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It doesn't necessarily make the action of focussing harder, though yes, it is far more revealing of the focus plane and inaccurate focus and other errors are easier to see. Camera movement, for example, is far more noticeable and lens design limitations too.

 

The act of focussing certainly becomes a lot more demanding of technique and something you tend to take more care and notice of, the higher the res you go. New technique is something you should expect to learn.

Edited by Paul J
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If conditions optimal and standardised for your comparison and method perfect (including camera on completely stable support) assuming identical sensor construction and calibration

Yes and

Maybe

But the stars all have to align ;)(there are so many variables)

Sharpness measured by what criteria( resolution/contrast/micro-contrast)?

Measured by what method (viewed pixels at 1:1 on a computer screen/printed output)?

 

What about focus accuracy above all, intent, content, exposure decision, dynamic range, lens characterististics, in camera processing and apparent sharpness added in post processing?

 

The non-smart alec version of all of that is that a higher resolution sensor may resolve fine detail more accurately, everything else being equal. :)

 

Whether you will see the difference in practical terms depends on all of the other stuff

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Is a high resolution sensor ex. 36mp more demanding of accurate focus?

 

Yes

 

if you capture an image with a 36mp sensor that is a touch out of focus will this same image appear as sharp on a 18mp sensor?

 

If you downsample the 36mp to 18mp then the downsampled image shouldn't look less sharp - if I understand the question.

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Is a high resolution sensor ex. 36mp more demanding of accurate focus?

 

No, it isn't.

 

If it was, photographers who moved from, say, an original Canon 5D to a 5DII would have noticed a higher miss rate given that the focus system was essentially unchanged. The issues that are being reported with D800s are not file size related; a D700 has more than enough resolution to reveal the whereabouts of the plane of focus.

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Yes, focus accuracy becomes more of a concern when sensor resolution is increased (unless you scale down anyway). This applies to manual rangefinder focusing as it does to automatic focusing, at least with a phase detection AF. Contrast detection AF will adapt itself to an increased sensor resolution – a higher sensor resolution will slow it down, but not diminish its accuracy.

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Got to try a D800. Didn't note much issue with focusing, but with a 60mm macro hand-held (as carefully as possible), it was definitely still revealing small movement streaks at shutter speeds up to 1/500th second.

 

So the old 1/focal-length rule was exceeded by 1000% or so at that resolution.

 

(yeah I know - digital resolution and clarity has obsoleted the 1/fl rule even for lower-res sensors.)

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A 36 Mp sensor is more demanding of everything. To get best results out of such resolution, you need perfect technique.

 

And given the frequently-observed inverse correlation between technique and creativity, its no wonder that there are so few interesting photos produced by the highest-res DSLRs.;)

 

 

(NB: Please note the ;))

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Andy makes a good point.

I have found that by far the most important factor in getting a sharp picture is eliminating camera and/or subject movement.

Many years ago I observed that photos taken with flash as the dominant light source were always very sharp. That's because the flash duration can be around 1/10,000 sec.

 

Peter also makes a good point. In 55 years of photography I have mastered the technical aspects, but I've yet to take a good photograph!!!

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