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[OM] Re: A question about color resolution and film vs. digital

Subject: [OM] Re: A question about color resolution and film vs. digital
From: "Carlos J. Santisteban Salinas" <cjss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 20 Jun 2004 19:25:25 +0200
Hi all,

>So ... the question.   What is the relative sensitivity of the eye vs.
>film vs. digital to differences in light intensity?  That is,  what is the
>smallest change in intensity that can be recorded by the eye, or film, or
>digital ... that then produces the sensation of different shade of color.
>Can digital resolve more or less difference in intensity than film?  And
>is film capable of representing more or less difference of light intensity
>than the eye?

I have read somewhere that the human eye is able to resolve tonal
differences of around 1/200. 8 bits per channel give steps of 1/256, thus
enough for viewing: images look smooth (to me) on 24-bit colour (8 bits x 3
colour channels), but I can see banding on 15-bits (5 x 3).

Noise should be an issue, too -- it may render the lowest bits useless,
switching randomly.

And you should take into account the *scale* of the levels, too. The human
eye is able to see scenes with very wide dynamic range. OTOH, a slide
*expands* a narrow tonal range into a wide range of densities, thus it
*may* have the lowest treshold of intensity resolution.

Let's hope I'm not *too much* wrong... ;-)

Enjoy,

...

Carlos J. Santisteban

<cjss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<http://cjss.galeon.com>



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