Hopefully this will lead to a better metric for digital cameras... like the: Low-light ISO eQuivelency Rating (LIQR), in which a higher number means it takes better pictures at parties, the pub, etc. :)<p>In seriousness, this is cool it's about time a digital camera manufacturer realized that I don't want to be a lighting expert when taking snapshots.
As a smarter man than myself once said: "Trying to judge digital cameras by their megapixels, is like trying to judge cars based on the maximum speed shown on the speedometer."<p>Apart from increased noise smaller sensors are a lot less versatile. It's hard to keep the depth-of-field shallow to draw attention to the subject. The smaller the sensor, the deeper the depth of field.
About time. I had to give my wife a lesson on why not to pay attention to the checklist on the front of the box. She bought a supposedly 8MP P&S. Which had 2x the resolution of my aging but still fantastic Olympus.<p>Every shoot taken with it looked like it had been smeared in blue grease. And the box didn't have any of the information I considered important; 2GB card, 8MP res., avi capture are really useless benchmarks for a camera.<p>Things you should be looking for are a fat sensor (1/3" in my case), very low f-stop, high ISO, and resolution. You can do a lot of things with high resolution except fix a bad photo. The first three things means you'll get the pass capture the device can give you.
On the one hand, this is all true. On the other hand, if you're shooting in good lighting conditions, a stupid megapixel count lets you do awesome crops.
This is good news, the resolutions don't need to be higher (or even as high as they already are) for any output device -- monitor or printer -- that any consumer will have. But it seems to me like Canon's ceasefire isn't unilateral. I get the idea that other manufacturers aren't clawing for pixels either.<p>IMHO, what camera manufacturers need to focus on instead (pun intended) is eliminating noise. Improving the dynamic range would be nice too, but probably requires much more development of the sensors.
My Canon D30 has 3.25 MP. I have an L lens, and I've blown up photos to 20x30 with no problem.<p>I really, really hope this signals an end to the pixel arms race.
Did Canon actually state that they are "dropping out of the megapixel race", or did they just release a new camera with a lower-than-expected megapixel count and the author is inferring their intent?<p>(Not that I object, as 10MP is plenty for most uses....)
I'm a rangefinder guy, so I shoot film.<p>I'm still tapping my foot waiting for a small digital, interchangeable lens kit to come out that isn't a giant DSLR. My crummy eyes can't focus anything TTL.
I have seen photos taken with a G10 at an arena concert by a professional photographer (who didn't want to take in her expensive gear). At ISO 1600, they were a grainy mess.