by Joseph T. Sinclair
Today we have phone cameras with lots of megapixels (MP). That alone doesn’t ensure quality. Nonetheless, it goes a long way toward implementing shooting high-quality images. Additionally, it gives you cropping power. The more MPs, the more you can crop, if you have to, and still retain a high-quality photo.
A surprising number of professional photographers (experts) play down MPs. They seem to be thinking that phone cameras aren’t real cameras and don’t need a lot of MPs, that phone camera users aren’t real photographers and don’t need a lot of MPs, and that cropping is something for professionals. And there are some professionals who don’t believe in cropping, a rather bizarre notion.
I say bring on the MPs. Point & shoot cameras are up to between 16 and 20 MPs. Phone cameras have all but completely replaced point & shoot cameras. Let’s have more MPs!
Why? We’ve already touched on some reasons. Phone cameras are real cameras, and some are already very good cameras, even though we’re still in the still early history of phone cameras.
Note that about 10MPs equals a 35mm film camera in resolution, and the 35mm camera was the choice of professionals for 70 years.
You don’t have to be a professional to be a good photographer. Indeed, there are plenty of amateurs who know as much about photography as most professionals, and many such amateurs have found certain phones to be serious cameras. Digital technology has also improved photographic prowess for the rest of us; that is, we can take better pictures with digital cameras, and in particular phone cameras.
Cropping photos is a time-honored technique made simple by digital technology. Now everyone can do it easily. Cropping away pixels enables us to get telephoto-like photos. More MPs means more flexible cropping. Very useful. Point, shoot, and crop later.
The primary technical reason that experts deride the MP race between camera manufacturers is that as you put more MPs on a small electronic photo sensor, the image quality tends to decrease. But this phenomenon is essentially in very low light, not in the light of day.
Therefore, I conclude that consumers want more MPs, and rightly so. Furthermore, I predict that phone cameras will get more and more MPs over the next few years. The Samsung Galaxy has gone from 5 MP in version S1 to 18 MP in version S5 (and S6). Although there have been improvements other than just additional MPs, the S5 is a better camera.
I should say that once you go over 10 MP, you are entering the realm of professional photography. But what’s wrong with that so long as taking photos remains easy and automatic?
We are headed toward a day when phone cameras will have what’s called prosumer capabilities. That means phone camera will have features between a point & shoot and a three-pound professional camera.
