Luminous Landscape Forum
Equipment & Techniques => Medium Format / Film / Digital Backs – and Large Sensor Photography => Topic started by: Gel on April 20, 2012, 10:31:32 am
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Is there a reason they are all CCD?
Forgive me for sounding obvious but why don't we have CMOS sensor technology (with it's high ISO capability) put into a larger sensor on a digital back?
I can understand Canon / Nikon not thinking it's a big enough market but why not one of the big boys like Phase/Leaf/Hassy?
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Hi,
Because Phase/Leaf/Hassy don't make sensors. They buy sensors from Dalsa and what used to be Kodak. Also, I guess that Nikon and Canon sell more full frame sensors in a week than Phase/Leaf/Hassy in a year.
Best regards
Erik
Is there a reason they are all CCD?
Forgive me for sounding obvious but why don't we have CMOS sensor technology (with it's high ISO capability) put into a larger sensor on a digital back?
I can understand Canon / Nikon not thinking it's a big enough market but why not one of the big boys like Phase/Leaf/Hassy?
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This is an obvious target area for Sony.
They can't compete with Canon/Nikon on DSLRs, because of lens selection - may as well just sell sensors to both of them.
Where they can compete is in mirrorless technology - stick two D800e sensors side by side for a 24x72mm sensor with live view, work with Zeiss to bring out a range of suitable lenses (starting with a 24mm or 28mm tilt-shift, for the equivalent horizontal angle of view of 12 or 14mm on full-frame - MF users often want perspective and focal plane control), sell the camera body for $5k (because it doesn't need all the fancy mirrors and viewfinder assemblies) and they'd practically wipe out Phase One, Mamiya and Hasselblad overnight.
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The main issue seems to be that there is a far bigger overhead in designing and putting an active pixel CMOS sensor into production compared to a CCD, and the far lower sales volume of formats larger than 36x24mm mean that this investment would not be cost effective. Or at least so far, and in the judgement of potential customers like Phase One, Hasselblad, Pentax and Leica. I mention them, not the various possible sensor makers, because it is the willingness of these potential customers to guarantee some minimum order at some acceptable price that dictates whether a company like Teledyne-Dalsa goes ahead with such a low volume project.
I think of this like new models of commercial aircraft, where the decision to go ahead is based on whether enough deposits are put down by airlines. I am skeptical of the idea that sensor makers just design and produce specialty products like this "on spec" and then go looking for customers. For example, it seems that the direction of Sony's development of sensors for DSLRs has often been heavily influenced by the wishes of its dominant customer, Nikon, to the point that Nikon often gets to use a new Sony DSLR sensor before Sony's far smaller DSLR division does.
P. S. you cannot simply stick two sensors side-by-side to get something usable in a high quality MF camera. The resulting seam is tolerable for some uses like X-rays, and Teledyne-Dalsa does make some large CMOS sensors that way, but nor for "photographic" cameras. Instead, any sensor larger than about 33x26mm must be fabricated by "stitching", which means that it is "etched" onto the silicon part at a time, moving the stepper field between each part and being very careful with alignment, which lads to a high rate of rejects. Both Canon and Dalsa have described processes involving each piece being only 24x12mm. The Canon example involved a three piece stitch for the 1Ds sensor. As the size goes up and so the number of "joins" needed in this process goes up, the failure rate increases rapidly, which is a major reason why camera costs rise rapidly once the size goes beyond about the mainstream "APS-C" sizes.
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Hi,
In a sense I would say that it may make more sense to build a truly optimal full frame camera than a true 645. It would probably be possible to construct a series of prime lenses that are diffraction limited at say f/4 and use a full frame version of the NEX-7 sensor. That combo would have 54 MP and probably have 14 EV of dynamic range. Such a camera would be quite affordable.
Best regards
Erik
The main issue seems to be that there is a far bigger overhead in designing and putting an active pixel CMOS sensor into production compared to a CCD, and the far lower sales volume of formats larger than 36x24mm mean that this investment would not be cost effective. Or at least so far, and in the judgement of potential customers like Phase One, Hasselblad, Pentax and Leica. I mention them, not the various possible sensor makers, because it is the willingness of these potential customers to guarantee some minimum order at some acceptable price that dictates whether a company like Teledyne-Dalsa goes ahead with such a low volume project.
I think of this like new models of commercial aircraft, where the decision to go ahead is based on whether enough deposits are put down by airlines. I am skeptical of the idea that sensor makers just design and produce specialty products like this "on spec" and then go looking for customers. For example, it seems that the direction of Sony's development of sensors for DSLRs has often been heavily influenced by the wishes of its dominant customer, Nikon, to the point that Nikon often gets to use a new Sony DSLR sensor before Sony's far smaller DSLR division does.
P. S. you cannot simply stick two sensors side-by-side to get something usable in a high quality MF camera. The resulting seam is tolerable for some uses like X-rays, and Teledyne-Dalsa does make some large CMOS sensors that way, but nor for "photographic" cameras. Instead, any sensor larger than about 33x26mm must be fabricated by "stitching", which means that it is "etched" onto the silicon part at a time, moving the stepper field between each part and being very careful with alignment, which lads to a high rate of rejects. Both Canon and Dalsa have described processes involving each piece being only 24x12mm. The Canon example involved a three piece stitch for the 1Ds sensor. As the size goes up and so the number of "joins" needed in this process goes up, the failure rate increases rapidly, which is a major reason why camera costs rise rapidly once the size goes beyond about the mainstream "APS-C" sizes.
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Sticking two sensors together would require exactly one more join than making those two sensors in the first place. If two full-frame sensors require 4 joins to make (for 3 pieces each) a 24x72mm sensor would require only 5 joins. Not a huge increase...
True, sales volume is a factor, but there would be a thousand times (or more) customers who would buy a $5k panoramic body for each one who would spend $40k on an IQ180, and they'd also steal many customers from DSLRs.
The main issue seems to be that there is a far bigger overhead in designing and putting an active pixel CMOS sensor into production compared to a CCD, and the far lower sales volume of formats larger than 36x24mm mean that this investment would not be cost effective. Or at least so far, and in the judgement of potential customers like Phase One, Hasselblad, Pentax and Leica. I mention them, not the various possible sensor makers, because it is the willingness of these potential customers to guarantee some minimum order at some acceptable price that dictates whether a company like Teledyne-Dalsa goes ahead with such a low volume project.
I think of this like new models of commercial aircraft, where the decision to go ahead is based on whether enough deposits are put down by airlines. I am skeptical of the idea that sensor makers just design and produce specialty products like this "on spec" and then go looking for customers. For example, it seems that the direction of Sony's development of sensors for DSLRs has often been heavily influenced by the wishes of its dominant customer, Nikon, to the point that Nikon often gets to use a new Sony DSLR sensor before Sony's far smaller DSLR division does.
P. S. you cannot simply stick two sensors side-by-side to get something usable in a high quality MF camera. The resulting seam is tolerable for some uses like X-rays, and Teledyne-Dalsa does make some large CMOS sensors that way, but nor for "photographic" cameras. Instead, any sensor larger than about 33x26mm must be fabricated by "stitching", which means that it is "etched" onto the silicon part at a time, moving the stepper field between each part and being very careful with alignment, which lads to a high rate of rejects. Both Canon and Dalsa have described processes involving each piece being only 24x12mm. The Canon example involved a three piece stitch for the 1Ds sensor. As the size goes up and so the number of "joins" needed in this process goes up, the failure rate increases rapidly, which is a major reason why camera costs rise rapidly once the size goes beyond about the mainstream "APS-C" sizes.
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Sticking two sensors together would require exactly one more join than making those two sensors in the first place. If two full-frame sensors require 4 joins to make (for 3 pieces each) a 24x72mm sensor would require only 5 joins. Not a huge increase...
... there would be a thousand times (or more) customers who would buy a $5k panoramic body for each one who would spend $40k on an IQ180, and they'd also steal many customers from DSLRs.
I would instead expect that the unusual 3:1 aspect ratio you propose would be a far lower volume niche product than the dominant 4:3 to 3:2 sensor shapes. One hint is the complete absence of such 72x24mm in CCDs, where the initial cost of product development would be lower than with a new CMOS sensor design. Another factor is that for panoramas, scanning backs using linear sensors are often an acceptable and far more cost effective solution.
And the idea that this could be done for a camera price anywhere close to $5000, far less than even the relatively high volume Pentax 645D with its smaller 44x33mm sensor, is wildly optimistic.
Ah, but the forums are a constant source of ideas for products that would obviously be great successes, if only all the companies who could offer such products were not run by either complete idiots who know less than us forum pundits do about what is and is not commercially viable. Like the fact that Sony has not chosen to pursue what you call an obvious target.
Seriously, you should least try to understand the likely technical and economic reasons why things are not the way you would like them to be, instead of glibly claiming that you know an obvious but neglected solution.
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I would instead expect that the unusual 3:1 aspect ratio you propose would be a far lower volume niche product than the dominant 4:3 to 3:2 sensor shapes. One hint is the complete absence of such 72x24mm in CCDs, where the initial cost of product development would be lower than with a new CMOS sensor design. Another factor is that for panoramas, scanning backs using linear sensors are often an acceptable and far more cost effective solution.
And the idea that this could be done for a camera price anywhere close to $5000, far less than even the relatively high volume Pentax 645D with its smaller 44x33mm sensor, is wildly optimistic.
Ah, but the forums are a constant source of ideas for products that would obviously be great successes, if only all the companies who could offer such products were not run by either complete idiots who know less than us forum pundits do about what is and is not commercially viable. Like the fact that Sony has not chosen to pursue what you call an obvious target.
Seriously, you should least try to understand the likely technical and economic reasons why things are not the way you would like them to be, instead of glibly claiming that you know an obvious but neglected solution.
612, 617, 624 and X-Pan formats were all widely used in film, so it's hardly niche. Not as widely used as less-elongated formats, perhaps, but still very common. Scanning backs aren't a solution if you need exposure times greater than a few milliseconds - lighting in a scene can change wildly over the course of the hours it takes to make a panoramic exposure at 1 second shutter speed.
CMOS fabrication is far easier and cheaper than CCD fabrication. Almost any factory capable of making silicon chips, processors, etc. can make a CMOS sensor. CCDs are built differently, and require different production plants. Also, the reason for the price of MF backs isn't manufacturing costs - it's simply because they can charge that much, since theirs is a low-volume product purchased largely by advertising houses and large companies, not by individuals. A CMOS MF sensor, targeted at individual photographers, would be a far higher volume product with a much greater audience than the specialised CCDs. Live view, MF video and high ISO capability alone would ensure that.
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612, 617, 624 and X-Pan formats were all widely used in film, so it's hardly niche. Not as widely used as less-elongated formats, perhaps, but still very common.
Even with the vastly lower costs of the film versions (where rolls of standard 135 or 120 film are used), panoramic cameras were and are a tiny fraction of the volume of cameras, so your usage of "very common" is strange. With digital, there is no using the same common films but the need for different, far lower volume sensors, so the costs are far more of a barrier.
Scanning backs aren't a solution if you need exposure times greater than a few milliseconds - lighting in a scene can change wildly over the course of the hours it takes to make a panoramic exposure at 1 second shutter speed.
Read up on scanning digital panoramic cameras: hour long exposures are not at all needed in the format sizes you are talking of. They can even handle some action, since no one part of the scene need be exposed for longer than with a normal "array" sensor. Consider for example the 160MP Seitz 6x17, and imagine the cost of a 6x17cm sensor!
http://www.roundshot.ch/xml_1/internet/de/application/d438/d925/f934.cfm
CMOS fabrication is far easier and cheaper than CCD fabrication. Almost any factory capable of making silicon chips, processors, etc. can make a CMOS sensor.
If that were true, one would have to wonder why Dalsa, Kodak and such have stayed with the supposedly more difficult, more expensive CCD technology, despite its added disadvantages of worse noise and lack of Live View capability. The facts stongly suggest that there are significant barriers of technology and/or cost. As I said earlier, those barriers are not so much the fabrication, but the original design of a good, large activepicel CMOS sensor, with its unique "mixed mode" requirements of analog and digital elements on a single chip, that is difficult. By the way it was a false hope that CMOS sensors would be cheeaper to fabricate than CCDs. Apparently the special requirements of the mixed mode nature and having adequate well depth nullified that hoped-for cost advantage.
I have to ask: if it is so obvious and easy and with such good sales potential as you seem to think, why do you think that neither Sony any other company is providing a CMOS sensor in a format larger than 36x24mm?
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One may suggest the size of the market for these products is based around the goods offered.
I shoot 50 weddings a year, give me a 22mp 9 micron CMOS with clean ISO 128000 at 1 fps and I'd take two.
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This is an obvious target area for Sony.
They can't compete with Canon/Nikon on DSLRs, because of lens selection - may as well just sell sensors to both of them.
Where they can compete is in mirrorless technology - stick two D800e sensors side by side for a 24x72mm sensor with live view, work with Zeiss to bring out a range of suitable lenses (starting with a 24mm or 28mm tilt-shift, for the equivalent horizontal angle of view of 12 or 14mm on full-frame - MF users often want perspective and focal plane control), sell the camera body for $5k (because it doesn't need all the fancy mirrors and viewfinder assemblies) and they'd practically wipe out Phase One, Mamiya and Hasselblad overnight.
If anyone were to go down this hypothetical route, I suspect it would be far more likely that they would stick two side by side for a 36x48 sensor.
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Glad we have BJL here!
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This question has been in the air for years. Cmos is a 15 years old tech that has started to show superior imaging potential 8 years ago and delivered big time on this promise 3 years ago.
The extended lead of the D800 is only making more obvious a fact that was true years ago already.
The guys running Hassy and Phase must have known that 5 or 6 ago. Now, is their business model and mode of execution compatible with the needs of leading technological development? In other words, are they providing enough business to the sensor manufacturers? My view remains that the only company that might be close to doing that now is Pentax, and their prices are twice lower.
We will see if there is a 645d mk II and whether it uses a CMOS sensor. If it does not, chances are that the whole MF thing will further spiral down into a niche market targetting the luxury segment with cameras delivering less real world performance than top DSLRs costing 10 times less.
Compare Silicon graphics to nvidia and you'll see why.
Cheers,
Bernard
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My view remains that the only company that might be close to doing that now is Pentax, and their prices are twice lower. ... We will see if there is a 645d mk II and whether it uses a CMOS sensor.
Agree on many points, in particular that the most likely place for CMOS sensors to arrive in formats larger than 36x24 is the relatively high volume sector tha Pentax is working on.
If it does not, chances are that the whole MF thing will further spiral down into a niche market targetting the luxury segment with cameras delivering less real world performance than top DSLRs costing 10 times less.
Compare Silicon graphics to nvidia and you'll see why.
That last comparison hits close to home: I was involved in justifying the purchase of some $10,000+ custom SG and Sun workstations that were obsoleted by vastly less expensive, faster, and more user-friendly Macintosh and Windows/Linux systems just a few years later.
Let me add that if Pentax _does_ offer something like a "645D II" with state-of-the-art 44x33 CMOS sensor, to which it can add the most sophisticated AF and metering in the larger than 36x24 world, it would add greatly to the challenges already coming from Nikon FX to the Mamiya and Hasselblad 645 format based systems.
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Let me add that if Pentax _doe_ offer something like a "645D II" with state-of-the-art 44x33 CMOS sensor, to which it can add the most sophisticated AF and metering in the larger than 36x24 world, it would add greatly to the challenges already coming from Nikon FX to the Mamiya and Hasselblad 645 format based systems.
Yes, but it could fund the development of the sensors Phase and Hassy need.
In essence I am afraid that there will probably be only one MF sensor manufacturer left in 3 years from now and that would be the supplier selected by Pentax.
Cheers,
Bernard
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Yes, but it could fund the development of the sensors Phase and Hassy need.
Yes, CMOS sensors in the format or formats used by Pentax would likely be available to other camera/back makers too. My concern is that Pentax seems to be adopting 44x33 format exclusively for its DMF system (putting aside the red herring of a couple of lenses intended in part for 645 film camera users, and so still covering the 645 format frame), so that the larger DMF formats like 48x36 and full 645 format would still be limited to CCDs. I suppose that if this happens, Mamiya and Hasselblad/Fuji might just have to refocus on 44x33 format, adding a few lenses and viewfinders for it.
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Yes, CMOS sensors in the format or formats used by Pentax would likely be available to other camera/back makers too. My concern is that Pentax seems to be adopting 44x33 format exclusively for its DMF system (putting aside the red herring of a couple of lenses intended in part for 645 film camera users, and so still covering the 645 format frame), so that the larger DMF formats like 48x36 and full 645 format would still be limited to CCDs. I suppose that if this happens, Mamiya and Hasselblad/Fuji might just have to refocus on 44x33 format, adding a few lenses and viewfinders for it.
I am not sure that the technology would differ between a 44x33 sensor vs a 56x42 sensor.
The key technological jump is the move to cmos.
So if Dalsa/Kodak manage, thanks to Pentax, to secure the business visibility they need to justify the investement needed to develop a cmos techno matching their expectetions, it could also be applied to larget sensors. Pentax would probably be smart enough to leave the door open for that.
Cheers,
Bernard
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Bernard,
I was thinking only of the economies of scale of putting something like a 54x42mm CMOS sensor into production: this is not particularly made easier by having a 44x33 CMOS sensor in production, any more than the current existence of 36x24 sensors makes 44x33 ones readily available. I also think that such a sensor is far more likely to come from an existing maker of good photographically suitable CMOS sensors that only has to scale up to 44x33 (like Sony, Panasonic, Samsung, Fujifilm, or whoever designs and makes the sensors for Nikon One cameras), not from a company that is not currently making such CMOS sensors of any size (like Dalsa or True Sense Imaging, which is the the former Kodak sensor division).
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The actual devellopment of a mask and a process for a large CMOS alone ,will cost between 10-20 mill.$US. This is without R&D costs for further peripherals and changes in Camera/Back architecture. I think it is the naked and brutal truth that none of the actual makers alone can afford this amount of money to be spent from their actual turnarounds.
The only chance they may have is sitting down to a table and devellop a standard chip for all of them. Something like a Ford 8 cylinder Formula one motor to give base for all the teams which worked for nearly 16 years. If they are smart they will do this. But I fear logics do not work in this connection..........
regards
Stefan
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The actual devellopment of a mask and a process for a large CMOS alone ,will cost between 10-20 mill.$US. This is without R&D costs for further peripherals and changes in Camera/Back architecture. I think it is the naked and brutal truth that none of the actual makers alone can afford this amount of money to be spent from their actual turnarounds.
The only chance they may have is sitting down to a table and devellop a standard chip for all of them. Something like a Ford 8 cylinder Formula one motor to give base for all the teams which worked for nearly 16 years. If they are smart they will do this. But I fear logics do not work in this connection..........
regards
Stefan
really? where did you get a figure like that?
did RED need to spend that much for their chips that they developed? RED also was promising the super large chips a while back, they wouldn't have done that unless it was achievable as a lower run "professional" cine camera.
paul
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really? where did you get a figure like that?
did RED need to spend that much for their chips that they developed? RED also was promising the super large chips a while back, they wouldn't have done that unless it was achievable as a lower run "professional" cine camera.
paul
RED haven't brought to market any large chips though.
And to the best of my knowledge, there has been no news on their 645 and 617 chips for quite some time now.
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did RED need to spend that much for their chips that they developed? RED also was promising the super large chips a while back, they wouldn't have done that unless it was achievable as a lower run "professional" cine camera.
RED has not delivered a sensor larger than 27.7x14.6mm, with the coming RED Dragon update being 30x15.8mm, so all small enough to be made on standard steppers without the expensive complications of "stitching" (the size limit is about 33x26mm). And these sensors sell in products costing vastly more than DSLRs with similar sized sensors, so can sustain far lower unit sales.
Beyond that, Jim Jannard and the RED marketing people blow a lot of smoke about fantasy products, so I would not take those pure vaporware claims as any indication of technical or commercial viability.
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RED haven't brought to market any large chips though.
And to the best of my knowledge, there has been no news on their 645 and 617 chips for quite some time now.
Likewise I believe the 645 and 617 sensors that RED placed on it's roadmap are not near-term products at this point.
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And to the best of my knowledge, there has been no news on their 645 and 617 chips for quite some time now.
Likewise I believe the 645 and 617 sensors that RED placed on it's roadmap are not near-term products at this point.
Indeed. The history as I know it is that
- in late 2008, RED announced a future generation of "Mysterium Monstro" sensors in 36x24mm, 54x42m and 186x56mm formats, to go in RED "brains" named EPIC FF35, EPIC 645, and EPIC 617.
A flier is still visible at http://www.engadget.com/photos/reds-digital-still-and-motion-camera-system-now-official/
In particular here are two key pages:
http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2008/11/red-dsmcpicture-12-13nov08.jpg
http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2008/11/red-dsmcpicture-14-13nov08.jpg
- The FF35 was to come in summer 2010; the others by 2011.
- Somewhere along this timeline, all references to these future FF35, 645 and 617 products disappeared from www.red.com, and searches there on FF35 and such give no results.
- In April 2011, RED announced that the first Monstro sensor would arrive in 2012, giving no specs except the name "Dragon".
- In April 2012, the Dragon sensor was announced, in format 30x15.8mm.
I am ready to conclude that, as the RED website and that flyer for the FF35, 645 and 617 cameras says:
"Specifications and delivery dates are subject to drastic changes"
and in this case, this means that those three fantasy formats have been silently canned in favor of a sensor in a smaller, more practical format, probably compatible with most existing cine-camera lenses, even though it is a bit larger than ANSI Super35.
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Paul
the figures are from someone in the industry who knows exactly. I have been talking with him for several hours about this because you can imagine that
Hartblei-HCam is interested what is going on - it directly influences our business.
There are several ways to pay such a chip- you can either pay for the devellopment or you can guarantee a number of chips to be bought from the the fab.
The costs will stay the same, you may even be cheaper if you finance this yourself, instead of financing the fabs banking for the setup.
and about CMOS- I think the question has been answered by Leaf today- they released the new CREDO line- looking very similar to the IQ´s to me. prbably the same chips, electronics and most of the features, with a little different housing and a bit lower price. Makes sense on the point of producing as many equal parts as possible.
But shows that it is very unlikely we will see a CMOS from either Phase or Leaf during the next 1-2 years, maybe longer, maybe ever......
Regards
Stefan
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I'm myself a bit worried that MF might not survive the coming ten years, because DSLRs are becoming so good, and MF technology maybe becomes obsolete in comparison and the market is too small to fund up development of up to date technology. That would be sad.
The first ten years digital medium format users where those used to film - any MFDB from 2004 and forward is an incredible improvement in flexibility, speed and (in most cases) image quality compared to film. However, the next generation of photographers maybe haven't used a film camera at all, but instead started off with DSLRs and then MFDBs don't feel that fast and flexible any longer but rather the opposite. What's left is image quality and while MFDBs with their 80 megapixels and lenses that support it is clearly ahead, D800 and future DSLRs put image quality bar quite high perhaps so high that fewer and fewer see a need to get better quality, thus shrinking the MFDB market regardless of their image quality.
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If we're dreaming I want a digital 67!
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If we're dreaming I want a digital 67!
OK, the usual dreaming game is on again, it comes back every few months.
- First predictions and hopes for 56x56mm square sensors, for those Hasselblad V and Rollei bodies that are surely going to return to dominance once photographers get fed up with rotating their cameras. See http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=65897.msg523144#msg523144
- Then talk of 6x7 sensors, for the even better RB67 and RZ67 bodies and lenses.
So let me finish it:
If the sensor makers had a clue, or listened to their customers, they would be giving us circular sensors that cover the entire image circle, so we can crop to any rectangular shape we like later.
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Hi,
My guess that the market for 6x7 sensors is much smaller than for the 645 size.
Best regards
Erik
OK, the usual dreaming game is on again, it comes back every few months.
- First predictions and hopes for 56x56mm square sensors, for those Hasselblad V and Rollei bodies that are surely going to return to dominance once photographers get fed up with rotating their cameras. See http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=65897.msg523144#msg523144
- Then talk of 6x7 sensors, for the even better RB67 and RZ67 bodies and lenses.
So let me finish it:
If the sensor makers had a clue, or listened to their customers, they would be giving us circular sensors that cover the entire image circle, so we can crop to any rectangular shape we like later.
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Paul
the figures are from someone in the industry who knows exactly. I have been talking with him for several hours about this because you can imagine that
Hartblei-HCam is interested what is going on - it directly influences our business.
There are several ways to pay such a chip- you can either pay for the devellopment or you can guarantee a number of chips to be bought from the the fab.
The costs will stay the same, you may even be cheaper if you finance this yourself, instead of financing the fabs banking for the setup.
and about CMOS- I think the question has been answered by Leaf today- they released the new CREDO line- looking very similar to the IQ´s to me. prbably the same chips, electronics and most of the features, with a little different housing and a bit lower price. Makes sense on the point of producing as many equal parts as possible.
But shows that it is very unlikely we will see a CMOS from either Phase or Leaf during the next 1-2 years, maybe longer, maybe ever......
Regards
Stefan
hi stefan, i am very disappointed if this is the case.
my p65 phase back that i love is extremely unpractical in 70% of my shooting, and i have hardly been using it. my dream is to have 400-800 iso at least (800- 1600 ideal), my p65 struggles at 200, i just can't use it in most cases. and i love shooting medium format, but it really is being left behind for advertising photography. three years ago many of my colleagues had medium format, and now I'm one of the few that still use them. If you want to see, then look at the behind the scenes of a lot of the top advertising photographers in the world and far more often than not they shoot dslr. many of the hire places are growing there dslr rentals , not medium format.
if medium format changed to cmos i believe that it would bring new life into the products and make them practical. not all shoots are shot with plenty of flash.
imo, paul
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Every single time I read about how hard (oh, wait, it is not hard it is IMPOSSIBLE :) ) to make a modern large format sensor designed from scratch for high end photography and not some 10 year old technology discretized by (ex)Kodak or Dalsa after the CIA or NSA gave them approval I magically remember this: http://www.dpreview.com/news/2003/12/19/fujifilmback
Radu
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Every single time I read about how hard (oh, wait, it is not hard it is IMPOSSIBLE :) ) to make a modern large format sensor designed from scratch for high end photography and not some 10 year old technology discretized by (ex)Kodak or Dalsa after the CIA or NSA gave them approval I magically remember this: http://www.dpreview.com/news/2003/12/19/fujifilmback
The OP's question and the claims are specifically about CMOS sensors, so I do not see the relevance of that Fujifilm CCD (Did it ever come to market? Maybe in Japan only, briefly.) CCDs have relatively lower costs to prepare each new model for fabrication, which is why Kodak and Dalsa can offer a large number of low volume CCD products.
Also, please avoid arguing against straw men: the skeptical comments have been about the difficulty and low likelihood of MF CMOS, due to the high initial costs of each new sensor design, not impossibility. I would say that it could be possible, if for example Pentax and a few others agree to fund the development of one relatively high volume CMOS sensor, probably 44x33mm at least for the first effort.
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The OP's question and the claims are specifically about CMOS sensors, so I do not see the relevance of that Fujifilm CCD (Did it ever come to market? Maybe in Japan only, briefly.) CCDs have relatively lower costs to prepare each new model for fabrication, which is why Kodak and Dalsa can offer a large number of low volume CCD products.
Also, please avoid arguing against straw men: the skeptical comments have been about the difficulty and low likelihood of MF CMOS, due to the high initial costs of each new sensor design, not impossibility. I would say that it could be possible, if for example Pentax and a few others agree to fund the development of one relatively high volume CMOS sensor, probably 44x33mm at least for the first effort.
a) My link is very relevant: it is still about a (somewhat) different technology than what was existent at that time and most of all a new manufacturer to join the fray, but if you insist to take it literary I guess I was offtopic. On the other hand if you missed a smiley and how I wrote "impossible" I guess the rest was blurry anyway. The morale of the story is that the cost of a new technology and the price end users pay can be wildly different.
b) A lot of people know why the Fuji never made it to the market, ask around and you will find out too. Pentax doesn't have the "problems" Fuji had.
c) No, IMHO TrueSense Imaging and Dalsa can "offer a large number of low volume CCD products" simply because a lot of the R&D and tooling was already paid for by the military which is well and good except that was a decade or so ago.
d) A shot analysis of possible customers for a CMOS sensor:
- Pentax desperately needs such a sensor to differentiate itself from the others in terms of dynamic range and higher ISO performance. Also the first MF manufacturer to offer modern LV and even video will have a plus on the market. Pentax unlike P1 and H seems to run on much lower margins so let's say a 1K USD added in parts cost will not increase the end user price very much compared to 1K added to a H or P1. Furthermore if Pentax can obtain a CMOS sensor with global shutter they will wipe out the advantage of leaf shutter lenses and high X-sync timings H and P1 have. Last but not least Pentax seems committed to a "one sensor size" policy and doesn't mind for now to offer just the smaller 44x33 mm size. And Ricoh is a huge company with lots of money, lots of pride and deep connections in the Japanese semiconductor industry.
- P1 and H have IMHO ZERO INTEREST to commission a CMOS sensor now. P1 and Leaf Mamiya recently updated all the range with CCD sensors and H most likely cannot absorb any increase in costs. All three (two) entities run much longer cycles of products so they will sell the current gear for years to come. The last thing they need would be an alliance with Pentax so they have the same sensor and cameras twice as expensive (sort of H4D 40 vs. 645D of today).
I trust that we will have some certitudes soon enough (Photokina 12 to CP+ 13) but just because some people are used to a certain business model that doesn't mean that things can't and won't change a lot in a very short amount of time.
Radu
P.S. Sorry about the convoluted message here it is middle of the night and I will go to sleep very soon ...
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b) A lot of people know why the Fuji never made it to the market, ask around and you will find out too. Pentax doesn't have the "problems" Fuji had.
In fact, the Fuji back did make it to the market in Japan.
Cheers,
Bernard
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Radu,
I agree with your general argument that there is a far better chance of Ricoh-Pentax acquiring a 44x33mm CMOS sensor for its "645D" system than of this coming from the initiative of Hasselblad or Phase One. One key is that Pentax might be willing and able to pursue a substantially higher volume, lower price, lower margin business model than the others, and for all I know, this might be enough to get MF CMOS past the tipping point into commercial viability. It seems that you, Bernard and I are all interested in seeing that happen. But I must repeat the point that Stefan Steib and I have been making: there is a substantial difference specifically between CMOS and CCD sensors in the cost of the initial development of each model of sensor, in the stages from design through to having the mask ready to deliver to the fabrication lines. That is why the Fujifilm DMF back is not relevant to this important CMOS vs CCD commercial viability distinction.
The key is whether any price high enough to cover the unit production costs (plus a bit of profit) can boost unit sales far enough above where they are now, which I believe is about 10,000/year total for all DMF brands and models. Does anyone know what MF camera unit sales were like in the film era? I have heard as high as 100,000/yr. If so, and if one or more less expensive DMF cameras using a single model of 44x33mm sensor could grab sales of 20% of that over a four year lifetime for the sensor model, then the $20,000,000 development cost that Stefan indicated would only contribute about $250 to the component costs of each camera, so that could be viable. For comparison, the sensor for the original Canon 1Ds was probably the lowest volume one in the DSLR world, and if I recall correctly, that was produced at 2,000 or 3,000 a month, so 24,000 - 36,000 per year selling at $8,000. That might be the sort of sales volume that a MF CMOS sensor needs to aim at. However, for Canon, that was only part of a plan for far greater total volume of CMOS sensor sales in later models, so Canon might have been willing to accept losses on that model for the sake of building its market dominance.