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Author Topic: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?  (Read 25238 times)

Ligament

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A question to those more knowledgeable than I:

"The new MacBook Pro -- which is in addition to the existing line of Pro's, which was also updated today -- is built around a 15.4" Retina display at a 2880x1880 resolution, 220 ppi with 5,184,000 pixels, with a display that is built directly into the unibody construction to make the notebook lighter. "

How will this 220ppi affect the image processing interface? Would it make you more accurate to print, etc?
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Ellis Vener

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #1 on: June 11, 2012, 04:17:24 pm »

Evidently Adobe is already at work updating Photoshop (and hopefully Lightroom) to accommodate the large "Retina" display.
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StuartOnline

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #2 on: June 11, 2012, 04:30:20 pm »

Well I am about to find out how the new 15" MacBook Pro with the Retina display will work.
I ordered one about an hour ago. My current MacBook is a 2009 model and was time for an upgrade.
Was happy to see that the new system comes with USB 3.0.
Should arrive the end of the week or the first part of next week.
I have both Lightroom 4.1 and Aperture 3.2.4.
Mostly work with Lightroom.
Aperture is supposed to be optimized for the Retina Display: http://www.apple.com/aperture/whats-new.html
It is going to be interesting to see how it works.

Stu
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michael

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #3 on: June 11, 2012, 09:06:11 pm »

I've ordered one as well and expect it next week. For someone like me that travels a lot, working on images with the new screen, not to mention 16GB of ram and a Dual Quad Core will be a pleasure.

I'll be writing up my impressions of the new screen once I have some experience with it.

Michael
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StuartOnline

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #4 on: June 11, 2012, 09:39:57 pm »

I've ordered one as well and expect it next week. For someone like me that travels a lot, working on images with the new screen, not to mention 16GB of ram and a Dual Quad Core will be a pleasure.

I'll be writing up my impressions of the new screen once I have some experience with it.

Michael

Michael,

A couple of hours ago I received word from Apple that I should receive the new 15" MacPro around June 21st.

2.6GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7, Turbo Boost up to 3.6GHz
16GB 1600MHz DDR3L SDRAM
512GB Flash Storage

I did add the extra ram but stayed with the 2.6GHz instead of the 2.7.
Also stayed with the 512GB Flash Storage.
Had to cut back on the cost somewhere. 

Now I need to look at some USB 3.0 external hard drives.
I think I read somewhere that you can get a Thunderbolt to Firewire 800 cable.
Also I heard there is a Thunderbolt to
Hope that is true as I have a number of firewire 800 drives.

Will be looking forward to your review.

Best,

Stu

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hjulenissen

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #5 on: June 12, 2012, 03:19:16 am »

A question to those more knowledgeable than I:

"The new MacBook Pro -- which is in addition to the existing line of Pro's, which was also updated today -- is built around a 15.4" Retina display at a 2880x1880 resolution, 220 ppi with 5,184,000 pixels, with a display that is built directly into the unibody construction to make the notebook lighter. "

How will this 220ppi affect the image processing interface? Would it make you more accurate to print, etc?
Obviously, bumping the resolution means that more spatial detail can be rendered for images. Any reasonable sized print have had more spatial resolution than display up until now (I believe that it still will, but the distance should shrink). I use a 27" at 2560x1440 so at a somewhat larger viewing distance, my experience should be similar to the new MBP (larger distance might be a good thing for viewing fatigue and the inevitable near-sighted-ness that will come with age?).

Increasing the pixel density for a given display size/viewing distance will also affect how user interface elements and text should be rendered/scaled, and put more demands on graphics calculation hardware. I'll just assume/hope that this is somehow solved.

I guess one relevant question is "how much of that detail will be visible for a given user, at a given distance, for a given image etc". Conventional wisdom is that most "natural" images (what is shot by a camera) don't need the kind of resolution that sharp/aliased text and UI elements can benefit from.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minute_of_arc#Human_vision

-h
« Last Edit: June 12, 2012, 03:22:25 am by hjulenissen »
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marcmccalmont

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #6 on: June 12, 2012, 05:48:29 am »

And no more 17" w/anti glare screen?
Marc
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Marc McCalmont

Ellis Vener

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #7 on: June 12, 2012, 10:37:49 am »

Some thoughts on the new Mac Book Pros from outside the tight little photographic world: http://massivegreatness.com/to-buy-or-not-to-buy
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Ben Rubinstein

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #8 on: June 12, 2012, 11:01:04 am »

100% pixel peeping will never have been so small! :D
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jpgentry

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #9 on: June 12, 2012, 11:56:36 am »

Well for software that is not updated for the display, I believe the text will be VERY small.  That's why software companies will need to adjust for this, unless Apple has something baked into the operating system?  I expect things to be hard to read compared to normal conditions. 

What I am very interested in finding out is what the color gamut and accuracy of the display will be as compared to my NEC 2690/3090 displays.

-Jonathan
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francois

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #10 on: June 12, 2012, 12:13:02 pm »

AnandTech has articles about the new Retina MacBook… Interesting to see how scaling works: http://www.anandtech.com/Gallery/Album/2078

Edit: Analysis link > http://www.anandtech.com/show/5998/macbook-pro-retina-display-analysis
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Francois

sandymc

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #11 on: June 12, 2012, 12:20:44 pm »

Well for software that is not updated for the display, I believe the text will be VERY small.

No, non-updated software will automatically be magnified, where necessary. "Where necessary" because things that are drawn by OS X (e.g., text) will automatically be drawn "retina aware". The retina display is in effect an "opt-in" system for apps. If the app doesn't opt in, it's assumed to want/need magnification for anything that it, rather than the OS, draws. Long and the short of that is that most text and UI elements will be the right size, and sharp, because they are drawn by the OS, not the app. However, some images and custom UI elements displayed by non-updated software on retina displays will appear slight pixelated.

Sandy
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indusphoto

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #12 on: June 12, 2012, 08:46:35 pm »

100% pixel peeping will never have been so small! :D

+1. Lens designers should be thankful. I guess people will now carry a non-retina device just to pixel-peep.

kaelaria

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #13 on: June 16, 2012, 02:32:46 pm »

Oh very interesting - something that really got glossed over and confusing even to me until now - the new Retina Macbook Pro does NOT have a 2880x1600 resolution. It's mearly a greater pixel density. It still only goes up to 1920x1200, the extra pixels are only used to make it clearer. That actually makes perfect sense now, since using such a tiny screen for such a massive resolution would be almost pointless. Still - how does it help you work to just have the screen sharper but not displaying any more data? Nice perk, but worth the extra grand?
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hjulenissen

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #14 on: June 16, 2012, 03:01:54 pm »

Oh very interesting - something that really got glossed over and confusing even to me until now - the new Retina Macbook Pro does NOT have a 2880x1600 resolution.
The physical panel is 2880x1800 pixels.

-h
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kaelaria

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #15 on: June 16, 2012, 03:02:39 pm »

Uh, yeah that's what I said.  And the usable resolution is still only 1920x1200.
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michael

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #16 on: June 16, 2012, 04:03:36 pm »

Uh, yeah that's what I said.  And the usable resolution is still only 1920x1200.

And what do you mean by that?

Michael
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kaelaria

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #17 on: June 16, 2012, 04:30:35 pm »

I mean only 1920x1200 is displayed.  Multiple pixels are used to do so but that is still the max resolution.  This explains it in full detail http://news.cnet.com/8301-33620_3-57454551-278/forget-retina-look-how-much-the-new-macbook-pro-displays/?tag=mncol;topStories
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sandymc

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #18 on: June 16, 2012, 05:02:51 pm »

I mean only 1920x1200 is displayed.  Multiple pixels are used to do so but that is still the max resolution.  This explains it in full detail http://news.cnet.com/8301-33620_3-57454551-278/forget-retina-look-how-much-the-new-macbook-pro-displays/?tag=mncol;topStories

I think you're misinterpreting a bit. Retina aware apps will display at 2880x1800 "pixel resolution". "Resolution" as found in the Apple control panel controls how many pixels make up screen elements such as fonts, UI items, etc. So in effect, the resolution setting in the control panel is kind of a zoom for the various UI elements. Note however that at normal viewing distances, you won't (shouldn't) be able to see 2880x1800 pixels, the pixels are too small to be distinguished individually - that's the point of a retina display.

Recommended resolution for the is 2880x1800 screen is 1440x900, because that is two pixels per "point", points being what Apple actually measure screen dimensions. That will be the sharpest setting for the various UI elements, because that is the resolution that artwork is created at for the retina screen.

Sandy
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kaelaria

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Re: How will the Macbook Pro Retina display affect image processing?
« Reply #19 on: June 16, 2012, 05:08:00 pm »

I'm not misinterpreting anything.

To put it simply - if you pull up a 2560 wide photo on the retina display, you only see 1920 lines.  Pure and simple.  They just look sharper is all.

If you pull up a 2560 wide photo on a 30" screen, you see 2560 lines.

It's like taking your 1920 monitor and running it at 1024.  More dense, not more resolution.  That's what they have done with the retina macbook (and iPad). 
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