Square sensor?

Okay, so I was just thinking about this the other day...

Do you think it would be a good idea to feature a square sensor in a camera? Here are my thoughts.

1. Since the light from the lens is circular, it stands to reason you would get more real estate. My only concern is that they might be engineered specifically for standard rectangular sensors. I can tell the hoods are for sure.

2. Switching from vertical to horizontal orientation could be done in camera with digital cropping, and therefore would be no need to reorient the camera. However it seems that cropping would negate any benefit of increased sensor size...

3. Some people like shooting square crops? Hasselblad does (did) it.

IIRC I saw that as a rumour for the 1DsIV on canonrumors.com

The sqaure sensor or negative are so counter intuitive to everything else in this industry, particularly printing. Most pro labs do offer square prints as one of their standards but virtually everything is based on the rectangle not the square. This is the primary reason why I never went to a square negative when I was shooting medium format film. It you wanted to make an 8x10 you had to crop off part of the image and then you had to keep this in mind while shooting.

I don't see any big advantage for the manufacturers doing this. Can you imagine the trouble the wwc would have if they took this square sensor to Walmart or similar for printng. They have a hard enough time with the camera as it is and through in this complication would not serve the Dslr market very well, imo.

I struggle enough to leave enough dead space on either end of a shot when I'm framing what I intend to print as an 8x10. I suspect with a square sensor I'd have a lot of shots that I could not crop to common print sizes without losing important parts of the scene.

Hasselblad focusing screens (from the past at least) commonly have guide lines for vertical & horizontal cropping to 8x10. That yielded a 645 crop on a 6x6 neg. There's no reason it would not work with DSLR's, particularly larger sensors. 5x7 & 8x10 ratios are not the same so, some cropping has to be accounted for even with digital.

One thing a square sensor would eliminate is the need for those gosh awful flash bracket contraptions you see wedding photogs using today. When you don't need to rotate the camera (with flash attached) for a vertical shot, things become much more simple & comfortable.

I will probably get some disagreement about this (and that's ok) but I've spent the last 35 yrs using a square format & believe me I know the advantages. So, please don't misunderstand, I dearly love my 5D & have no trouble rotating it for a vertical shot sans flash, but would like to use portable flash above the lens without all the plumbing.

Circular (to match the lens) may be better. Any rectangle can then be cropped.

My theory is that one day sensors will be cheap as chips (haha) and all lenses would have sensors built in (no dust!), then square /circular would be easier and tilt (shift=crop) too. Ie lots more than necessary info recorded, an the best crop chosen later.

Ainoko wrote in post #9200666
Okay, so I was just thinking about this the other day...

Do you think it would be a good idea to feature a square sensor in a camera? Here are my thoughts.

1. Since the light from the lens is circular, it stands to reason you would get more real estate. My only concern is that they might be engineered specifically for standard rectangular sensors. I can tell the hoods are for sure.

2. Switching from vertical to horizontal orientation could be done in camera with digital cropping, and therefore would be no need to reorient the camera. However it seems that cropping would negate any benefit of increased sensor size...

3. Some people like shooting square crops? Hasselblad does (did) it.

Actually, a square inscribed on a circle will have four equal sides, but all of those sides will be shorter than the longest sides of a rectangle inscribed on the same circle. Rectangles will lose some ground to the area covered by the square, but the square will not be able to cover wide or tall subjects as well, all other variables being equal.

I am with you on this one, however. I wonder how long until sensors are round and pixels per square inch has been maxed/standardised so that a big round sensor could be set up to shoot round, square, FF, 8:10, and so on at the touch of a button?

Martin Dixon wrote in post #9203684
Circular (to match the lens) may be better. Any rectangle can then be cropped.

My theory is that one day sensors will be cheap as chips (haha) and all lenses would have sensors built in (no dust!), then square /circular would be easier and tilt (shift=crop) too. Ie lots more than necessary info recorded, an the best crop chosen later.

Check HERE.

The LX3 has a neat feature. The sensor is larger than any of the images you can take with it. You can basically choose the ratio of the crop you want to use and it will use that portion of the sensor. This allows, for example, a 4:3 and a 16:9 to have more surface area than they would have if they were just cropped from a 3:2. Allowing the user to select a crop from a circular sensor would be the natural extension of this design. It would be really cool to be able to switch to a portrait view with the press of a button.

http://a.img-dpreview.com …cDMCLX3/images/​asp/AR.jpg

Amazing! Thanks DStanic. Things are happening faster than I thought. I understood the sensor (of cropped size or more) was the most expensive part of the camera (excluding the lenses). This must be changing.

I used to shoot a lot of 6x6 in the early days and cropping was always a chore.. What I usually did was compose my shots so I didn't have to crop and printed full frame then trimmed off the access..

On a similar note,, I went to an exhibition last month were the photographer (a friend of mine) shot her images quite loosely on her D200 and did square crops.. She had them printed up as 18x18 inch prints and had them mounted on a 100mm mat in a black wooden frame.. In a word,,they looked stunning!

I don't mind the odd square crop in post but it's something I never want to overdo.

Martin Dixon wrote in post #9203684
Circular (to match the lens) may be better. Any rectangle can then be cropped.

My theory is that one day sensors will be cheap as chips (haha) and all lenses would have sensors built in (no dust!), then square /circular would be easier and tilt (shift=crop) too. Ie lots more than necessary info recorded, an the best crop chosen later.

Nice though the idea sounds, it will never happen as the manufacturers would have to throw away too much of the surface area. To cut a circular sensor out of a square section would result in throwing away approx 27% of the material for every sensor. It would also only ever give a square crop equivalent to 64% of its area.

The maths doesnt really make it worthwhile imho and by the looks of the camera manufacturers who have also decided not to try.

yogestee wrote in post #9207691
I used to shoot a lot of 6x6 in the early days and cropping was always a chore.. What I usually did was compose my shots so I didn't have to crop and printed full frame then trimmed off the access..

On a similar note,, I went to an exhibition last month were the photographer (a friend of mine) shot her images quite loosely on her D200 and did square crops.. She had them printed up as 18x18 inch prints and had them mounted on a 100mm mat in a black wooden frame.. In a word,,they looked stunning!

A whole lot easier to do these days with digital!

Square images can certainly work. Charlie Waite compiled a book a few years ago (pre-digital) in which every image was an un-cropped 6x6 format. They all worked and most of them were excellent. I've had it in mind to get a set of square prints made up for ages — just waiting for the right images.

I like the idea of a circular sensor with a choice of cropping modes, with the active mode highlighted in the viewfinder for composition. Definitely convenient and flexible.

Circular sensor will never be created. You need to think past the camera and think about manufacturing. When designing the chips on a silicon wafer, you need to maximize the output per wafer to increase yield. If you have circular sensors, you will have a lot of dead space. This is bad, and the manufacturers would never build it.