What would the approximate number lines of resolution that 35mm offers?

If you were going to make a comparison to digital, high quality film would be ~ 20 million pixels.

How does that translate into lines of resolution in terms of tv?

Thanks in advance.

Somewhat less than 4 million lines of vertical resolution. Not really a good comparison. Good S-video has ~ 500 lines of resolution. VHS 240. Where film really shines is its' contrast range. Video has a much compressed contrast range compared to film.

So HDTV doesn't come close to approximating film then?

Is there a standard conversation to compare the amount of pixels in film to other formats, such as each line of resolution is made up of x number of pixels?

I don't think that there really is a way to compare the resolution of film to other formats. Film does not have pixels for all intents and purposes it's more of a continuous gradation. The actual film "pixels" cannot be seen unless extreme magnification is used like a microscope. This is coming from my limited experience.

Film resolution varies depending on the stock used. It's the same as 35mm camera film. 1000 ASA film is a lot grainer than 25 ASA film. On the other hand, you can shoot in much lower ambient light with 1000 ASA film. Films resolution is the size of a silver halide crystal (very small...). Video formats are always a trade-off of how much resolution you desire vs. the file size/processing power necessary to display the image at a given size. I really think it would be funny to see what a camcorder image would look like blown up to the size of a drive-in movie screen...

So how many pixles does HDTV have and is there a standard way to determine how many pixels per line resoultion there is in non-film formats?

If film would have rougly 4 million lines of resolution does hdtv do a good job of duplicating that, less/more?

I'm tired of the math... Try this:

http://www.dvdtalk.com/forum/showthr...hreadid=207243

So assuming I chose the right numbers that would put HDTV around 1.2 million pixels at best? For those that have time comparing film and a good HDTV signal, are they comparable?

HDTV is 1920x1080, 2.0736 million pixels.

I've heard 35mm slides need at least 3000x3000 dpi resolution to scan well. That would be 9 million pixels if 35mm film is an inch square. Less, if it's less.

Here's a 4000 dpi scanner that's supposed to be good for film...

http://www.itworld.com/Comp/2871/IDG010529Canon/

And here's something talking about film resolution in lines per millimeter...

http://people.smu.edu/rmonagha/mf/lenslpm.html

And here's a 16 megapixel camera that they say is twice the resolution of film...

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0009/00...foveon16mp.asp

Only two weeks ago, Eastman Kodak announced a chip able to capture digital images with a resolution of 4,096 by 4,096 picture elements — or pixels — per square inch. That, by some measures, is about twice the resolution of 35-millimeter film.

Thanks.

The Evolution of Resolution, by Film Technology

Well I guess when HD-DVD get released then atleast we won't have to rebuy the movies up until the point that film gets better if HDTV can duplicate the video quality.