Cotton Top Tamarin at Wellington Zoo, New Zealand.
The above photograph is a 100% crop, saved at low quality, of only a very small part of the original image (as discussed below). This little monkey moved around so fast, and was behind such closely woven wire netting, that I thought it would be nearly impossible to photograph it! However, it stopped for about 3 seconds and I was able to capture a sharp image, despite the thick wire between the camera and the monkey!
The original image (with a size of of 6048 pixels width x 4032 pixels height, as shown below) was captured hand held with the full frame 24.6 megapixel Sony A900 camera, using the Sony 70-300 mm G SSM lens, at a focal length of 70 mm. The above image is a 100% crop, and has an image size of only 598 pixels width x 823 pixels height. Therefore, the width of the cropped image is only about 10% of the width of the original image, and the height is only about 20% of the height of the original image. To obtain a full-sized 6048 pixels x 4032 pixels image with the above field of view, the photographer would need to use a 514mm telephoto lens.
Nevertheless, if this image is printed at 150 pixels per inch, it will give a good quality print of 4 inches width x 5.5 inches height. Because of the clarity of the above image, I have obtained a successful print which is 8 inches wide x 11 inches height. Although this represents a print of only 75 pixels per inch, there are no signs of pixelation and it looks very good when viewed from about 1 metre away from the print. The ability to obtain a good quality print of this size, when the cropped image is such a small part of the original, is one of the advantages of filming with a 24 megapixel camera.
Note that, in this example, the total area of the original image is 24,385,536 pixels (6048 pixels x 4032 pixels), and the total area of the cropped image is just 492,154 pixels (598 pixels x 823 pixels). Therefore, the cropped image represents just 2.02% of the total area of the original image.
Below is a reduced size copy of the original image, before making the cropped photograph shown above.
Cotton Top Tamarin at Wellington Zoo, New Zealand.
Note that the original size of the above image was 6048 pixels x 4032 pixels. If printed at 150 ppi, the print width of an image that is 6048 pixels wide, is 40.32 inches (6048 pixels divided by 150 ppi).
The above image has been saved at a low quality and is displayed at a relatively small size. Therefore, a 40 inch wide print of the above image looks a lot better and shows a great deal more detail than can be seen in the above image.
Click here to see another photograph of a cotton top tamarin.
Click here to go the cotton top tamarin page of the Wellington Zoo's web site.
Click here to see further pictures that demonstrate the amazing amount of detail in images taken by the Sony A900.
Click here for a discussion about how to obtain high quality large prints from your digital camera.
Click here for a discussion about some factors you should consider when deciding whether to upgrade your digital camera.
Click here to go back to "Nature" Page 1.