# Why is 4K important?



## snoke (Jul 20, 2017)

Everyone says 4K "not important." TV only 1080p. No need for 4K. Too much data. Too hard to process. And nobody makes video, everyone just make photos.

For every birthday party for my children, I video the whole "happy birthday" song and cake thing. I do it with my phone and my phone does 4K. You can say that the most important videos I make are all done in 4K and using a camera - not expensive Canon equipment (good argument why have it if it is never used for important things!) If Canon make DSLR do 4K and have good IS lens, then I do 4K video of birthday with Canon camera. But not now.

In 15-20 years time, as my kids get older and we have parties where "remember when", I'll have videos to share of those moments. "Oh but my photos are 1893MP!" The difference between photos and videos of parties is "Oh, that's a nice photo" and "listen to them laughing!" / "look at what they're doing!". Back to those future parties. At that point in time, TVs are either going to be 4K "standard" ("Gee dad, why didn't you have good video back then?") or maybe even 6K/8K ("Wow, dad, when I was a baby that was the best video available?!") 1080p might be "ok" now but it will age and it will not age well. Just look at the recent promo's for the upcoming re-release of Terminator 2. Cinemas will be 3D but a 4K UHD edition is being done and it looks sweeet.

Nobody buys a 24MP camera so that they can keep 2MP images (ok, maybe 4MP if you've got a UHD screen), everyone buys 24MP cameras to keep 24MP pictures. Even if they only ever get downres'd for monitors, by keeping the original raw/jpeg, you can re-render it for bigger screens in the future. Same with video.


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## neuroanatomist (Jul 20, 2017)

snoke said:


> Back to those future parties. At that point in time, TVs are either going to be 4K "standard" ("Gee dad, why didn't you have good video back then?") or maybe even 6K/8K ("Wow, dad, when I was a baby that was the best video available?!") 1080p might be "ok" now but it will age and it will not age well.



Too right. I had a bunch of movies of my childhood, heartwarming family scenes of me and my dad, who's now deceased. But they were all shot on Super 8 and the quality was crap by today's standards, so I threw them all away. 

: : : : :


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## chris_w_digits (Jul 20, 2017)

Once it becomes practical to shoot 4K (for many it is now), I say go ahead. However, I remember not long ago when many people could not even tell the difference in 720 and 1080 on a flat panel at normal viewing distance. At the university where I work, 1280x800 was a sufficient resolution to present practically any material to a class or for a seminar without the pixel structure being visible to students except the ones closest to the front. The brightness and contrast and color fidelity was more important than the resolution in that case. This makes me wonder how many people could tell the difference in 2160 (what I wish 4K were called) and 1080 if they had trouble distinguishing 1080 and 720 at normal distance. I would imagine that other factors (contrast, brightness, color fidelity) would contribute more to the perceived quality than resolution once it is past what the eye can resolve. I have a rather large collection of 1980s music videos which are nearly all 4x3 aspect in 480 (NTSC) or 576 (PAL) format and they hold up quite well when scaled up if the original quality was good. In my opinion, the common stretching of 4x3 to 16x9 or putting annoying "echos" on the sides of the videos to fill out the screen is what makes a lot of old material look terrible (that and using way too low a bitrate to encode it).


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Jul 20, 2017)

Not everyone says 4K is important. I have it on my 5D MK IV, but so far haven't bothered with it. I may play with it, but I doubt that it will be of much value if any to me.


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## Zeidora (Jul 20, 2017)

Video is just fine, so shoot it with VIDEO camera. A dSLR is a PHOTO-camera.

Whoever cares about 4K should also care about t-stops (as opposed to f-stops), fluid heads, and audio quality. There seems to be a major disconnect between 4K "quality" and the remainder of the quality requirements. As a pro-video friend once pointed out, the difference between photography and videography is: when you press the shutter in photography, all your problems are over. With video, all your problems start.

That is why I don't get why people care about 4K on a dSLR, with f-stop lenses and handheld. Does not compute for me. And for snap shot videos, a cell phone is just as good.


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## ajfotofilmagem (Jul 20, 2017)

We all know that there are 41-megapixel mobile phones today. So you should throw your DSLR in the trash, and make photos with "the highest resolution available," is not it?

Dinamic range
Depth of color
Bokeh
Image Stabilization
High Bit Rate
No, none of this matters ... :


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## stevelee (Jul 21, 2017)

When I shoot video on my iPhone, I shoot 4K. It doesn't have optical zoom, so the extra resolution comes in handy when I edit. I can zoom in a lot, and still have rather sharp videos that Compressor can output to 720p. 

As for TVs, people couldn't tell the difference between 720p and 1080i because they really are the same amount of data, for one thing. I notice that OTA, some of our local stations broadcast 1080i and at least one does 720p. Both look slightly better from indoor antenna reception than when compressed for cable. 

Another reason the two are practically indistinguishable is at what I consider normal viewing distance, a 46" set is not big enough for it to matter. Now that 65" sets are becoming more common, then 4K can make a difference. My guess is at this point streaming 4K is going to be highly compressed most of the time, so may not be much improvement over 1080p of Blu-Ray, if as good.


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## Darkly (Jul 26, 2017)

neuroanatomist said:


> Too right. I had a bunch of movies of my childhood, heartwarming family scenes of me and my dad, who's now deceased. But they were all shot on Super 8 and the quality was crap by today's standards, so I threw them all away.
> 
> : : : : :



Old media may not be crisp and shiny like current, but I certainly wouldn't throw away anything like that away just because it wasn't of the highest quality. Call me sentimental but moments in time captured on celluloid are beyond value.

Back to the original question of the value of 4k, you're looking at twice the horizontal resolution of a 1080p video. On my 42" TV 1080p content looks pretty sharp, and you've got to think how much sharper can an image get before you simply can't tell the difference any more. The difference between SD and HD1080 is night and day on that size of set. The difference between 1080p and 4k at that same size is less striking, and many will find 1080p content perfectly acceptable. 4k and higher resolutions will be more appreciated with larger screen sizes, and for many people the differences start to become significant at 50" and higher.

As for capturing family memories, grab them with whatever you have and enjoy them for what they are. Old Polaroids have the power to take us back to special moments in time, and although few people regard them as being particularly high quality they still do the trick...


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## neuroanatomist (Jul 26, 2017)

Darkly said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > Too right. I had a bunch of movies of my childhood, heartwarming family scenes of me and my dad, who's now deceased. But they were all shot on Super 8 and the quality was crap by today's standards, so I threw them all away.
> ...



Perhaps the five  in succession were insufficent to make my point. Is there a better sarcasm emoji?


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## rfdesigner (Jul 26, 2017)

snoke said:


> Everyone says 4K "not important." TV only 1080p. No need for 4K. Too much data. Too hard to process. And nobody makes video, everyone just make photos.
> 
> For every birthday party for my children, I video the whole "happy birthday" song and cake thing. I do it with my phone and my phone does 4K. You can say that the most important videos I make are all done in 4K and using a camera - not expensive Canon equipment (good argument why have it if it is never used for important things!) If Canon make DSLR do 4K and have good IS lens, then I do 4K video of birthday with Canon camera. But not now.
> 
> ...



hmm... not so sure

I'm old enough to remember CDs comming in.

There was debate about whether 44.1k or 16bit was enough and so on..

30 years later and we're still using 44.1 & 16bit. Sure there are other "better" formats, but 44.1/16 is plenty good enough.

When it comes to video, there was 640/480 analogue.. pretty grim, more like old 78s

Then we got 720p DVDs... Holy Muffins! what an improvement

Blueray/1080p.. OK.. it's nice, but I still watch 720p, I've got a few bluerays but my laptop only goes as far as 720p and you know what?.. I don't enjoy stuff any more because it's 1080p.

Now we have 4k.. and 8k's in the pipeline

Now I don't know what the video version of 44.1k/16bit is, but I'm willing to bet it's probably about 3k. And 1080p is more than my laptop can show, my next laptop will show 1080p and it will be nice to have it and "old" vidoes will look a touch "old" but only a touch, because the colour, contrast, sound quality etc will all be there.

So it's more like going from 22k/16bit to 44k/16bit.. nice to have and you will notice, but we're never going to experience the kind of "you only had X" in your day like we do now looking at old analog video.


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## svensl (Jul 26, 2017)

I used to shoot photos only, mainly landscapes and dog photography. Recently I started shooting video of dogs also. It's been a steep learning curve and it is a lot of fun. Coming from photography I have a Canon 5D Mark IV which is a great camera. I mainly do 1080p due to the crop factor limitations of the 5D but recently have been asked to do 4K to future proof the content. If it was easier to shoot 4K with the 5D I would do it more often to utilize the extra resolution in editing.


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## unfocused (Jul 26, 2017)

neuroanatomist said:


> snoke said:
> 
> 
> > Back to those future parties. At that point in time, TVs are either going to be 4K "standard" ("Gee dad, why didn't you have good video back then?") or maybe even 6K/8K ("Wow, dad, when I was a baby that was the best video available?!") 1080p might be "ok" now but it will age and it will not age well.
> ...



I know what you mean. Everybody talks about how "Citizen Kane" is the greatest movie of all time, but it was shot on black and white film, so I know it's absolute crap. Why waste my time with that when I can watch "Fifty Shades Darker" which is so much better because it was shot with modern equipment.


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## ethanz (Jul 26, 2017)

The 4K from my 1DXii is great. If you want 4K, pony up the money for a camera that has it. And if you actually want good video, as a previous poster said, get all the accompanying sound/accessories to make it nice.

Neuro, people may not be able to distinguish between your sarcasm and your regular posts.


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## neuroanatomist (Jul 26, 2017)

unfocused said:


> Why waste my time with that when I can watch "Fifty Shades Darker" which is so much better because it was shot with modern equipment.



Oh, come on. You know why you _really_ bought Fifty Shades Darker. Because it sounded like it had a helluva lot of DR.


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## neuroanatomist (Jul 26, 2017)

ethanz said:


> Neuro, people may not be able to distinguish between your sarcasm and your regular posts.



Maybe ten  would make it easier?

: : : : : : : : : :

Or would it be better to just use one big one?


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## Maximilian (Jul 26, 2017)

neuroanatomist said:


> unfocused said:
> 
> 
> > Why waste my time with that when I can watch "Fifty Shades Darker" which is so much better because it was shot with modern equipment.
> ...


*rofl* That made my day. Thank you.


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## Khalai (Jul 26, 2017)

neuroanatomist said:


> unfocused said:
> 
> 
> > Why waste my time with that when I can watch "Fifty Shades Darker" which is so much better because it was shot with modern equipment.
> ...



Did you get your abbreviations bad again?


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## unfocused (Jul 26, 2017)

ethanz said:


> ...Neuro, people may not be able to distinguish between your sarcasm and your regular posts.



I don't believe there is any difference between his regular posts and his sarcasm.


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## Khalai (Jul 26, 2017)

unfocused said:


> ethanz said:
> 
> 
> > ...Neuro, people may not be able to distinguish between your sarcasm and your regular posts.
> ...



His sarcasm level is over 9000!!!


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## neuroanatomist (Jul 26, 2017)

Please, gentlemen. I don't have a sarcastic bone in my body. 

I have 204 of them (for those who are counting, that's all of them except the humeri).


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## davidhfe (Jul 26, 2017)

Zeidora said:


> Whoever cares about 4K should also care about t-stops (as opposed to f-stops), fluid heads, and audio quality. There seems to be a major disconnect between 4K "quality" and the remainder of the quality requirements. As a pro-video friend once pointed out, the difference between photography and videography is: when you press the shutter in photography, all your problems are over. With video, all your problems start.
> 
> That is why I don't get why people care about 4K on a dSLR, with f-stop lenses and handheld. Does not compute for me. And for snap shot videos, a cell phone is just as good.



There's a world of content between "I need to match transmission values between multiple cameras and lenses" and "snap videos on my phone." External sound is neither difficult nor expensive, and monitoring jacks on SLRs is a feature video-focused folks talk about as much as 4K. Fluid heads? There are plenty of applications where a static tripod is sufficient.


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## foo (Jul 26, 2017)

snoke said:


> In 15-20 years time..



Thing is, in 15-20 years time when you have a 256K screen, those 4K videos will look crap..... Not because hey look any different, but simply because you'll have the same bias that today says less than 4K equals crap.



> Nobody buys a 24MP camera so that they can keep 2MP images ..



Your 24MP argument doesn't hold up here as you're talking about the opposite direction, as long as you have the 24MP raw you can produce 2MP today, 4MP tomorrow, all the way up to 24MP in some years time, but your 4K video will always be 4K, even in 20 years when technology has marched past you..

If you'd used film you might have had some ability to re-scan it to higher resolution as the technology becomes available... but 4K will always only be 4K

Not suggesting I'd not like 4K today, but the importance of it doesn't stand the test of time.


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## Khalai (Jul 26, 2017)

Zeidora said:


> As a pro-video friend once pointed out, the difference between photography and videography is: when you press the shutter in photography, all your problems are over. With video, all your problems start.



Great quote, I have to remember that


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## padam (Jul 26, 2017)

1080p is good and practical from a size/quality perspective. It was a huge jump from what it was before, 4k is still going to be noticeable but mostly on bigger screens, which is really not needed for every kind of content and going even higher will show even less benefits from a practical perspective.

The problem in the case of most cameras (including the 6D Mark II) that unlike the C100 or A7S it achieved by line-skipping, loosing a lot of information in the process, looking a bit soft. And we all know that Canon is not going to release lower megapixel camera in the lower-price segment with better video possibilities, not to mention the codecs, with a good codec the size/quality ratio is still manageable (especially if it used more information to start with).
With the recent A9 restrictions, now it seems clear that neither camera manufacturer wants to produce a camera that does photo and video equally well, they prefer to sell separate products for that.


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## Hector1970 (Jul 27, 2017)

I find 4K overkill. HD is fine and will remain so. The high megapixels are a problem already. Editing 4K requires an expensive computer. If you are making a movie you must gut need 4K It for ordinary stuff I think it's impractical.


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## snoke (Jul 27, 2017)

foo said:


> > Nobody buys a 24MP camera so that they can keep 2MP images ..
> 
> 
> 
> ...



1080p = 2MP
4K = 8MP.
6K = 18MP.
8K video = 33MP. Better?

Sony A9 do 20fps, maybe A9 II deliver what you want!

Future 256K screen make 24MP image tiny.

4K = 8MP
...
256K = 32768MP

Scan negative limit small. 8MP for 35mm.


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## rrcphoto (Jul 27, 2017)

snoke said:


> Everyone says 4K "not important." TV only 1080p. No need for 4K. Too much data. Too hard to process. And nobody makes video, everyone just make photos.



all you described is why video is important, not to why 4K is important. regardless of the tv resolutions as they continue to increase - your videos 15-20 years from now even if they are 4K will be out of date.


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## Mikehit (Jul 27, 2017)

snoke said:


> foo said:
> 
> 
> > > Nobody buys a 24MP camera so that they can keep 2MP images ..
> ...



I presume among all those numbers you actually had a point somewhere...?


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## LDS (Jul 27, 2017)

4K may be important for *actual* needs, especially in the commercial market, even when used just as for marketing.

As a future proof format for decades to come, no. Maybe the resolution increase wills stop because the human eye won't resolve more, but virtual reality could turn movie into immersive experiences... and plain, old, flat 4K will be hopelessly outdated anyway  And when memories are important, the technology usually matters very little.

When I project my father's old Standard 8mm B/W silent films, the dark room, the screen, the beam of light, the rattling projector, the occasional dust grain or hair magnified on the screen are all part of the experience. Seen on a LCD TV they are not the same thing. Maybe in forty-fifty years putting an USB stick into a player, and seeing its contents on an old, flat screen will look the same...


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## Antono Refa (Jul 29, 2017)

snoke said:


> In 15-20 years time, as my kids get older and we have parties where "remember when", I'll have videos to share of those moments. "Oh but my photos are 1893MP!" The difference between photos and videos of parties is "Oh, that's a nice photo" and "listen to them laughing!" / "look at what they're doing!". Back to those future parties. At that point in time, TVs are either going to be 4K "standard" ("Gee dad, why didn't you have good video back then?") or maybe even 6K/8K ("Wow, dad, when I was a baby that was the best video available?!") 1080p might be "ok" now but it will age and it will not age well.



There are photos of my grandpa wearing a custom of an old lady, looking very happy, my great grandmother holding my little sister, and my father's cousin when she was a year old and her family lived beyond the iron curtain.

My family was happy going down memory lane, not caring one bit the photos were printed when 4 by 6 was large, and the most I could get was 4MP.



snoke said:


> Nobody buys a 24MP camera so that they can keep 2MP images (ok, maybe 4MP if you've got a UHD screen), everyone buys 24MP cameras to keep 24MP pictures. Even if they only ever get downres'd for monitors, by keeping the original raw/jpeg, you can re-render it for bigger screens in the future. Same with video.



Nowadays, all cameras have, at the very least, 16MP. That does not mean most people print larger than A4 on regular basis.


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## Deleted member 91053 (Jul 31, 2017)

"Everyone says 4K "not important." TV only 1080p. No need for 4K. Too much data. Too hard to process. And nobody makes video, everyone just make photos."

Totally agree!


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## 9VIII (Jul 31, 2017)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMAX

IMAX Film is supposed to be around 12K resolution equivalent, people could recognise that there is a desire for super high resolution media as far back as the 1970's, I don't see why that should be any different now.
It's not that hard to meet the minimum requirements for an IMAX experience in your home either: http://www.lfexaminer.com/20090522a.htm


> we aim for a minimum eye-to-screen distance of 0.35 times…screen width and a maximum distance to the last row equal…to the screen width.”



As long as the back row is within spec for IMAX, then sitting 6 feet from an 82" screen is within spec for a "home equivalent" to IMAX.
The back row may not be ideal, but neither is 4K, in fact if IMAX is equivalent to 12K that means 4K is actually almost exactly 10x less total pixels (12K at 16:9 would be 81 Million pixels, 4K is 8,294,400).
So if you factor in the lower image quality of 4K, it is still appropriate to be used interchangably with 1080p.
I predict 4K will be the "SD resolution" of the year 2100 and beyond.

8K is finally within the same order of magnitude of detail as IMAX, but even that is less than half the pixel count and really will probably be appropriate in 99% of home theaters at the same screen size people have today.


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## Mikehit (Jul 31, 2017)

9VIII said:


> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMAX
> 
> IMAX Film is supposed to be around 12K resolution equivalent, people could recognise that there is a desire for super high resolution media as far back as the 1970's, I don't see why that should be any different now.
> It's not that hard to meet the minimum requirements for an IMAX experience in your home either: http://www.lfexaminer.com/20090522a.htm
> ...


So in a viewing room 6 meters long, you need a screen size of 18metres. Yeah, right.


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## IglooEater (Jul 31, 2017)

9VIII said:


> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMAX
> 
> IMAX Film is supposed to be around 12K resolution equivalent, people could recognise that there is a desire for super high resolution media as far back as the 1970's, I don't see why that should be any different now.
> It's not that hard to meet the minimum requirements for an IMAX experience in your home either: http://www.lfexaminer.com/20090522a.htm
> ...



I seem to recall IMAX recording some space stuff on Canon cinema gear. Seems they must think 4K is at least sufficient for some of their material. 
http://www.canonrumors.com/canon-cinema-eos-captures-space-in-4k-for-new-imax-3d-film/


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## neuroanatomist (Jul 31, 2017)

Mikehit said:


> So in a viewing room 6 meters long, you need a screen size of 18metres. Yeah, right.



Meh. We had immersive TV years ago, even with CRT.


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## ethanz (Jul 31, 2017)

neuroanatomist said:


> Mikehit said:
> 
> 
> > So in a viewing room 6 meters long, you need a screen size of 18metres. Yeah, right.
> ...



lol, trudat. My nephew does that and we tell him not to stand so close.


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## neuroanatomist (Jul 31, 2017)

ethanz said:


> My nephew does that and we tell him not to stand so close.



Yeah, but there's probably nothing to worry about if he does (unless he's blocking your view of the TV  ).


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## ethanz (Jul 31, 2017)

neuroanatomist said:


> ethanz said:
> 
> 
> > My nephew does that and we tell him not to stand so close.
> ...



Interesting, thanks.


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## Talys (Sep 2, 2017)

Mikehit said:


> 9VIII said:
> 
> 
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMAX
> ...



It's a nonlinear growth ratio. When you're at IMAX, you aren't expected to see the whole screen. If you were at home and it were possible to have the same ratio, your seating would be elevated and for you to be so immersed your front wall (with the screen) would ideally be several times larger than the back, with the whole wall a viewport. 

Of course, unicorns are nice too.


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