I think that has to do with the color rendering the sensor can do. MF are 16 bit color. It adds to the sharpness as well.

TaoTeJared said:
I love the Foveon look to the images and do think it is a hell of a sensor. I'm not sure what it all is, but something is different about it. I'm always drawn to the eyes and how it renders them. I keep passing on getting a DP2 just to try it out and compare side by side.
Original size is here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/isiahonline/5432797344/sizes/o/

Never would change from Nikon but I do like to see technology advance as it will always have some influence to others.

Nice reflection of the photographer and crew in the dogs right eye... It certainly does have that "medium format" picture feel about it.

I love the Foveon look to the images and do think it is a hell of a sensor. I'm not sure what it all is, but something is different about it. I'm always drawn to the eyes and how it renders them. I keep passing on getting a DP2 just to try it out and compare side by side.
Original size is here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/isiahonline/5432797344/sizes/o/

Never would change from Nikon but I do like to see technology advance as it will always have some influence to others.

heartyfisher said:
Could be interesting seeing a 45MP DX camera this year!

WHAT AN IDEA! Um... Whatever the technical arguments, that thought certainly has my attention.

heartyfisher said:
PS:Just read through the preliminary spec of the SD1. Its almost equivalent to the FM. Ie minimal features but a featuring their 45MP sensor. could be great for DX landscape photographers.

I am sure that some will have a hard time until they learn how to use a more basic camera. A simpler camera is actually not a problem for those who can.

Having written that, I'll run for the hills to avoid the "tech-is-all-you-need" brigade - grin.

Just had a quick read.. so they have a new 15X3=45MP sensor in 1.5crop size. with equivalent resolution to 30MP bayer system. Sounds cool.

re similarity with film layers : Remember that the 3 layers are not colour sensitive like the film. The first layer senses all 3 colours. the second layer 2 colours and the third layer 1 colour. so its no wonder they are taking a lot of time "Image Processing". in effect they need to subtract the values of the lower layers from the upper layers to get the correct colours but I bet there are weird colour shifts across the spectrum and layers depending on the actual frequency of light getting through the silicon. Still that sample looks good and they seem to have it very much in control. Could be interesting seeing a 45MP DX camera this year!

PS:Just read through the preliminary spec of the SD1. Its almost equivalent to the FM. Ie minimal features but a featuring their 45MP sensor. could be great for DX landscape photographers. Makes sense now why sigma has been producing super sharp lenses lately(eg 17-50F2.8).

Don't forget that they aren't known for great quality control either.

I'm hoping that they've spent more time improving the user interface than they have on the sensor and other internals. Judging by everything I hear about Sigma's other cameras, this sounds like one of their weakest points. The other being that they use their own proprietary mount that only 1 company makes lenses for.

I'm not impressed with that photo TaoTeJared. Any of Nikon's current DSLR cameras could have done just as good of a job. It's all in the lighting and subject rather than which sensor was used.

Looks impressive, but I was reading a review on the SD15 and I'm not all that impressed.

And considering the rate at which Sigma is moving, it's practically glacial.

They need to be moving faster if they want to be considered seriously.

Looks like the SD1 is getting closer to being released. Below is the first sample image they have released. Really impressive for sure. I do like the Foveon sensor look for sure but it is a shame the camera lacks everything else.

TaoTeJared said:
Didn't sigma announce the SD15 like two years ago? And it just came out a month ago. The 85mm 1.4 was first announced like 3 years ago but then back to the drawing boards. They have a very odd non standard way of announcing things. Stock price maybe?

The SD1 will be watched closely as Canon and Nikon have both submitted patents on this type of sensor - albeit, almost 4 years ago or something like that. (I'm not sure on the dates but it has been a long time ago.)

Now if they somehow made bodies that accepted Nikon, Canon, or other mounts with AF, metering etc. they would change the market for sure. This sensor in a real camera companies body would be a game changer. Sigma, sadly just doesn't have the resources.

That's exactly why I don't take them seriously at all.

Didn't sigma announce the SD15 like two years ago? And it just came out a month ago. The 85mm 1.4 was first announced like 3 years ago but then back to the drawing boards. They have a very odd non standard way of announcing things. Stock price maybe?

The SD1 will be watched closely as Canon and Nikon have both submitted patents on this type of sensor - albeit, almost 4 years ago or something like that. (I'm not sure on the dates but it has been a long time ago.)

Now if they somehow made bodies that accepted Nikon, Canon, or other mounts with AF, metering etc. they would change the market for sure. This sensor in a real camera companies body would be a game changer. Sigma, sadly just doesn't have the resources.

The X3 Foveon sensor isn't a new design really. Sigma has used the "same" Foveon sensor in other cameras. Everytime a new camera comes out the X3 is always touted as a "game changer" but always fails to stir up anything.

Hopes were high that it would be the "new digital film" back in 2002.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0202/02021103foveonx3preview.asp

Interesting read: http://www.dpreview.com/news/1010/10100504Sigmainterview.asp

I for one am looking forward to our new Sigma overlords.

Could thw Sigma SD1 X3 bethe Kodachrome of Image Sensors? Is the 3 level a game changer in the industry? I guess we will have to wait for a working model to see how it behaves.

Sensor sensitivity is one thing, what about quality of light, DR. I don't think this will ever find its way into a DSLR, maybe a phone at the best

Pete

Right, shade. They're claiming basically a 3-fold (300%) improvement over silicon, not 95%.

I'm really skeptical about this but would love to see that kind of improvement. The real problems they'll have are
1) capture cross-section is very small for quantum dots (basically, I'm saying that it's not probable that a light wave will be absorbed by a quantum dot because the dot is so small—this is a similar problem to what they're accusing silicon of having problems with!)
2) if you put lots of quantum dots very close to each other to try to overcome problem 1), you end up changing the electrical properties of the quantum dots and they behave more like a crystal such as...wait for it...silicon. edit: this isn't the whole story, either. I don't know the whole story. I guess my point is that quantum dots are only quantum dots when they're mostly by themselves.

What could improve light gathering is to use a material with a direct band gap so that you don't need to use phonons in the material to conserve momentum in every photon absorption like silicon has to. But using silicon saves you so much grief down the road because of the beautiful interface it forms with its oxide (SiO2) that I don't see it leaving us anytime soon. Near-future improvements will probably come through backside illumination.

It's not a 95% increase in performance, it's capturing 95% of the light that strikes the sensor rather than the current 25% (all of this is according to the article, of course). That should basically be a free 2 stops of light, which is a very solid improvement, but not really that much bigger a leap than we've seen in the past (especially considering that the article is likely overstating the true improvement). There may be other implications in capturing more light rather than just improving the signal-to-noise ratio, though, like less internal reflections off the sensor.

Yeah I'm holding off judgement until there are actual samples proving a 95% increase in performance. Otherwise it's just vaporware and they are just making bold promises in order to get more development money. But we'll see.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=quantum-dots-cell-camera

http://www.dpreview.com/news/1003/10032201quantumfilm.asp

Im inclined to believe that any time you can newly apply quantum technology to something "old" its bound to be a good thing. We'll be able to shoot a reasonably good portrait in the trunk of a car according to those percentages. :]

http://www.crn.com/hardware/224000261;jsessionid=FGYRE4WNPAPVPQE1GHPSKH4ATMY32JVN

An interesting link to a company claiming to increase sensor sensitivity from 25% to 95%. They're starting with high end cell phone cameras, but I wonder if this has broader application?