I just purchased a Canon SD600 ELPH. I love it. But I have it set on the largest pixel rate and Superfine compression rate. Yet when I take a picture....and I view the specs...the pictures max out at around 3 megabytes. Isn't a 6 megapixel camera that's maxed out to everything supposed to give you around 6 megabyte pictures? I'm pretty new to this so I might be completely wrong. I always thought whatever the megapixel was, meant the megabyte the picture will be. So if you have any help...I'd greatly appreciate it. Also, sometimes when I take pictures...an icon on the bottom left side of the LCD comes on where it looks like a red camera with some 'half circles' around it...flashing? Does anyone know why that happens?
2007-01-23 08:17:29 · 3 answers · asked by Baston Chowda 1 in Consumer Electronics ➔ Cameras
I also own the sd600 and love it.
the red hand means the picture may be blurry because of low light. take the picture anyway because it usually comes out good.
How do you know the picture is coming out to a 3 and not a 6 - where are you viewing it and what is telling you it is a 3.
email me through this site and we will solve the problem.
good luck with the camera.
2007-01-23 08:41:11 · answer #1 · answered by Elvis 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You’re confused between the camera sensor size (6 megaPIXEL) and the file storage size (3 MegaBYTES). A megapixel is the not the same thing as a megabyte.
The camera's sensor has small areas that are senative to light. Each small area is called a pixel, a thousand of those equals a megapixel. Since you're camera is 6.1 megapixels then your max resolution is 2816 pixels wide by 2112 pixels tall. When you are choosing size of a picture you are merging pixels to make one pixel . . . and or better said you are using less pixels on the sensor.
Now the quality setting is the compression setting for the image. Your camera like 99% of the cameras uses JPEG compression to compress the file size down so you can get more pictures on your storage card. How the computer does this is to automatically record pixels in similar color range and combine them into grouping. So the finer the picture quality the choosier the compression software is in determine the color differences for the grouping range. So think of it like this on course setting it'll throw a pink pixel into the same grouping as a red pixel. On the fine setting it creates its own pink grouping and a red grouping. The result is the file size that is much larger to record more information . . . say 3.2 megabytes instead of 1.8 megabytes.
You notice the file size difference in the pictures you take. Though there is one caveat to this rule. This is that if the picture you are taking is largely monotone and similar colors it will be of a smaller file size because the "similar color grouping will be naturally larger than normal".
Below are some links if you want to research it more. It's a great topic to dive into more. If you are printing out pictures and starting to do desktop publishing this topic is a must learn.
Hope this helps you out.
~ Tex
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Oh yea, and the red camera icon means that you are using a slow shutter speed. Make sure to hold the camera very steady or better yet use a tripod.
2007-01-23 19:08:05 · answer #2 · answered by Tex 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I have a 6MP Canon...and it's top jpeg file size is about 3MB or more, so don't worry about it at all.
And the little red hand is the camera shake warning...to let you know that your photo could possibly be blurry because of low light and a slow shutter speed. You would need to possibly raise your ISO or keep the camera absolutely still or add more light.
I suggest you read the manual...again
2007-01-23 22:30:59 · answer #3 · answered by Petra_au 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋