Does medium format take in more light?

brainmonster

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I know for camera sensors, for example a micro 4/3 sensor is less sensitive to light than a full frame (35mm equivalent) sensor. At the same aperture and shutter speed, a full frame sensor is capable of much better low light performance because it takes in more light.

How about medium format, is it more light sensitive due to having a bigger "sensor" or "contact area"? For example, a 75mm 4.5 medium format lens, does it take in the same light at 4.5 as a 75mm 4.5 35mm film camera lens? Or more light?

Is there some sort of "equivalency" in the numbering or is there any difference in metering here to be aware of...
 

Dali

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If I were you, I would go back to basics prior to waste money in taking pictures. It would save you time and money in the long run.
 

Dan Daniel

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F-stop is mathematically defined to be interchangeable across different focal lengths. f/4.0 on 28mm is the same as f/4/0 on 80mm as f/4.0 on 150mm, etc.

The issue with digital is the size of the individual pixels, not the 'amount of light.' The better low light performance is because a larger pixel has more light hitting it and requires less amplification to generate an actual image.

In film, grain size is the closest equivalent. So in some ways the exact same thing happens. Medium format has more grains covering an area of the image that 35mm film will have. So it will have less 'noise' if you define noise as random rendering based on grain rather than the optical image projected onto the film plane.

I'm going to shoot some photos now.
 

miha

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Refrain!
 

film_man

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Don't know about light but medium format takes a lot more money in that coin slot. And don't even think about large format. Worse than gambling...
 

Ariston

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brainmonster said:
Thanks! It was an innocent question...it had to be asked, even if the answer is self-evident to some ;p
Click to expand...
There is nothing at all wrong with asking. Believe me, I still have to ask people to help me work my lenses.
 

baachitraka

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You may start learning from "Exposure Value" then you can understand about the combination of aperture and shutter...

Is more exposure, leads to less grain? May be...but there are other factors
 

AgX

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Yes, it takes more light.
Think of the light sufficient for 35mm now being spread over a much larger area. (On the presumption that both films have the same sensitivity, film speed that is.)

How are things handled?
For the same angle of view the larger format needs a longer lens. To gain the same exposure to light the apertutre of that lens is greater in diameter, at same f-stop(!), than with the lens used for the smaller format.
Larger diameter of aperture = more light throughput
 

Sirius Glass

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film_man said:
Don't know about light but medium format takes a lot more money in that coin slot. And don't even think about large format. Worse than gambling...
Click to expand...

Oh, but large format does not have all the safety interlocks that 35mm and medium format have, so large format provides infinitely many ways to screw up a photograph.
 

Ariston

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Sirius Glass said:
Oh, but large format does not have all the safety interlocks that 35mm and medium format have, so large format provides infinitely many ways to screw up a photograph.
Click to expand...

You just have to be sure to screw up in ways that cancel each other out. For instance, if you are going to forget to close the lens, it's important to also forget to take out the dark slide.
 

Sirius Glass

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Sirius Glass said:
Oh, but large format does not have all the safety interlocks that 35mm and medium format have, so large format provides infinitely many ways to screw up a photograph.
Click to expand...

Ariston said:
You just have to be sure to screw up in ways that cancel each other out. For instance, if you are going to forget to close the lens, it's important to also forget to take out the dark slide.
Click to expand...

How about:
  1. Put in the film back.
  2. Pull the dark slide.
  3. Open the lens.
  4. Crank the focal plane shutter to the next larger slit.
 

Ko.Fe.

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I must have been doing it wrong all the time. And not only me, but light meter manufactures. And S16 is obviously wrong.
Wait, but why my Seconic meter works with any film format?
And from where this bogus about m43 vs FF come from?
You are getting more dof with same aperture, ISO and shutter speed with m43.
This is it.
 

Sirius Glass

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Hey, take it easy on the newbie. None of us was born with this knowledge, someone had to take the time to teach us.
 

Sirius Glass

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Many people say they know when in fact they do not.
 

RauschenOderKorn

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Dan Daniel said:
Medium format has more grains covering an area of the image that 35mm film will have. So it will have less 'noise' if you define noise as random rendering based on grain rather than the optical image projected onto the film plane.
Click to expand...

I cannot quite follow. If you have the same film in MF and 35mm, the grain size is the same. You have more grains in MF due to the larger image area, which will result in a different image quality due to less grain showing in the enlargement. But sensitivity to light will be the same.

And "noise" in film as "random rendering"? Never heard of that.
 

Mainecoonmaniac

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No. The sunny 16 rule applies to all formats. The only time when you need more light is reciprocity failure or bellows extension. Wouldn't be great if bigger cars used the same gas as the little ones?
 

Dan Daniel

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I'm using many terms very imprecisely, and some of the jumps I am making in language barely work in English, if that.

If you take a photo of the side of a building, same angle of view, 35mm film and 120 film. Look at the same, say, window in both negatives. The 120 film will have much finer pattern than the 35mm film.

But in both cases, the grain of the film will have some randomness to it. Call the randomness of the grain pattern 'noise.'

If you could look at the actual optical image projected onto the film plane (imagine a textureless, 'grainless' if you will, ground glass) it would have no 'noise' beyond the optical flaws of the lens itself. Whether we use a digital sensor or film grain, we are imposing a rigid 'screening' (in the graphic arts sense) on the image. In digital, there will be a rigid pattern based on the pixels, and a random pattern based on noise from the electronics. In the film image, the grain will have a semi-random structure. It will also have a different relative size depending on the amount of film used to render the image (120 film using more film area than 35mm).

Is this making any sense? Is it even worth worrying about?
 

Mainecoonmaniac

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Think of a beach with people wanting to get a tan. People tanning themselves on a small beach will get the same amount of tanning on a large beach. Also, more people on the beach won't decrease the intensity of the sun for everybody else.
 

pentaxuser

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This seemed a very good answer to what I think the OP wanted to know It looked like a good explanation to me. Then I made the mistake of reading the posts that followed and I am now as much in the dark world of confusion as I think he was when he asked the question.

Frankly we have done the OP no favours in terms of giving an answer that is commensurate with his current knowledge and desire to improve on it. I find this a pity.

pentaxuser
 

MattKing

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Speaking generally, you need to be careful when you are trying to find equivalencies between film and digital. There are lots of them, but not everything is equivalent.

As has been posted above, a smaller digital sensor isn't less sensitive than a larger one, it just doesn't give quite as nice results when the amplification is turned up in order to deal with low light levels.

For digital, low light and high ISO (which means amplification) results in noise.

For film, low light and high ISO (which means "faster" film) results in grain.

If your piece of film is bigger, you don't have to enlarge it as much, so the grain isn't as obvious in the final print or screen image.

The use of f/stops does a great job of negating the differences between formats. In essence, they refer to a ratio, and the ratio behaves the same with smaller and larger formats.

A better example: Assume you have a 135 format (aka "35mm") film camera and a 6x4.5 format medium format film camera. Assume as well that your subject fits perfectly in a 4/3 aspect ratio (meaning it will fit perfectly in 6x4.5 negative and can easily be cropped to 32mm x 24mm from the normal 3:2 aspect ratio 135 negative).
At f/5.6, a 40mm mm lens on the 135 format camera will (once cropped accordingly) give very similar results for both the image captured on film and the exposure of the film as the result obtained at f/5.6 with a 75mm lens on the 6x4.5 format medium format film camera.
I refer to a 40mm lens for 135 film and 75mm lens for 6x4.5 medium format film because each of those focal lengths correspond to the diagonal of the image area used for that aspect ratio on the film.
 

itsdoable

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Wow, 24 replies in 4 hours!

A standard lens in 6x9 is ~100mm, while it's equivalent view in FF is 50mm. At f/2.8, the opening on the 100mm lens is a lot bigger than the 50mm, and lets in a lot more light (~4x). But the lens spreads that light over a larger area, about 4x bigger, thus the amount of light hitting the sensor/film plane is the same. Hence the use of f-stops in metering, as they are the same across all formats. IE: the amount of light hitting the sensor/film is the same for a fixed f-stop and shutter speed, regardless of lens (ignoring transmission losses).

However, the depth of field is not the same.
 
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