For those of you who are arguing with me in the other thread about film, I'm brining it here. a 35mm film, quality depends on what ISO you are useing. 800ISO is about 2MP 50ISO is about 15MP. I used to run a photolab, I have a semi-pro film camera, I subscribe to 3 photo magazines. I have a Nikon D80. (semi-pro digital) I have used 100-1600iso film in my camera, and developed the pictures, and blew up the best choice off each roll, to a 8x10 print on high gloss fuji photo paper. The 1600iso film looked HORRIBLE. I really wouldnt even try to sell that picture as a 4x6 on a professional level. There was so much noise. The 800iso film Looked decent, but it had it's fair share of noise. I would sell this, but only if it was a great picture. The 400iso film, Is starting to have problems. If it's not a bright sunny day, I need to kick my exposure times way up, and the images start to blur from movement. A tripod helps this greatly but handicaps you. There is still a little noise, but not much. The 200iso film, was beautiful. The colors, the clarity... it was flawless... However Dont even think of useing this film unless it's bright and sunny, or in a studio enviroment. The 100iso film, was unbeleivable clear. This was the best quality/color/contrast/noise. out of all of them. The only problem was... My film camera's flash wasnt quite bright enough to do anything with this except outside in bright sunlight, with flash, on something within 6 feet. Compareing it to my digital camera, (10.2mp) I would say the 'detail/clarity' was closest to the 400iso film, but it has the noise on that of 100iso. I can adjust my settings for what I need... kind of like you would do with your film... cept the digital dosent use film. I'm not sure what iso films they use for movies. I do know that you can see the noise in the film on quite a bit of HD content tho. For those who are not professionally photography inclined. Film noise is like... white noise (think of your old TVs 'snow' effect) The more noise, the more... 'speckling' the picture has in it. A 10megapixel camera is only passed by film higher than 35mm. (now onto this level of content) The most imporant thing in a camera over 3mp... NOT how many megapixels it has. I normally use a 200$ lens on my camera. (yeah, it's kinda cheap, but at least it's cheaper than my car) The pictures I take with it... are sub-par for my camera. I put a $2000 lens on my camera... and the image had 2x the detail. (seriously) So I could actually use my 200$ lens. (only 200$) save the image to a 5mp image... and it would look almost identical to the 10mp image. The lenses are the most imporant thing above 3mp. Some HD movies are REALLY funny, because if you watch closely you can see that their EYES are out of FOCUS. The only solution to that is... NOT to increase the resolution. But to buy a better lens. Can they buy one? I'm not sure if there is better than what they use. Focus, Focus, Focus. That is what I want to see on my 1080p TV. I want movies in Better focus. Higher rez? I dont care. When I can see every pore on a guys face... (where it is in focus) Why do I need more detail? I want to see (where it is out of focus) with detail. I can sit 2feet from my 40inch TV. And it looks fine. (detail) Quantum Tarantino - Film gets that? 4096x2400 For an example on how much light it would take to film a movie useing 50-100iso film... Let's just say... have you ever had a 3,000,000 lumen spotlight shine in your face? That is what the entire SET would need to be lit by. They use at least 400iso film. I'm sure. Otherwise motion would be blurry. 400iso 35mm film has the quality of about 3mp.

#1. If you had read anything I said previously than you would know that I said optics are important. #2. Are you bringing up ISO just to sound like you know what you're talking about? You do realize that you can change the ISO setting on your D80, right? At 200iso you should have no noticeable noise and you should get these same results at 800 with NR on. I guess I'm going to have to reiterate myself yet again... Comparing 35mm film directly to MP is stupid because of all the variables you have to take into account. However, the one thing that is comparable between the two is how much detail each resolves, not the "noise/detail/clarity" which is dependent on many different factors. Just so this is clear to you, I'm going to repeat myself. The only fair comparison is how much detail they resolve, that is capture if both are using the same set of glass. Now in this regard I've heard people claim anywhere from 6mp, all the way up to 20mp, being equal to 35mm film. However I have never heard someone say something as brash as 3mp being equal to 35mm, and I bet you can't find someone who knows their head from their ass when i comes to photography say the same.

You worked at Wal-greens photolab, not running one yourself, which is what your wording implies. Also I have a D200, which is a better camera than Kwaad's, which means I know what I'm talking and don't have allot of money to make frivolous purchases with. However, I don't subscribe to any photography magazines which must mean I'm stupid, since having a subscription to a magazine makes you an authority on any subject.

I just want to say... Not a single word in my post was directed at you. And if you've ever used 800iso film, you can get more detail from a 'decent' 6mp camera. (easy) My point is, exactly what you say. The amount of 'detail' is what is revelant. But I feel beyond 4megapixel... is only good for printing insane high quality prints... after you crop the image.

All I'm saying is measuring this sort of thing is near impossible and all circumstantial. A million other factors go into getting detail from a photo than just 35mm or mp.

Oh yeah, I am also talking about RAW images. Not 'crappy' JPEG. (good JPEG is almost as good as RAW tho) But like you said. You can use the D80/D200 at 800iso with noise reduction turned on. I am not really talking about ISO/detail on a digital. quality at high ISO, digital has surpassed film... By a long-shot. I am refering to movie film tho. Action+no flash = VERY high ISO film. I do understand that the scenes are VERY well lit. (it dont look like it on the movie, but it is VERY bright) But I would still guess they would 'normally' use 250-800iso film. (250iso film for indoors, and 800iso for sunny) Back to my point. I doubt 800iso film has that much more 'detail' than the 2mp 1080p runs at. I understand there are alot more pixels, and detail and such. But 5% of the picture will be like 4-8x more detail than 1080p. Then something like 20-50% would be around 2x the detail. And the rest... would not be noticeably different. sieanr - do you at least quazi-agree with that? Because if you do. That is what I have been trying to say all along... Also, Do you think a digital movie theater is better or worse than a 'film' theater?

I'm pretty sure you started this thread because you didn't like being proven wrong and just want to hear that you're right. Regardless, I'll just respond with this EDIT: Gahhh, just right click "view image" to see the whole thing.

C'est vraiment très instructif tout ça, vraiment.