You NEED High MEGAPIXELS Cameras! Myth or Fact? Can AI Tech Change the Game?

[Music] so [Music] hi guys welcome to the channel more and more cameras these days have eye-watering megapixel numbers and still maintain a very high frame rate that's something we just couldn't even have dreamt of just a few years ago so we're pretty quickly to dismiss cameras like the r6 r3 or sony a92 as not having a sufficient amount of megapixels for bird photography and i catch myself doing that sometimes as well but is that really the case and how was i able to take great bird images with just 8 megapixels only a few years ago so let's have a look at the impact of megapixels today see if there's a sweet spot and let me share with you why i think that while you don't need high megapixels there's a distinct advantage in the field when using cameras with high meta pixels that allow me to take images that i was previously not able to take with lower megapixel cameras so let's look at a few image examples taken with cameras ranging from 8 megapixels to 45 megapixels make sure afterwards to let me know in the comments could you spot the images taken with the lower megapixel cameras so we got a beautiful dunlin from norway we got a pair of region honeyeaters we got a rat waddle bird we got a western spine bull we got a gengan cockatoo and two eastern yellow robins were you able to spot in this 4k video what the lower megapixel images were and what the high megapixel images were let me know in the comments it's quite interesting isn't it because personally i'm not really able to tell the difference between even 8 and 45 megapixels unless i'm printing the images very large for smaller sizes on the web and for most other applications and even a lot of magazines eight megapixels or less sometimes is still sufficient because the images are simply not printed very large the only time the difference between the megapixel really shows if you want to print very very large however even then the difference between an r6 with 20 megapixels and an r5 with 45 megapixels is actually smaller than one might think because the rs5 doesn't automatically print twice as large because it has double the amount of megapixels no the difference on the long side of your print is actually only around 25 to 30 percent extra that you're gaining when you're doing a print at 300 dpi with a full frame r6 image compared to full frame r5 image personally i don't usually display my images very large or make very large prints so why am i still a firm believer in high megapixel counts the answer is flexibility because i can do things with 45 megapixels in the field that are much harder to do with 20 megapixels in fact i've actually adjusted my shooting style two to four to five megapixels in the field and the added flexibility that they give me in the past when i only had like eight megapixels for example it was quite important to be very close to the bird and shoot as much full frame as possible because the moment you had to crop a lot the files were just getting too small so what happened a lot of times there was an awesome bird in front of me i got nice and close it would raise its wings i clipped the wings i don't get the coolest shot simply because i was so close or i had a branch i was nice and close for one bird but suddenly two other birds came onto my branch happened i couldn't fit all birds into the frame because i tried to force the bird full frame into my image however now with the 45 megapixels on my r5 i can actually purposefully step back maybe a meter maybe two meters be wide enough that if the bird raises its wings or two or three birds come into my frame i can still get the shot and if i only have one bird i can actually crop in a little bit now and still have a sufficiently large file so this is the flexibility i'm talking about because now i'm simply missing less awesome shots we can't predict what happens with birds so when you're too close because you're forced to be closer with your lower megapixel cameras you're risking that you're sometimes missing a really cool scene because the bird takes off you're clipping the wings with with the 45 megapixels and being able to stand back a little bit more i have the great benefit that i usually don't miss any action any take offs or multiple birds at all simply because i can stand further back and if i need to i have the ability to crop so why don't we look at a few side-by-side examples now taken with the r5 and r6 on the same lenses or some different lenses of the same birds on the same perch so we can really see what the difference is between the 20 megapixels of the r6 and the 45 megapixels of the r5 let's go so here's the first image of a cape baron goose and if we zoom into that we can see fantastic details not much noise at all great sharpness and just an overall nice image we go to the next image is the same bird taken from the same position but this time with the r6 so the first thing we notice when we zoom in we can't zoom in as much anymore but when it comes to sharpness and feather details and noise levels i actually think the file is quite similar and we can also look at these two images side by side you get an idea of how much larger the r5 file with 45 megapixels is compared to the file on the right of the r6 so if we zoom in to 100 you can see that the file with the r5 on the left hand side is significantly larger but overall i'd say the feather details and fine details and image quality overall are very similar what would you guys say so at first glance the difference from a pure image quality standpoint is pretty similar isn't it but obviously as we can see the file of the r5 is significantly larger the nexus files i want to show you are two eastern yellow robins the first image is taken with the r5 and f4 500 millimeter lens if we zoom in again we see some beautiful detail and not that much noise considering it was taken at iso 6400 then we have a similar image of the same bird on the same purge this time with r6 and the 500 millimeter lens and in this not so good light conditions i think the r5 had an ever so slight edge when it came to the feather detail but this file taken at iso 8000 actually holds up very well as well with great sharpness and great feather details and not so much noise and i think in this image it's actually quite visible how much larger again the file is off the r5 like the robin there is almost i'd say double the size in the frame so when it comes to getting as many pixels onto the bird as possible the r5 definitely has an advantage but overall again also in these examples i think the r6 has a slight advantage when it comes to noise at higher isos but overall i think the image quality between the 20 megapixel r6 and the 45 megapixel r5 is not super dramatic i'd say the r5 is a little bit more detailed but looking at these side by sides i don't really feel like there is a night and day difference what do you guys think on the left we have the r5 with a 500 millimeter lens and on the right we have the r6 with the 600 millimeter lens so in this example the r5 has a 100 millimeter disadvantage but let's see which bird is bigger in the frame 600 millimeter r6 or 500 millimeter r5 so if we zoom in to 100 we can actually see quite interestingly that even though the r5 has a 100 millimeter disadvantage the file is actually still bigger like the bird when we zoom into 200 is still much bigger in the frame so let's go ahead and crop these images to how i would crop them so the r5 file taken with 100 millimeter less on the left hand side is still over 11 megapixels whereas the r6 file on the right hand side is a little bit under 7 megapixels so even with that large 100 millimeter difference in focal length the r5 file is still significantly larger than the r6 file and this is one of the main advantages for me when i talk about that flexibility with the high megapixel camera i can stand a little bit further away simulated by having less focal length in this test and still get quite a nice large file after cropping and here's a raw file of the tree creeper and then we have my edited file afterwards and if you want to know all about image editing and how you can make your own images stand out make sure to check out my master class down in the description where i show you exactly how you can learn to edit your images step by step to perfection and make them stand out from the crowd so if that's of interest to you make sure to check it out it all gets a little bit more murky and harder to decide what's best when we look at these cool programs that are around now like lightroom super resolution or topaz gigapixel ai both of these programs are very capable and can enlarge your folders from 20 to 45 megapixels or larger without losing much image quality so in theory you could use an r6 and then just upsize all your files to the r5 size or whichever size you need that will actually work and can be a decent workflow however personally i feel like that that works the best when the files are as uncropped as possible where you lose more image quality is if you do a large crop on your r6 file and then try to blow it back up so while the cameras in the 50 megapixel range maintain an advantage in flexibility because you can make them really really big or crop them a lot and still have a decent file size you can definitely work with the smaller size files from the r6 for instance in the 20 megapixel range and enlarge them enough with these ii programs that you are not really at a big disadvantage so in saying all that where do you think the sweet spot in terms of megapixel is personally i think for most photographers around 30 megapixels probably the ideal compromise between file size ability to crop and cost because the files are smaller and faster to deal with you can have smaller sized and cheaper memory cards it's less demanding on your computer you can usually get away with just using a laptop for editing your files you have less noise in your images typically at higher isos and more forgiving when it comes to poor technique and how demanding the cameras on the lenses so there's a lot of arguments to be made that a lower megapixel or sort of intermediate megapixel camera is probably the best deal for most photographers what do you think let me know in the comments the real reason for me to have a high megapixel camera is that ultimate flexibility that i've talked about because i actually miss less shots in the field and end up with a lot more usable images that even after cropping still have a very sufficient file size and if i need to i can always upscale that crop again in one of those ai programs it's quite a fascinating topic isn't it we always get hung up on 20 24 30 35 45 megapixels but for most use cases the image size probably almost doesn't matter because we're usually looking at the images at such a small size that even an eight megapixel file is still sufficient so do you need high megapixels to take great bird images no but is it nice to have and is it nice to have the ultimate flexibility in the field of being able to step back a bit more and still crop and still have a large file totally but in the end we just have to remember that the higher megapixels usually come with a higher cost because we have to have faster computers faster memory cards bigger memory cards and so on so for most people the range of 20 to 30 megapixels is probably quite a nice compromise what do you guys think let me know in the comments however personally i'm still a little bit in love with the high megapixel cameras because even on a big screen like this you can open up the file and you can zoom all the way into the eye and you see all this amazing details so there is something about the high megapixel files that i really enjoy besides the flexibility in the field in saying that a camera like the r6 r3 with 20 or 24 megapixels will be more than sufficient to take amazing bird images and even crop a little bit if you have to i hope you enjoyed this video like always make sure to please give me a thumbs up share the video with your friends and subscribe to my channel also check out my masterclass in the description and i will see you guys in my next video very soon bye

Channel: Jan Wegener

Views: 30,510

Keywords: bird photography, australia, jan wegener, birding, birds, equipment, manual mode, wildlife photography, bird photography equipment, bird photography gear, birds in flight, Canon EOS R5, animal eye autofocus, R5, canon mirrorless, 100-500, Canon RF 100-500 L IS, Sony A1, take sharp images, sharper images, sharpness, ISO, Noise, noise reduction, high iso, shutter speed, Do you need high megapixel, high megapixel, 20 vs 45 megapixel, How many megapixels, Is 20 megapixels enough?

Id: kEzH2-bNu0I

Length: 14min 29sec (869 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 01 2021