Picture Ratios Inconsistant

[Mr. Pickles]

This kind of bugs me. It isn't a cropping deal, it is a camera deal. Why do some cameras use a picture ratio of 0.75, and other use 0.6666?

Normal screen resolutions are 0.75 (width / height) which include 800x600 or 1024x768. There are a LOT of prosumers that shoot at 2048x1536, which is 0.75. My Canon DSLR shoots at 3072x2048, which is 0.6666.

A 4x6 print has a 0.6666 ration, but that is about it as far as normal print sizes. I know they are all a bit different, but you have to crop a lot of a 0.6666 image when printing big. Seems you have to crop more than a 0.75 sensor would.

So, does this ever bother you?

[BigB]

the 4x6 is probably the most common size printed by a wide margin. Most people just want to take shots and have them printed, not sit in front of a computer and edit photos that a lab would normally do.

[badpickev]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pickles

This kind of bugs me. It isn't a cropping deal, it is a camera deal. Why do some cameras use a picture ratio of 0.75, and other use 0.6666?

Normal screen resolutions are 0.75 (width / height) which include 800x600 or 1024x768. There are a LOT of prosumers that shoot at 2048x1536, which is 0.75. My Canon DSLR shoots at 3072x2048, which is 0.6666.

A 4x6 print has a 0.6666 ration, but that is about it as far as normal print sizes. I know they are all a bit different, but you have to crop a lot of a 0.6666 image when printing big. Seems you have to crop more than a 0.75 sensor would.

So, does this ever bother you?

karma to you. no it doesnt bother me. i bet its sensor related. it seems the aps-c sensor size has a varied crop rateing. Sigma is 1.7, canon is 1.6, 1.3, and 0, nikon and fuji is 1.5, kodak is 0 oly is 2. km is 1.5 dont know about pentax. I am guessing that you have a canon with a 1.6 or 1.3 crop sensor.

[Paul Shields]

Well I think Mr P answered his own question when referring to the ratio being based on the sensor in use. It's one the reasons to like the Olympus 4/3rds sensor which requires no cropping to fill a 'normal' screen (1600x1200, 800x600 etc) - and this helps with some print sizes. I doubt that this would make other manfacturers rush to the 4/3rds standard though . Maybe there's a need for an in-camera feature to specify the visible area exposed (would be easy to do in an electronic viewfinder).

[Mr. Pickles]

Well, I think I answered my own question, but also wanted to know if it bugged people. When I shoot certain "scenes", I'm fiddling around sometimes trying to get the shot "right" in the measly viewfinder. When I get the result on my screen on the PC, and tweak it or whatever, if it is a "keeper" and I want to hang or am gonna sell a big or medium size print, I have to crop. If I "cropped" when I shot for the viewfinder, I loose that balance later.

So, I guess you shoot with the image looking good in the viewfinder, and then zoom OUT a touch, to leave some dead space around that MIGHT get whacked off later...

[photosbymorgan2]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pickles

Well, I think I answered my own question, but also wanted to know if it bugged people. When I shoot certain "scenes", I'm fiddling around sometimes trying to get the shot "right" in the measly viewfinder. When I get the result on my screen on the PC, and tweak it or whatever, if it is a "keeper" and I want to hang or am gonna sell a big or medium size print, I have to crop. If I "cropped" when I shot for the viewfinder, I loose that balance later.

So, I guess you shoot with the image looking good in the viewfinder, and then zoom OUT a touch, to leave some dead space around that MIGHT get whacked off later...*

I have crop marks on my focusing screen set for an 8 x 10 print and since I print mostly 8 x 10 to 16 x 20, the crop marks work well and I can make sure that how I compose my picture will be what is printed. If I was to print anything that would be out of the 8 x 10 ratio then I would compose for the full view and then have it printed. Not many people want photos larger than 16 x 20.

[Wilt]

Photo formats existed LONG before computer monitors and digital cameras!!! You will find that 4"x5" and 8"x10" are still very common portrait sizes (and film sizes) with 5:4 aspect ratio, but there also were 5"x7" prints and film size with 7:5 aspect ratio. Long before someone (I think Leica) came out with the 'miniature' format, 35mm, with its 3:2 aspect ratio. But even in film, manufacturers of cameras did not all conform to one universal frame size!

Then came computers, with pixel ratios dictated by CRT, then LCD pixel counts, 4:3 ratio. Olympus is the only dSLR manufacturer to have adopted that ratio, in the merger of cameras and computers represented by its newest camera line, but that is fairly commonly found in P&S digitals. The dSLR mostly conforms to the 3:2 aspect ratio expected by 35mm film shooters.