[ale] OT: megapixels

[John Marasco]

A cheap printer will print 600 dpi to create a clean crisp printout.  That means a 4x6 print would consist of 2400x3600=8 million dots (three colors equals a pixel).  A photo printer has significantly greater resolution (thousands of dpi).  Different people will percieve resolutions differently when printed (or even on screen).  Some might think 600 dpi is perfectly smooth, others might find it increadibly grainy.  I have a printout from a 4 mega-pixel camera on my desk next to a normal picture and I can see a distinct difference in the "crispness" of the two images.  Not that the digital images isn't good, the lines just aren't as clean (IMO) from a "normal" viewing distance of 1-3 feet.  Of course the digital picture is cropped from a larger image and doesn't reflect the total resolution of the camera.  I would suggest buying the most resolution you find practically affordable.  Even if it looks good on you screen today and you never want to print pictures out that doesn't mean you will be as happy viewing the pictures in 20 years on your 10,000 x 12,000 pixel wall screen (remember that 20 years ago a 14 inch COLOR monitor was all the rage). ;)

Pictures are forever, make them as good as you can.  You may never get a second chance.

FYI - There is a company called Foveon that has a very interesting technology that should increase the pixel count of consumer cameras by three (or four, I'm not positive) fold in the next few years.  They already have a rather expensive model out with the technology.  Another interesting feature of the Foveon technology is the ability to capture a lot more of the detail in a picture for a given resolution (pictures are more crisp).


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