Yes. And as I was trying to say earlier, there is no law saying that you have
to represent the pixels as read, green and blue values for the same location
to call the data "a picture" or the format an "image format". The bayer
pattern data is just another way to describe an image. You may actually say
that it's a different image from the RGB data you might convert it to,
because the latter also has some interpolated data - but *of course* the file
data represents a picture!
Sure. Without getting too much into the Foveon vs. Bayer debate,
it should be noted that the Bayer RAW data doesn't produce a unique RGB
image. That's both the advantage and disadvantage of RAW.. more advanced
interpolation algorithms could produce better results than others. With
RGB in every pixel, it's a lot more defined (once you define what R, G,
and B mean in a colorimetric sense)
I, personally, think that the Bayer is a good compromise. It
provides luminance information at every pixel location. The chroma is
downsampled (2:1 for G, and 4:1 for B and R). Since that's not too far
from visual perception, it seems like an acceptable way to go. Now, if
the Foveon-type sensor could have good color rendition with the same
number of sensor sites, then it would be a lot more competitive.
And like I said, more or less, if Pentax had bothered, they might have tried
to introduce an extension to the TIFF format allowing the colour model to be
set to, "bayer pattern data" or whatever, and perhaps rules for
transformation to RGB to be stored as TIFF tags...
I think they sorta did that. The TIFF has a number of funky tags
in it. Some are obviously proprietary.
But we're discussing minor details here, of course, I must have little to do
these days... Yep, I have, come to think of it; I'm on sick leave as a result
of the fact that I tried something called "sports" last week...
- Toralf
LOL... I've got so much to do these days, I can't do anything.
Getting ready to fly my airplane to Alaska and try to wear out my -DS...
:)
-Cory
--
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* Cory Papenfuss *
* Electrical Engineering candidate Ph.D. graduate student *
* Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University *
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