Why DSLR? – Camera Sensors

Friends, lot of us have a doubt why should we go for DSLR. In this post, will try to tell you about one of the basic difference I have learned, that makes DSLR special. Image Sensor Size. Respecting Suresh and Venkat’s comments on my last post, I will try my best to stick-on to lay-man terms.

Digital SLR cameras uses sensors to record image, just a replacement for photo films to capture the image. So, we expect what ever the 35mm films used to record, to be recorded on our camera, isn’t it? But thats not the case. The sensor size make the difference. Look at the below image.

Cropping factor of DSLR cameras

Lets say the rounded frame is what a camera sees through its lens. The larger rectangle is what the SLR(film) camera registers, and so the same is captured by the professional DLSR cameras. And because of that reason, the high-end DSLR cameras are also called “Full Frame DSLR”. Can you see the inner rectangle? this is what semi-professional & few basic DSLR camera (like my D5000) can register.

So, what you get is a cropped image of original. Lets say we have a professional 5Mega pixel DSLR camera & a basic 5 Mega Pixel DSLR camera, and we are taking same object. Though you get same resolution image, you can see a outer portion is cropped, because, the remaining portion is digitally enlarged (digital zooming effect). And as a result chances of getting a noisy image is more.

If so, then whats the status with Point & Shoot and Mobile cameras? Look at the below image, the inner most rectangle is what you got to see in mobile camera & second inner rectangle is what you see in point & shoot camera.

DSLR Vs Point Shoot & Mobile camera sensor recordings

Sensor sizes make a huge difference, between cameras. Now we have discussed one of the reasons why we find many noisy images on our mobile/point & shoot cameras. Suresh & Venket, let me know if you still find too technical.