Standardized Measurement

[Michael73]

The way I see it, the biggest advantage of cameras with higher and higher numbers of megapixels IS NOT that you can make billboard size prints without a lot of loss but especially if you're shooting RAW images, you can crop almost to your heart's desire and not have to worry about the print looking pixelated.

With that said, is there a standardized way to measure how much cropping you can do given a certain # of megapixels, shooting in RAW before pixelation becomes apparent?

Ultimately, what would be great would be to say, "If I bought this 6 megapixel camera I can crop this much, but if I spent a little more and bought an 8 megapixel it would allow me to crop this much more." Make sense?

 

[Lovesong]

It does, but one thing to remember is that you have to have a certain print size that you are aiming for. Professional-quality prints are done at 300dpi. This means that for a simple 4X6 you'll need to have a picture that is 1200 X 1800 pixels... obviously, for larger prints you'll need more pixels.

Now there are some people that can't tell the difference between a 300dpi and 240dpi. Whether that constitutes "pixelated" is really in the eye of the beholder.