Super CCD vs CCD (vs CMOS?)

(obviously the CCD is only one part of the camera, and the lens quality and other factors will determine the end quality of the image - but i'm interested in CCD stuff at the moment)

Does Super CCD really offer that much better image quality than conventional CCD?


(this picture show the basic way super ccd works, but doesn't show the colours)

Super CCD uses the same mosaic type pattern, using 2 green pixels, 1 red and 1 blue. Recently they have announced the 4th generation - Super CCD "SR" and Super CCD "HR" (HR = High Resolution - basically the same as Super CCD but more pixels, eg 6mp sensor instead of 3mp sensor).

"Fuji uses aggressive interpolation to take advantage of the closer pixel spacing on the SuperCCD, producing an image that has more pixels than the sensor itself. In the case of the S1, the camera produces a 6.1 million pixel file from a 3.5 million pixel sensor. The resulting image doesn't have as much resolution as a real 6 million pixel sensor, but images produced by the S1 did show a slight improvement in detail resolution when compared to other 3.5 megapixel cameras." extremetech.

Fuji claims: "New, Honeycomb-Shaped Super CCD Image Sensor Technology Significantly Improves the Color, Clarity and Sharpness of Digital Pictures" (99) dpreview here's a review of the Fuji s7000 which uses the 4th generation of Super CCD 6MP sensor: dpreview s7000, this review of the Fuji S700 (using 4th generation 3MP Super CCD SR) concludes that the S700 "Exhibits more resolution than a camera with a normal 3 million pixel CCD" and there's a "Visible improvement in image resolution using the 6mp image size" but there's bad stuff too: see the conclusion.

Here they say that Super CCD offers a much better "interpolated" high resolution (eg 6MP image from a 3MP sensor) than you get from just interpolating a 3MP image yourself (using photoshop etc) - But it does not offer the same quality as a real 6MP camera.

"it would seem the Fuji s602 [with a 3MP super ccd sensor] can provide almost as much usable data as a typical 5mp native digital camera" comparisons here - although trying to compare the difference the CCD makes is always going to be difficult because different cameras have different lenses, images processors, etc etc.

here's another review of the 3MP Super CCD "SR" Fuji F700 Zoom with sample images - the guy says he doesn't think this new 4th generation Super CCD lives up to all the hype. (when the camera costs £260, for 3mp, 3x opt - is it really worth the extra money compared to a Canon A70 (3mp/3xopt) from £210, or an Olympus C-350 (3mp/3xopt) for £139? - see dealtime.co.uk.)

for some more on super ccd, see my earlier post: here.

Update 09/02/04 super CCD 3rd generation artifacts. Fuji 3MP Super CCD HR no better than Canon's standard 3MP CCD here.

Conventional CCD development is obviously not stagnant:


(this is how standard mosaic / bayer CCD / CMOS sensors work)


(this shows sony's new 4 colour ccd)

Sony seem to be the other big player in CCD development - they have developed a new CCD adding an additional colour (link) and a lot of other manufacturers often use Sony CCDs. (more info: sony press release) Cameras that use the new 4-colour filter CCD: macnn and a review of the Sony DSC-f828: dpreview dsc-f828 - it apparently "reduces color reproduction errors". Dpreview concludes that the 4-colour filter CCD is good: "New RGBE four color CCD delivers more pleasing color balance than DSC-F717 it replaces"

Kodak and Olympus are working together, Kodak have developed this 5MP GRGB CCD, (using the standard 1 Red, 2 Green, 1 Blue pixel), which is used in this Olympus E1.

Pentax use a 6MP Sony CCD in the stupidly named Pentax *ist D.

What about CMOS?

Most people tend to think of CMOS sensors in relation to cheap poor quality digital cameras that generally produce images that don't compare well to CCD cameras.

However - there's high-end CMOS sensor development from the like's of Nikon and Canon. 4.1MP in the case of this Nikon: Nikon D2H Review (dpreview) and 6MP CMOS sensor used in the popular high-end Canon EOS 300D. Canon are using an 8.2MP CMOS sensor in this new Canon.


(this is how foveon sensor works)

Another CMOS sensor (the clever Foveon X3) is used by the Sigma sd10 (preview) and the Sigma sd9 (review), I thought this deserved a more specific mention - reading this makes it sound awesome! more tech details.

...another is the Kodak DCS 14n which has a 13MP CMOS sensor. What's the quality like - and how does it compare to CCD? - From quickly skimming the reviews using a CMOS sensor in these high-end cameras results in pictures that are just as good as a CCD camera can produce. I've read elsewhere, that CMOS is preferred from a manufacturers point of view, because it's easier to manufacture and also cheaper.

From Canon's site - they think CMOS is good: "CMOS: Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor. A type of semiconductor that has been, until the EOS D30, widely unavailable for digital cameras. CMOS semiconductors use two circuits, negative and positive polarity circuits. Because only one of the circuits can be on at once, CMOS chips are less energy consuming than other chips that utilize simply one type of transistor. This is a clear advantage of the CMOS sensor over the standard CCDs in use today."

(as a completely unrelated side-note - did you know aiwa are owned by sony? link)

As a side note: Fuji XD cards tend to be twice as much as Compact Flash cards, eg 256mb CF £33 ex vat, 256mb XD £66 ex vat (28/01/04)