Are we being lied to about the "digital" cameras?

[ConcernedCanuk]

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I don't own one, never have, so this IS a serious question.

I take many, many pictures, all of them on those ten dollar throw-away cameras.

I get them developed, printed, then have them scanned to disc. They are usually in some huge size like 1400x1100 pixels(something like that) and are perfectly clear when I reduce them to 800x600 for desktop pictures.

Most of the pictures I have seen of the abuses, with our Star Lynndie for example, are MUCH smaller, and fuzzy, much like a frame taken off a video.

I find it hard to believe that digital cameras would produce pictures of less quality of my throw-away cameras, which probably have a lens in them that is worth a penny or two.

So - here's my question.

Is it possible that there are MANY more pictures of Lynndie and gang, and that they are in fact videos that would show MUCH more than we have already seen?

I have a hard time getting it into my head that all these pictures are of poorer quality that my "brownie" camera took 30-some years ago.

Anyone? :shrug:

[AlCzervik]

1. depends on how many pixels the cameras

shooting on, i have a 4mp but i can change it to a 1mp if i want and the picture quality is not nearly as good. It could also be stills grapped off a mpeg.

[DoYouEverWonder]

2. Depends on the camera

The good ones take pretty good pictures but the cheap ones can take pretty crappy pictures.

The digital cameras pics tend to get grainy unless you have very good lighting because you're dealing with a pixalated images, ie an image that has been converted into dots.

[ConcernedCanuk]

6. Really ! - guess I'll stick to my throw-away cheapies then

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I would have expected MORE clarity from digital cams for some reason.

Must be some theory there I just can't grasp.

hmmm

[LoZoccolo]

15. Webcams are digital cameras too...

...but due to their general overall cheapness and small picture size, they take worse pictures than you'd get from a throwaway.

[Liberal Christian]

3. There are several factors

It depends on many things:

lens quality
camera resolution
resolution at which the image is saved

You never know with a digital image if it has been saved with lower resolution and smaller sizes so that it will be easier and faster to transmit. People with dialup connections often try to get image files to be as small as possible.

[Deja Q]

4. Somebody's resizing the images for the internet and/or TV

1 megapixel cameras are about 1280x960 in resolution.

The cameras may have been 1/2 MP (640x480), use cheap plastic lenses, and are of very low quality. I've one at work and the quality is crap.

Would you use a TOTL 5MP camera in such hostile territory? Those cameras (a year ago) were expensive. Of course, they're about $300 now, but they're still expensive compared to the .5-1MP versions.

Many pics I've seen were framegrabs from CBS News, et al, so they were framegrabs of an NTSC signal (~720x525).

I'm normally a quality freak.

Not this time.

What's been posted is quite clear...

[gmoney]

5. most of the pictures are cropped, too

from what I hear, a lot of the pictures are "blown up" to remove empty space around the subject, which will make them look granier... plus, I bet there's not a lot of light in those prisons, so that makes images granier. And I'm guessing you don't take your $2000 top of the line camera with you to Iraq and into the prisons. Probably had to be one small enough to slip into a pocket without being noticed... unless the CO issued the camera, then it's a case of George Bush cutting the specs like he did on the body armor

[seabeyond]

7. good point.

i take tons of pictures and mine come out beautifully. now if you are moving or shaking or dont have it on the right setting then it could have an unclear. but for the most part and literally 1000 of pictures i have, by far the majority are crisp and clear. what i like about digital.

[dweller]

8. depends on how many pics you want to store

on your card.
My camera will shoot in 4 different resolutions, the larger they are, the fewer i can store on the memory.
smaller, more pics.

smaller res, grainier and don't blow up well etc.

so maybe they were small to begin with?
dp

[ConcernedCanuk]

9. I'm still trying to grasp the theory

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I mean,

I use the cheapest camera available,

the negatives are turned into a print,

then the print is scanned to CD.

I would have thought my pics would be inferior compared to digital.

So where is the advantage of digital, other than being able to directly upload them to your computer or the net?

I digress from my original question regarding the quality of the "abuse" images,

but why would I invest a few hundred bucks (or more) in a camera that I may lose, damage, whatever, when I get a brand "new" camera every time I develop my pics?

I am failing to see any great advantage in digital cameras, and to regress to my original "theory/question" - these throw-away cams are pretty small, only about 4-1/2" x 2" x 1" thick.

Still curious.

[nonconformist]

10. There are digital cameras not much larger than a credit card

Quite a bit smaller than a disposable.

Anyway, as everyone above has said, it depends on the settings. If a person was planning on taking a lot of pictures and needed as much room as possible on their memory card to hold them, they'd probably set it at the lowest resolution. Re-sizing of the images will also result in a loss of image quality.

You can get cheap digital cameras for under $100 anymore, and the quality is mediocre. You're really just getting the convenience of a digital more than anything with those. The higher-end cameras that cost several hundred dollars have higher mega-pixels which will result in a much nicer quality. As with anything, you generally get what you pay for.

As far as the benefits for a digital - I'd say convenience is a big one. If you want to take a pic and share it online, you can complete the process within minutes. With a standard camera, you have to take the pic, hope it turned out okay, get it developed, come home and scan it (or get them put on disk as you do), then upload it to your computer. With a digital, all it takes is a couple of clicks and you're in business. Also, it's nice to see the shot right after you take it and see how it turned out, and delete it and re-take the photo if necessary. No more wasted money on developing bad pics. Another benefit, especially thinking in terms of the torture pics, is you wouldn't have to get them developed - and seen by others. Like with a Polaroid, there is a nice sense of freedom with a digital.

[gmoney]

11. Film still has advantages

The cheapest 35mm film camera still offers image quality advantages over many, many digital cameras, simply because 35mm film is analog, which is the basically the equivalent of "infinite" megapixels. Cheap optics don't degrade the image as much as you might think, especially compared to low resolution or light sensitivity.

The big advantages of digital are: immediate review of images (most have a little LCD on the back to let you see if you got the shot or not), instant availability of images (no need to wait until the roll is filled and the film goes to the lab and comes back), selective use of images (make prints only of the best images instead of processing and printing everything), and it removes the need to scan images for use on web pages, page layout programs, or to e-mail to friends.

Another HUGE advantage of digital, especially in a situation like the Iraq prison -- privacy. You don't have to send your pictures to anyone else to see the results. So, it's perfect if you're shooting prison torture pictures you wouldn't want to have processed at the Baghdad Walgreens. Or other compromising images. The bad news is that digital images are easily distributed and will inevitably wind up someplace you don't want them.

People assume digital = better quality, but that's false in most cases. Digital does allow for greater flexibility, and lets you make copies of copies of copies without degradation (except if you're compressing and recompressing files). But it's sort of how like even the cheapest AM radio still sounds better than most streaming audio, simply because the streaming audio is so processed and compressed to be digitized.

[ConcernedCanuk]

12. OK - privacy, NOW it makes sense. Privacy and speed.

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Our new found impatience with high-tech stuff.

I remember when it was normal for me to fire up the computer, (IBM PS2 20 meg 8MHz, 640K ram) go make a coffee while it booted up( I almost miss the beeps and buzzes).

NOW

If a page takes more than 2 nanoseconds to load, we get impatient!

My once "high-speed" Pentium1 tweaked with a 233MMX(60x faster) processor and 128meg ram (that's 6 times more memory than the PS2 had in HD space, and 200 times as much memory) is now a "slow" 'puter.

Privacy and convenience - now it makes sense.

Thanks :hi:

[Liberal Christian]

14. The difference is film vs.digital

The technology behind preserving an image on film is very different than preserving an image digitally.

Your cheapie camera actually has a fairly decent lens. It uses the same color print film that most people use even in very high quality film cameras. You can't control how much light enters the camera to make the image, but in outdoor settings, you'll get good quality pictures to start with. Then the picture or the negative is scanned on a decent scanner and saved at a medium resolution, which is good enough to print to a 4x6 or view on a computer monitor. And you're using the whole picture.

The Abu Ghraib images were probably saved at a very low resolution so that they could fit more of them on the digital memory card and transmit them more efficiently over the internet. They may also, as others have mentioned, been cropped to focus on the main image, then enlarged, which will result in a grainier image no matter whether you're using film or digital.

Try taking a 2x2 or 1.5x1.5 block out of the center of your film-to-disk image and making it as large as the whole original photo. You'll see a sharp drop in quality.

[maggrwaggr]

17. once you buy the camera, the pictures are free

you can take as many pictures as you want and it doesn't cost you a dime.

versus going to the drug store, buying film, getting it processed and prints made at approximately 10 - 20 bucks a pop.

Plus instant gratification.

That's the plus of digital.

I'm a photographer from way back and I still love film, but I love digital as well.

Plus my digital camera is TINY, about the size of a cigarette lighter, so I can stick it in my pocket and take it literally anywhere. I even took it on a paintball course and took pictures of playing paintball, something you wouldn't do with a "real" camera.

[kiahzero]

13. No.

I get them developed, printed, then have them scanned to disc. They are usually in some huge size like 1400x1100 pixels(something like that) and are perfectly clear when I reduce them to 800x600 for desktop pictures.

Exactly... you get them developed (normal pictures), and then scan them. Scanning a picture at a high resolution will make them enormous, like you describe.

Digital cameras do not have to have any standard resolution. The variety the soldiers are using are probably just VGA cameras (640x480) or perhaps even 320x240 - inexpensive and able to fit into tiny devices.

As for them being frame captures from video - I doubt it. Video captures generally have more blurred lines if the subject is moving, though such effects can be avoided.

[Xithras]

16. I heard they were taken with a camera phone.

I think it was mentioned on CNN at one point early on, but I don't know that it was ever verified.

I know the photos off my wifes LG camera phone really suck, and are actually worse quality than the torture pics. My kids have a cheap ($30) 600*400 digital camera that they play around with that outputs photos about the same quality as the torture pics. My Olympus, of course, is nearly as clear as my 35mm.

[slaveplanet]

18. Please-spare me

anybody who still thinks this is just a bunch of MP's taking pics from a digicam is just a source of distraction at this point.

This whole invasion is run by remote control. The brass had remote access to soldiers and artillery cams from Qatar. If you believe they didn't have 24 hour streaming video of interrogations , well I don't know what else to tell you....

[ConcernedCanuk]

20. hmmm - I'm not sure what prompted the "spare me" comment

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But I tend to agree with you.

I wouldn't doubt for a minute that some, if not most of these pictures are off of security cameras.

I mean, it WOULD make sense to have security cams in a prison, right? -

It's not like remote cams are expensive or hard to install anymore.

So, are we to believe that none of these prisons have any security cameras?

hmmmmm - :freak:

[ScreamingMeemie]

19. I use a digital camera everyday for my job and the answer is yes,

digital cameras can take some mighty crappy pictures. If they are not on autofocus, if they are a lower pixel count. All kinds of factors.

[hunter]

21. 30-some years ago was 1974...

That was "Instamatic" time, not "Brownie"

A Brownie, with black and white film, took higher resolution pictures than an average Instamatic with cheap color film.

Doesn't matter. There are more pictures and movies.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

22. These are not from a video camera.

The resolution is wrong and there aren't the right kind of blow-up artifacts for it to have been from a TV camera (at least anything less than an HD cam)