One of the FALSE rumors that were spreading around the web was that the new Fuji X PRo 1 would have an organic sensor (see picture on top). It turned out to be false. But…
…now one of my best(!) sources has informed me me that Sony already has working prototypes of organic sensors! They will not hit the market this year, but they will in 2013. In general, Sony plans to bring major advances and more deeply expressed “sensor paradigm shifts” from the end of 2013 forwards with new Foveon-like sensors and organic materials allowing them to go well beyond the 100 megapixel barrier on a full-frame sensor. Sony has already officially announced that they will display a 100 megapixel sensor this year. The current (medium) format camera with the highest pixel resolution is the “Mamiya DM-Series 80Mp DSLR Camera Kit with 80mm LS Lens”. Price: $34,495.00 at Bhphoto (Click here).
I haven’t been told which camera will use this new generation sensor first. But let me dream for a moment. Imagine a full-frame NEX-9 camera with that sensor. I bet it would kick Fuji new Amazon hotseller (clcik to see ranking) in the butt 😉
Reminder (SR = Sonyrumor):
SR1=probably fake rumor
SR2=rumor from unknown sources
SR3=50% chance it is correct
SR4=rumor from known sources
SR5=almost certainly correct!
114 Responses
sony kiking fuji? no way 🙂 sony sensors are going bad bad very bad.. after the sluggy a77 now its the time with the orrible 36 mp d800 .. no need such megapixels sony will quit soon
Nice try fuji fanboy. Your 3-lens system might be your hope to enter the big boys. But the price make it niche only. Not to mention the resolving power is severely lacking for such expensive camera. While the speed is simply abysmal.
On the other hand, sony “only” has a little bit more than 50% of all sensor in the world and 90% of all cameraphone. Heck, even a couple of fuji use sony sensor.
Where you get such numbers?
Sony has 15% of CMOS sensor busines:
http://image-sensors-world.blogspot.com/2010/02/cmos-image-sensors-technologies-markets.html
I dont know if the numbers are corect but not all sensors must be CMOS type.
This data is from a SAMPLE revenue chart by Yole containing 2009 sales information… Actual sales information is available in reports from various analysts for a price as high as $5000 USD, and definitely not available for free online viewing.
Word on the street 😉 is that Omnivision and Samsung hold the highest shares of the CMOS imaging sensor sales by revenue numbers for last year.
38% of dslr sensor market
http://image-sensors-world.blogspot.com/2011/09/sony-image-sensor-business-presentation.html
ahah sony fan boy! sony how much lenses have? 100??? bhuaua
Sony makes more Lenses then Hasselblad and Mamiya combined. Whats your point? Did mommy not breast feed you this morning?
Hahahaha
nice
IGNORE THE TROLL
It’s one lonely little teenager who talks constantly about Fuji and Canon
Why is SonyAlphaRumors always talking BS and taking things out of context?
The image in your post about 100Mp+ Sony organic sensor is stolen from a 2009 Fuji white paper on its research into a sensor with “panchromatic” organic layer.
And you can see this covered on this blog http://peter.vdhamer.com/2011/11/19/fuji-organic-sensor/ all the way back in November of last year.
Come on…
The actual paper where this sensor image is taken from is here http://www.fujifilm.com/about/research/report/055/pdf/index/ff_rd055_004_en.pdf
Rght on the first page. Also Fuji’s research talked about 40Mp+ APS-C sensors which translates to about ~100Mp full frame. Maybe this is where SonyAlphaRumors got the bit about Sony coming out with a 100Mps full frame sensor.
I’m not saying that Sony has not or is not doing research on organic sensors but I’m saying that this article is a rip-off of work done by Fuji and the site admin has the temerity to then claim Fuji’s work as Sony’s and then bash Fuji at the same time.
Please keep this site classy and accurate/truthful!
In article you mention Peter talking about 80Mpix FF sensor.
All major brands working on new tech such as organic sensors.
Yeah but 40Mpx APS-C sensor scaled to full frame is more like 100Mpx than 80mpx as FF is a bit > 2x the area of APS-C
Thank you for pointing out this obvious issue about this post. The exact figure on the post is right there on the first page of that paper from Fuji researchers!
I hope this site is not going to become a camera/sensor tabloid.
Apologies for the hasty message.
Err…. The admin mentioned that the image is from fuji – right below the image itself….
Indeed, but the locals around here don’t let little details like that get in the way when there’s a chance to complain about something. Permissiveness and optimism are so last week.
😀 lol
The samples from the D800 that have been posted are fantastic! Detail and beauty like never seen from 35mm cameras before! Nikkor’s newer high end lenses can handle the resolution. However the laws of physics says that 36mp is the cap. Unless you produce huge large format lenses and attach them to the 35mm camera. Which make no sense to compress the image like that. Better to put it on larger format size sensors / cameras. All the computer technology in the world cannot change the laws of physics and light and lens optics. Learn about refraction and image resolution through focused glass (lenses) and you will see. Unless it is computer generated, the lens has a maximum upper limit to it’s resolving ability!
I hope 100MP is just a show off sensor.
If it becomes real than hello diffraction at, what f4, LOL and you can only shoot and get 100MP picture if live in zero gravity and use a tripod…
Diffraction will be there anyway, whatever the resolution.
Suppose you photograph a point of light such as a star, with a lens that is perfect except for diffraction (what is called “diffraction-limited”). Instead of a point in the image, you get a small circular patch of light, brighter in the centre.
The more accurately that patch is recorded, the better the chance of correcting the picture by sharpening. It is best if the patch spreads across several pixels.
It is also worth remembering that there are ways of designing lens diaphragms that reduce diffraction.
I would expect these super-high-resolution cameras to have plenty of options for saving smaller files for ordinary shooting. You could keep the highest resolution for your landscape-with-tripod shots or for studio fashion work with flash.
> here are ways of designing lens diaphragms that reduce diffraction.
Care to elaborate? This is not true that I know of. There are ways to deal with the issue: not use lens apertures at all but implement NDs or variable transfer glass. But edges always impart diffraction.
this is real thom or fake? surprise see you here but not at the busiest m43 olympus rumor EM5 😀
A tripod in zero gravity? 🙂
Transparent Counter Electrode – this can’t exist. 🙂 Any registering device consumes matter which it registers.
Oh, I’ll try to weight myself more often.
I think overall the a77 sensor got very good ratings, showing impressive detail and moderate noise for a sensor with such high pixel density. The same sensor in Nex7 seem to have performed even better (see impressive scores in DXOMARK).
Earlier sensors like the recent 16Mp sensor are widely recognised as one of the best sensors in the industry.
So adjectives as “orrible” make no sense.
a77 have a good sensor from iso 0 to 200 then you can trow away it… DxO mark tests are garbage! nikon are in the first place and you belive? ahah no way wait and we see, i think sony will go with nex but will leave dslrs market.. nikon is going nowere with sensors made by sony…. hope in canon 1dx is going to kick! and in fuji
hello gyu!
?
you’re retarded 😉
go to hell with your fucking fuji and canon :p
Yes, let´s dream for a while …
100+ megapixel?? if this happens only ISO 50 will be usable on sony cameras.
can someone delete my comment ^^^^^
lol, oops!
Ahahaha dumb samefagger
The tech will probably be introduced in P&S cameras and then work its way up to larger formats. If we’re lucky it might make it in time for the A99’s successor, but even that will probably be a stretch.
The possibility are awesome. Organic devices are still reall difficult to handle but have huge antvantages. Just think of 100mp. If you have a software inside the camera combining Pixels you could get super images. 4 pixels combined would give a 25mp camera etc…
Greatz
Another possibility, given plenty of pixels, is to add more primary colours, to match the new printers that have orange and green inks as well as CMYK. At present, the red-green-blue set in the sensor is a bottleneck limiting accurate colour, especially in skin tones.
To be honest, a 48MP count would suffice, never mind 100! 12MP non-interpolated 12×9″ prints, yes please!
Use an RGBW CFA (not Kodak’s layout) with 4:1 pixel binning, who needs Foveon?
100 MP on a FF-Sensor.., it would be than the resolution up to 400 lp/mm on the long side…. right? Which lens can be used in such high resolution?
Anyway I`m really happy to live in this times where photography seems to catch the unbelieveble capabilities of our eyes… soon… perhaps…
Free the photography from technological chains! 😀
How expencive is this “organic sensors” technology in comparison to normal chips? Someone any ideas, rumors?
The sensor would have 340 pixels per mm if it was a 3:2 sensor, 36 x 24 mm in size. A good FF lens has a resolution of around 90 lp/mm and a great 35 FF maybe 125 lp/mm. So the sensor with perfect alignment with the resolution test lines would achieve 170 lp/mm. Things are never that well aligned so you would probably need around 360 pixels per mm to represent the typical good lens and 500 pixels per mm for a great lens. Further advantage of the high resolution sensor is much better color resolution as current sensors have to interpolate the colors from the bayer matrix. Another issue is that the final MTF for a lens sensor system is the product of the two MTFs not the lowest of the two. So a high resolution sensor will provide a better image from a given lens than a lower resolution sensor even if both have a better MTF then the lens. Also 100 MP is only twice the pixel density of the A77 and less than the new Sony TX200V, which is already at the FF equivalent of 553 MP. This is not quite as bad as it would seem since the small lenses used with the small sensors are much sharper than the lenses needed to cover FF sensors. Sony could easily go to 200 MP on a full frame sensor and still not be running out of benefits in image quality. Of course few really need that much resolution, but some do. Systems achieving over 3000 MP are being used commercially.
The trolls around out in full force today. Illiterate morons, armed with poor grammar and bursting with teenage angst.
Indeed…:)
+1
With all of the spell check and grammar check software out there, why can’t anyone use that software?
I hope you are meaning not me above? my english is my second foreign language and the spell check is only in german… I hope I was anyway understandable enough ^^
oh, and thanks on Bill above for the good explanation 🙂
1) storage media is an issue with 100MP if 12fps shoot 😀
2) 100MP will not sell at that cheap anyway
3) sony dont like to sell camera, they are no stock!
Actually selling stuff isn’t in Sony’s corporate culture.
It is good that Sony pushes its sensor technology forward.
Plenty of it will be implemented in actual products.
Having said this, most Sony Alpha and NEX users are NOT complaining that Sony sensors are not good enough.
(I would argue that Sony sensors are for the moment best in class)
Most of the “complaints” are – not enough cameras being produced and to few lens choices.
I hope that Sony starts “slimming” down on the number of camera models and focus instead on delivering the ones ordered already and look at the whole eco-system of Alpha & NEX users.
It is tremendous what a great lens can do to a camera.
My experience with my NEX-5n change dramatically when I switched from the kit 18-55 to the amazing Zeiss 24mm f/1.8.
Yes, I would like to see more glass options!
Yes that would be nice…………
We, keep reading about wonderful new sensors and consumer grade cameras being discontinued and replaced after only a years or so on the market.
Personally I would like to believe that Sony has big plans to compete with Nikon and Canon for the serious amateur and working professionals.
Both Canon and Nikon, continually replace, update and add new lenses suitable for both cropped and full-frame cameras, but Sony is very, very slow to do this, and seemingly preferring to live off the great work done by the Minolta engineer’s years ago.
You never know, Sony could announce fifteen new lenses tomorrow and change everything 🙂
Even getting that 500mm released would be a nice change of pace.
100MP, even if acheivable in the sensor, seems like a major headache for every other part of the camera: buffer, processing, storage, lens.
Even a desktop based PC with the latest i7 CPU would struggle with a 100MP image, nevermind a much slower in-camera CPU!
Suspect that this technology is aimed at high densities in small sensors, not high densities in FF sensors. It will be used to create 16-20MP JPEG images for cell phones rather than 100MP RAW FF cameras. If it is used in FF, suspect that many of the extra pixels would be used for other things (such as on-sensor focusing).
Current PCs may be slow when dealing with high resolution images (which can easily be produced now on a scanner), but the number of cores in CPUs is going up, and image processing is a suitable task for multi-processing.
Yes, you will want to store your photos on a Blu-Ray disk instead of a DVD. But that will not be a problem in two years time. Blu-Ray burning drives are already available at a price and will soon be routine.
Or use the cloud. Try services such as Carbonite.
Dedicated image processors are much more efficient than a multipurpose CPU in a PC, but only for processing images. But just like the processor in PCs, they are getting faster, better and more efficient all the time.
I have stiched ten A900 images in 200Mpix panorama and it take minute or so. Actually for image processing RAM is more important than procesor. A77 Bionz procesor handle 24Mpix 12fps. It could be possilbe to make PCI-E card with Bionz engine for image processing.
After using Sony’s new “orgasmic” sensor we will all need a cigarette.
😉
+1 and is an “orgasmic” made by an ugly girl
daripada duit riset buat ngegedein sensor mendingan buat memperbaiki image quality biar bisa bersaing sama tetangga
MP race, Sony? Still? Seriously?
Yes. If you have a problem with it buy a camera with less MP – simple really.
Wow, congrats, that was exactly my problem with that, you solve it, brilliant!
My point is Sony ARE pushing forward with more resolution where other manufacturers are holding back, my guess being that Sony are hoping advancements in sensor tech will allow for those improvements to enable higher resolution without the disadvantages of having smaller photo sites. If they manage to pull it off, it will be a big market advantage for Sony which I guess is what they are hoping for.
Canon and Nikon are more than happy to stick with comparatively low resolution and see where that takes them.
If what you want is in the latter catagory, then I think you are backin the wrong horse. Sitting around hoping that Sony will change tack and follow Canon and Nikon in their low resolution high ISO pursuits will be fruitless.
I dont expect this to be 100+Mpix, but to be a 36Mega-MetaPixel with 3 subpixel each and no bayer filter anymore.
Word up!!
If you look at the pixel pitch of current mFT (GH2/G3/GX1: 16 MP) and APS-C (NEX-7/A77: 24 MP) and translate this to fullframe, these sensors would have about 60 MP already in that format. So 100 MP is not so far away from this resolution.
But it needs a new generation of lenses as currently only some of the best prime lenses like Leica’s ASPH Summilux / Summicron would be able to open that image resolution potential to the sensor.
If noise and dynamic of that sensor generation can be kept on pixel level at least on current niveau that would be perfect!
The sensor in a camera should be better than the best lenses at their best aperture. The sensor should never be the limiting factor in image quality.
This then leaves you free to use various lenses with different characteristics to suit the job in hand.
Didn’t Canon demo’ed their 100MP sensor breakthrough last year already??
All i ask for from Sony is to make a FF camera that has the gamut of film & records the data at 16 bits native per colour. I don’t even mind if it’s just 12MP 🙂
If this is true, I think we will see the end of the Mega Pixel race!!! I bet in 5-8 years the talk of mega pixels will be a thing of the past. We will all be able to reminisce about our 24MP cameras and go down the street to Walmart and buy a 80-100MP Point and Shoot for $350.00 and make 6ft prints from it that put our 24mp cameras to shame!
i wish sony please do better A77… 😛
i wish Sony please do the announced A77 I ordered on november.
All you suckers with your puny 16 MP sensors, haha,
NEX 10, 100MP!
No doubt Sony is very good at sensors, APS-C and FF. From a strategic look at the industry, Sony is most likely to lead in sensor technology.
But, excellent images are not made from just sensors 🙂
Lenses are equally important and here Sony is at bottom in the industry. Looking at SLR gear illustrative blur graphs, lenses with Sony badge performs really poor. If Zeiss – OK, if Minolta – OK.
When will Sony learn to develop HQ, compact lenses?
Today I use m43 and evaluates Fuji and Sony (ditched Pentax last week). The NEX-7 is very appealing to me, but the parade of shit lenses is a show-stopper. Sad!
I assume you mean for E-mount?
Because if you mean A-mount, our lenses are fantastic, and many of them wipe the floor with Canon or Nikon versions. Look at the 24-70ZA vs the L, or the 135/1.8 vs anything else…
+1
Also the Sony 70-400 G for A mount wipes the Canon and Nikon zooms in this range out.
E mount’s problem is that it doesn’t have many lenses to compare. Some of them like the 30 and 50 actually perform quite okay, though, assuming you can find anywhere actually selling them. The 16 could certainly stand to be better, but I get them impression it was designed to a price point.
As for A mount lenses being “bottom of the industry”; hah.
which lens can solve a resolution like that?
I can’t wait to see the 100% crops of a 100MP camera from the Sony users. Wow, just the thought of how good those book shelves, mailboxes, and tree stumps will look. I can’t wait.
No doubt we will be able to zoom in to see the dust mites on the whiskers of the cat pictures that will flood the boards.
This Megapixeldiscussin reminds of a very intelligent person who did say something very interesting:
“512 KB memory for a PC is enough” 😉
Noone knows how a 100 MP sensor would behave in real life, because it is new technology. Maybe Sony goes the wrong way, maybe it is the future. Who knows?
That won’t keep posters from declaring it the greatest and the worst ever.
you mean 640, don’t you? 😉
Except that he never said that.
for those who seem to be bashing 100mpx sensors, understand that R&D is really research centric development, not researching what the market needs (that is marketing’s job). what typically happens in technology companies is they spend money to develop the best academic product, figure out the yield (% of workable parts) and redevelop a “lesser” product but have greater yield while considering market needs.
i’m simplifying the whole process, but my guess is you won’t see a real 100mpx product any time soon.
You can’t just develop in any direction you like regardless of the market. A university can afford to do so, but no company.
umm you nitrogen cool it stick it in a microscope or in a satellite and WOW its AMAZING AND NO NOISE. Don’t be short sighted. they don’t just make consumer stuff.
I believe Hasselblad has a camera that boasts 200mp.
Hasselblad’s 200 Mpix applies only to still subjects. The sensor is 50 Mpix and a sequence of images is taken with the sensor shifted by a fraction of a pixel each time.
But it does show that computers can handle this size.
This will require very good technique from the photographer. Tiny pixels don’t like camera shake. So, in 2013, will we be all shooting on heavy tripods with perfectly focused lenses and shimmed mounts ? Hmmm
Seems silly and I can’t wait to try 😉 It should at least make a nice base for downsampled goodness …
Well, on 100+ Mp there’s no matter if couple of pixels cover each other. In normal picture sizes the ‘micro’shaking cannot be visible not dependig of pixel amount. It’s just a benefit to have a technical chance to get more strict pictures when necessary.
I’m sure that both pixel density and ISO ability are developing year by year. And other sectors as well. Or does someone here seriously think that the world (of photography) is ready now on 2012 and everything has been invented?
The problem can sometimes be in processing and memory capacity, but the Moore’s law is still going strong…if you remember our 1Mp cameras with 64MB cards not so long time ago 😉
Either using tripods or flash or both, if you want studio quality shots. This is how it has always been done.
If you are shooting a basketball match, then you can discard much of the resolution.
umm think foveon. its not 100 megapixels its 33MP RGB
Andrea, could you comment on the new 16~20mp APS-C sensor SONY is working on. I want to know if the goal is to produce a super low light APS-C sensor or simply a replacement of SONY’s 16mp with general improvement but not completely focused on low light. Thanks.
what I heard from an insider, the new A57 will just use the same 16 MP apsc sensor used in Nex-5N. So you should expect great high ISO3200 and usable ISO6400. A tad worse than Nex-5N due to translucent mirror.
Thanks. I was thinking if I should just get a NEX-5N or the upcoming low-light special (cheap men’s D4). Seems like the new sensor is a long way from coming to the market.
Screw Full Frame ! Imagine a BEX 7n with 50 MegaPixels. Looks like a Touris, butt with MFD resolution, what could be better than that.
One of the local Pros tell a great story. He, along with three Amateurs were somewhere they shouldn’t have been. The three Amateurs had Pro Bodies with BigWhiteLenses, he had a Mamiya 6×7 MFRangefinder. The Amateurs were ticketed, he was just told to leave the area 🙂 🙂 🙂 Being a Tourist has it’s advantages 🙂
So I can sell all my lenses and just shoot 14mm and crop from there. This is news!
STUPID SONY SENSOR 36 MP ON D800 IS WAY TOO MUCH CRAP CAMERA! SONY IS A FAP IN SENSORS hopefully sony will go ‘bankrupt soon with stupid nikon!
“Spoon”….are you out there? If so, what do you think of this?
@carl: Does releasing just 1 lens — 500mm really can change the game? no offense, but i just wanna see how 1 lens can change the pace 🙂
faster come out with 1 FF please… sony ~
It would be a change of pace from the ~4 years of not releasing it. The optical design dates back to the Konica Minolta era, so 6+ years ago.
@carl: Oooo….
Pretty pointless to make a 100 megapixel sensor when you can’t make a great 24 megapixel sensor… or make jpeg software to maximize performance… or have enough quality lenses to utilize 24 megapixels.
That part of sony that makes sensors and the part of sony that make cameras aren’t the same. Second the 24MP sensor gets one of the best DXO scores. You know they stick those sensors in more then just consumer camera’s right?
My A900 has a great 24 megapixel sensor, but I’m guessing you’re excluding that.
“But let me dream for a moment. Imagine a full-frame NEX-9 camera with that sensor. I bet it would kick Fuji new Amazon hotseller (clcik to see ranking) in the butt ;)”
Why?
AFAIK, this site, mirrorless and 4/3rumors were a major part of spreading that false rumor regarding Fuji “organic sensor”.
When the NEX-7 is not even available in volume, Sony has other major practical worries.
Let them also make some decent lenses and other accessories for the NEX.
They can always make sensors and companies like Nikon will always find a way to make them much better. LOL!
The only Nikon camera with a Sony sensor that clearly pulls ahead in a few areas (“made better?”) is the D3X. Yet not without compromising in other areas (colour accuracy where it gets spanked by the A900) to do so.
admin, now that the nikon d800 is finally out, why don’t you create a new blog post and let sony users chime in their 10cents about it. besides, it uses the 36mp sony sensor. will sony use it with their update to the a850?
hey admin ,am planning to buy the A57 DSLT camera once its released, want to use it for long term use, but jus curious, how much performance improvmnets will be there in the new organic foveon like 3 layer sensor, will their be loads of image quality and low light performance diffence between the organic and aps-c exmor hd sensors??.. should i wait till 2013 and for those cameras oer jus go for the a57?
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