Are M4/3 Sensors Big Enough? 16 MP Enough? Upsizing M4/3 Image Files; How Much Quality is Lost? Or is it?

JPEG made from an Olympus E-M5 raw file; minor adjustments in Lightroom 5 (click to enlarge)

Often times we hear criticisms leveled at the M4/3 format cameras for only having 16mp sensors.  Some say 16mp is not enough when, in reality, 16 mp is more than enough for almost all of our uses.  Look at Nikon's and Canon's top pro cameras.  The Nikon D4s has 16mp and the Canon 1DX has 18mp.  You would think that the pros would be clamoring for more pixels if these weren't enough pixels to satisfy their bosses and clients.  In reality, 16mp is enough for all but a few things we would want to do with our images.

But what if you need to crop an image more than you normally would and what if you wanted to enlarge that cropped image to make a good sized print for your wall?  Can you get a good print from that cropped native file as large as you may need it?  It depends upon how much you crop, of course.  If you think you can't because you have cropped too much, you always have the option to upsize that cropped file to a point where you can make a big print with it?  But will you lose sharpness, contrast, color fidelty and overall quality?  Let's see.  Read on.

1:1 crop of above file, original file; click to enlarge and examine the detail,
noise, contrast, etc.

The image at the top of this blog post was made using my Olympus E-M5 and a Panasonic 35-100mm f/2.8 lens.  The E-M5 has the same sensor as the E-M1 and the E-M10.  All 16mp.  I tweaked (fine tuned color correction, etc.) the image in Lightroom and added Lightroom's "normal" export sharpening when converting it to a JPEG.  I then took the same image and cropped it to very close to 1:1.  I did not do anything with the crop.  I then exported the cropped version of the image, again, adding "normal" export sharpening in Lightroom when converting to a JPEG.

I don't know about your thoughts, but I think it looks incredibly good.  A 16mp digital image can be enlarged roughly to 14.4" X 19.2" (35.57cm X 48.76cm)  at 240 dpi and, if you want more print resolution, you can print up to 11.52" X 15.36" (29.26cm X 39.01cm) at 300 dpi.  If you read Scott Kelby's blog, Scott Kelby's Photoshop Blog, from this past Monday (June 23, 1014) he says he never prints at a higher resolution than 240 dpi.  He also says you can print just fine at 200 dpi.  Scott is an expert in all things digital photography (being a very talented and successful photographer, a great teacher and the best selling digital photography author year after year), and I would not hesitate taking his advice.  That being said, I still print at 360 dpi (Epson's native resolution), as that is what I was taught was necessary when I first started printing my own work several years ago.  I may just reevaluate that after reading Scott's blog post.  The only way for me to find out and be satisfied is to do it and evaluate the prints for myself.

In any case, at 240 dpi, you can easily make a 14" X 19" (35.57cm X 48.76cm) print.  At 200 dpi, you can even go larger to a 17.28" X 23.04" (43.89cm X 58.52cm) print.  How often do you need a print larger than that?  How often do you print that big at all?  Also, in reality, you can go much larger than that.  If you are having a pro lab print your images, they will tell you the minimum pixel dimensions you will need for any sized print.  They easily go larger than these figures with the same number of pixels.

But suppose you have to crop that image and your file is only 2/3 as big as it originally was.  Can you upsize the file (or uprez it, as it is also called) to get it back to the original, or larger sized file?  Yes you can.  Look at the image below.  I took the original, as seen at the top of this blog post, and upsized it in Photoshop CC to the size it would be if the E-M5 were a 24mp camera.  I used the "preserve details" mode in the dialog box.  I then returned the image to Lightroom and cropped it to make this version the same size as the 1:1 cropped image above, then exported it in exactly the same way as I did the others.

Are there differences?  Yes, barely any, and you really have to look closely to find them.  It is so close, I would venture to say that, indeed, you can upsize an image, in this case 50%, and get identical results as you would printing the original.   In fact, I have upsized a 16mp EM-1 file to 36mp and had it printed, comparing it side-by-side against a file of the same subject taken in exactly the same way with my D800E.  The result was the prints looked so close, that not one of photographer friends could pick one over the other for being better.

Same size crop from the same file but after the file had been upsized to the same size it would have been
had it been made with a 24mp camera;  click to enlarge and compare against the crop from the original

If you think your 16mp image file from your M4/3 camera isn't enough for your needs, you always have the option to safely upsize it to gain those extra pixels.  There is virtually no loss in quality, contrast, color, saturation or resolution.  I have used Photoshop CC and I have used Alien Skin Blow Up 3.  Both produce excellent results.  Try it and see for yourself.

Thanks for looking.

Dennis Mook

Many of my images can be found at www.dennismook.com.  Please pay it a visit.  I add new images regularly.  Thank you.


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