Digital BW, The Print

Hi Austin, thanks for weighing in.

>> As you say "A red sensor produces, via interpolation an RGB
>> pixel." That is
>> true for color mode, but as far as detail is concerned it doesn't care if
>> it's captured by an R, G, or B, sensor, and it only takes one color of
>> information to make detail. The depth of tone of that pixel may be differ
>> depending on which sensor records it, but a true pixel worth of detail
>> (let's call it a gray pixel) will be recorded.
> 
> Well, yes and no...each sensor definitely gets unique data, but as far as it
> being actual "grayscale" data, not really.  It's just like putting a
> red/green/blue filter over your film camera, it may or may not "see" things.

Well, to quote you, yes and no. Even the absence of light gets recorded as a
detail. It'd be a black pixel, no? As you say, if film is capable of so many
grains of info per unit measure of area, even empty areas represent
information.

What I mean is, if you use a high resolution film (like Techpan) to shoot a
piece of coal on snow, such that your image is composed of expanses of pure
black and pure white, you may have few tones, but the film still recorded
those two tones at great resolution.

>> Thus, for grayscale, the number of sensors the camera has IS the amount of
>> detail it records (raw) - no interpolation is necessary.
> 
> Well....not really...it still has to interpolate the "average" intensity
> across colored sensors...

This I don't get. Could you define that process a bit more for me. Why does
it have to average anything in grayscale?

Todd