'Effective megapixels'

[rich_g85]

My boss was just telling me about his Fuji Finepix, which he says is 2.1MP but according to the packaging is '4.2 effective MP'.

I seem to recall that this 'effective' figure is a clever trick by the marketing people to twist the truth. A bit like saying this car will do 90mpg, but only downhill with your foot on the clutch.

Can anyone enlighten us on why it would be 'effectively 4.2MP'?

 

[Amp34]

They are interpolated, my sister had a similar fuji.

I think the camera guesses what should be in between the captured pixels and stick them in.

 

[Raymond Lin]

My boss was just telling me about his Fuji Finepix, which he says is 2.1MP but according to the packaging is '4.2 effective MP'.

I seem to recall that this 'effective' figure is a clever trick by the marketing people to twist the truth. A bit like saying this car will do 90mpg, but only downhill with your foot on the clutch.

Can anyone enlighten us on why it would be 'effectively 4.2MP'?

It's digitally "enhanced", a bit like putting the same photograph into Photoshop and bump up the pixel count.

 

[D.P.]

More or less, but because of the sensor orientation there may be some slight improvement by doing this in the fuji camera than a standard picture on a PC. Indeed I believe the results dictate this.

But it is not correct to call it 4MP.

 

[divine`]

Is the effective pixels thing not the actual number of pixels?

As the D70 is listed as being 6.1MP (Effective)

Or is my SLR 3MP and interpolating?

edit - ok, was a little bit wrong, but still.

Nikon D70

6.0 million effective pixels
6.3 million sensor photo detectors

 

[TrUz]

Take a look at this: http://www.dpreview.com/learn/?/Glossary/Camera_System/effective_pixels_01.htm

TrUz