.
Quote:
But once you combine that info into fewer locations, the artifcats present from that misconvergence largely disappear. You lose detail, but you also lose noise and moire. We could talk about the fidelity of said image -- combining a red blue and two green pixels, all at slightly different locations, down to one point is NOT a perfectly accurate representation of the actual image, but it works well enough for the purposes of eliminating artifacts while trying to keep a sharp-looking image.
It's not about having sharp images. It's about having sharp images that are color accurate. Moire is just discoloration after all.
Quote:
two years is a long time for a device which people are asking to see at MWSF.
It doesn't matter. What's good enough for the consumer is here already, but don't try to hide the fact that moire and other color aberrations cannot effectively be cancelled through scaling, not on a reasonable scale anyway.
Ok, that is the $200 one I was refering to with a capicity of 5 minutes at "best" quality. Hell, the video on the gateway is only 320x240. And why is it 22-25 FPS? Isn't NTSC 29.97?
<snip>
For that matter, my 10 year-old daughter is "making her own movies" with a Kodak DX4330 digital still camera.
The quality of the movies in the DX4330's movie mode is around that of VHS in SLP mode. Put another way, it's s#@%y. But she's happy with what she's doing, and she can edit them in iMovie. So who am I to complain?
The real question to me is how much compression Apple, Panasonic, or whoever can do while still giving a picture consumers would want to pay for. Thanks to DVD, the standards consumers expect have gone up considerably.
In talking to Snell & Wilcox engineers at a broadcasting trade show, 6 Mb/sec seems to be the magic threshold right now. There's a TV station group (which will remain nameless to protect the guilty) using "V-Bricks" to shuffle their signal around to the individual stations. The specs are MPEG-2 video at 3 Mb/sec.
At a trade show when I rattled off those specs to broadcast engineering professionals, I got the same reply independently from four different ones: "Don't they know the video looks like s#@%?"
Apple doesn't really seem like the company to come out with cameras. Music was ok, but cameras don't seem to likely, well, to me
on the contrary they offerd the "Quicktake Digital Camera" back in, uhh I'm not sure...94? They may even have been the first to offer a commercially available digi camera.
Apple doesn't really seem like the company to come out with cameras. Music was ok, but cameras don't seem to likely, well, to me
I think that if Apple had something significant to bring to the digital camera market they would consider it. But the truth is that iPhoto works fine with most popular still cameras, and iMovie works fine with a large number of video cameras. I don't see what Apple could bring to the camera market that isn't there, the same as the printer market today, there just isn't a need.
I can't see Apple getting into this market now. To make a camera requires not just the operating software but a lot of hard engineering in the sensor, electronics and lenses. Apple could make the investment but given the crowded market why should they? If, by some magic, the sensors were available but not being used for digital cameras then I could see Apple jumping in.
Currently the hottest consumer camera is the Canon D300. Apple is not going to beat that.
There is a large variety of DV cams out there. Prices are below $1,000. No way Apple can compete with that.
It might be fun if Apple would build a handful of prototypes to show off to spur other camera makers in a good direction.
I can't see Apple getting into this market now. To make a camera requires not just the operating software but a lot of hard engineering in the sensor, electronics and lenses. Apple could make the investment but given the crowded market why should they? If, by some magic, the sensors were available but not being used for digital cameras then I could see Apple jumping in.
All true. Except for some bits of information floating around out there.
Item #1: Sony's boss talks about trying to work with Steve Jobs, and is quoted with words to the effect of, "We'd like to work with Apple, but Steve has his own agenda."
Item #2: After a bit of prodding (read: screaming) from the broadcast/post production communities, Apple and Panasonic get together to make DVC Pro VTRs work over FireWire. This has led to partnership (of sorts) with FCP and other higher data rate flavors of DVC Pro.
Item #3: Panasonic has a working prototype of a tapeless broadcast camera.
None of this in itself would suggest Apple will introduce a tapeless camera whenever. What it does suggest is that the pieces are there if Apple wants them. We all know that Steve's team in Cupertino has a track record of putting disparate hardware and software pieces together to make insanely great products. How many of us saw the original iMac coming? Or the iPod, for that matter? And how many of us reading here really know what's buried in the Cupertino labs where the really secret Apple projects are buried?
Having said that though, I'm with you; I don't see a still/video camera iPod. Yet.
Speaking of bits of information floating about... I happen to notice that at the CompUSA store near me, the month of January is loaded with seminars and demo days of "iPhoto" and that iMovie and FCP "demo days" are also plentiful.
There is only one day set aside for the iPod in January. Now make of this what you will, but it struck me as odd that there are many more events scheduled for free software products than for the rumored cheap iPods.
I suppose that iPhoto and iMovie are due for upgrades, but to put such a focus on iLife software without a physical product to push seems ... well unlikely.
Speaking of bits of information floating about... I happen to notice that at the CompUSA store near me, the month of January is loaded with seminars and demo days of "iPhoto" and that iMovie and FCP "demo days" are also plentiful.
There is only one day set aside for the iPod in January. Now make of this what you will, but it struck me as odd that there are many more events scheduled for free software products than for the rumored cheap iPods.
I suppose that iPhoto and iMovie are due for upgrades, but to put such a focus on iLife software without a physical product to push seems ... well unlikely.
iPhoto, iMovie, and iDVD are more selling points for the Mac than an iPod, which works with iTunes for Windows, is because they help to lower the cost of switching to the Mac platform. They also show off the ease of use of Mac programs/OS. iPods are selling themselves at their current price point, a lower cost version would get tons of free press why waist precious marketing $ to plug a product that is getting press without it?
I saw a CF camcorder at Best Buy for $99 after rebate. However much CF you buy, you can record up to an hour. Only about 2" square. It was heavily Windows-specific, but what a clever concept! It does stills too, of course.
It reminded me of the early MP3 players, such as the Rio: a product that's almost practical, and just needs a little tweaking...
iPhoto, iMovie, and iDVD are more selling points for the Mac ...why waist precious marketing $ to plug a product that is getting press without it?
Well it is a given that the iLife products are a major value added proposition for the Macintosh line up. But IF a NEW product were introduced as ... "one more thing" at MWSF, that Apple's "precious marketing $$$" would be well spent in showcasing that new product.
Hey, you might be right, with nothing new announced at Mac World, then Apple would be reduced to pounding on the fundamentals.
Comments
Originally posted by Matsu
Ever scanned something? General scanning orthodoxy, when it is neccessary to remove moire from a scan, is to scan said image into your computer at twice the vertical and horzontal resolution, apply a filter and downsample. buh-bye moire.
That works for half-toning, which creates moire patterns. Moire from a mosaic image sensor IS NOT half-toning and not nearly as predictable.
If you're dealing with 4X the pixel locations, it's not that the information isn't there, it's that it isn't converged properly, hence the moire.
But the information isn't there. Green light that bounces off blue and red photodetectors is basically useless, and so forth. The information was never there and no matter what resolution you can't somehow retrieve it because it was discarded before it ever was processed.
But once you combine that info into fewer locations, the artifcats present from that misconvergence largely disappear. You lose detail, but you also lose noise and moire. We could talk about the fidelity of said image -- combining a red blue and two green pixels, all at slightly different locations, down to one point is NOT a perfectly accurate representation of the actual image, but it works well enough for the purposes of eliminating artifacts while trying to keep a sharp-looking image.
It's not about having sharp images. It's about having sharp images that are color accurate. Moire is just discoloration after all.
two years is a long time for a device which people are asking to see at MWSF.
It doesn't matter. What's good enough for the consumer is here already, but don't try to hide the fact that moire and other color aberrations cannot effectively be cancelled through scaling, not on a reasonable scale anyway.
Originally posted by kupan787
Ok, that is the $200 one I was refering to with a capicity of 5 minutes at "best" quality. Hell, the video on the gateway is only 320x240. And why is it 22-25 FPS? Isn't NTSC 29.97?
<snip>
For that matter, my 10 year-old daughter is "making her own movies" with a Kodak DX4330 digital still camera.
The quality of the movies in the DX4330's movie mode is around that of VHS in SLP mode. Put another way, it's s#@%y. But she's happy with what she's doing, and she can edit them in iMovie. So who am I to complain?
The real question to me is how much compression Apple, Panasonic, or whoever can do while still giving a picture consumers would want to pay for. Thanks to DVD, the standards consumers expect have gone up considerably.
In talking to Snell & Wilcox engineers at a broadcasting trade show, 6 Mb/sec seems to be the magic threshold right now. There's a TV station group (which will remain nameless to protect the guilty) using "V-Bricks" to shuffle their signal around to the individual stations. The specs are MPEG-2 video at 3 Mb/sec.
At a trade show when I rattled off those specs to broadcast engineering professionals, I got the same reply independently from four different ones: "Don't they know the video looks like s#@%?"
Originally posted by psgamer0921
Apple doesn't really seem like the company to come out with cameras. Music was ok, but cameras don't seem to likely, well, to me
on the contrary they offerd the "Quicktake Digital Camera" back in, uhh I'm not sure...94? They may even have been the first to offer a commercially available digi camera.
Maybe someone could straighten me out on this?
Originally posted by psgamer0921
Apple doesn't really seem like the company to come out with cameras. Music was ok, but cameras don't seem to likely, well, to me
I think that if Apple had something significant to bring to the digital camera market they would consider it. But the truth is that iPhoto works fine with most popular still cameras, and iMovie works fine with a large number of video cameras. I don't see what Apple could bring to the camera market that isn't there, the same as the printer market today, there just isn't a need.
Currently the hottest consumer camera is the Canon D300. Apple is not going to beat that.
There is a large variety of DV cams out there. Prices are below $1,000. No way Apple can compete with that.
It might be fun if Apple would build a handful of prototypes to show off to spur other camera makers in a good direction.
Originally posted by neutrino23
I can't see Apple getting into this market now. To make a camera requires not just the operating software but a lot of hard engineering in the sensor, electronics and lenses. Apple could make the investment but given the crowded market why should they? If, by some magic, the sensors were available but not being used for digital cameras then I could see Apple jumping in.
All true. Except for some bits of information floating around out there.
Item #1: Sony's boss talks about trying to work with Steve Jobs, and is quoted with words to the effect of, "We'd like to work with Apple, but Steve has his own agenda."
Item #2: After a bit of prodding (read: screaming) from the broadcast/post production communities, Apple and Panasonic get together to make DVC Pro VTRs work over FireWire. This has led to partnership (of sorts) with FCP and other higher data rate flavors of DVC Pro.
Item #3: Panasonic has a working prototype of a tapeless broadcast camera.
None of this in itself would suggest Apple will introduce a tapeless camera whenever. What it does suggest is that the pieces are there if Apple wants them. We all know that Steve's team in Cupertino has a track record of putting disparate hardware and software pieces together to make insanely great products. How many of us saw the original iMac coming? Or the iPod, for that matter? And how many of us reading here really know what's buried in the Cupertino labs where the really secret Apple projects are buried?
Having said that though, I'm with you; I don't see a still/video camera iPod. Yet.
There is only one day set aside for the iPod in January. Now make of this what you will, but it struck me as odd that there are many more events scheduled for free software products than for the rumored cheap iPods.
I suppose that iPhoto and iMovie are due for upgrades, but to put such a focus on iLife software without a physical product to push seems ... well unlikely.
Originally posted by Aphelion
Speaking of bits of information floating about... I happen to notice that at the CompUSA store near me, the month of January is loaded with seminars and demo days of "iPhoto" and that iMovie and FCP "demo days" are also plentiful.
There is only one day set aside for the iPod in January. Now make of this what you will, but it struck me as odd that there are many more events scheduled for free software products than for the rumored cheap iPods.
I suppose that iPhoto and iMovie are due for upgrades, but to put such a focus on iLife software without a physical product to push seems ... well unlikely.
iPhoto, iMovie, and iDVD are more selling points for the Mac than an iPod, which works with iTunes for Windows, is because they help to lower the cost of switching to the Mac platform. They also show off the ease of use of Mac programs/OS. iPods are selling themselves at their current price point, a lower cost version would get tons of free press why waist precious marketing $ to plug a product that is getting press without it?
It reminded me of the early MP3 players, such as the Rio: a product that's almost practical, and just needs a little tweaking...
Originally posted by @homenow
iPhoto, iMovie, and iDVD are more selling points for the Mac ...why waist precious marketing $ to plug a product that is getting press without it?
Well it is a given that the iLife products are a major value added proposition for the Macintosh line up. But IF a NEW product were introduced as ... "one more thing" at MWSF, that Apple's "precious marketing $$$" would be well spent in showcasing that new product.
Hey, you might be right, with nothing new announced at Mac World, then Apple would be reduced to pounding on the fundamentals.