Digital - Minimum Aperture

Published by: cfz 2010-03-10

I have recently moved from film to digital photography, and am just coming to grips with the new technology. I bought a Konica Minolta Dimage Z3, but will probably upgrade to an SLR if I take to digital. It�s a great little camera in many ways, but there is one major disappointment for me. The minimum aperture seems to be f8, no matter what I do with shutter speed or ISO. Is this normal with digital cameras? I didn�t see it mentioned in any of the product reviews I read, or indeed in the camera manual. But this is a real problem for landscapes in particular.

It's common with many of the digital cameras that don't allow you to swap out lenses. The Digital SLRs are identical to film SLRs in that respect. Whatever lens you buy for it, that's the aperture capability for it.

Olympus Zuiko Digital Lens Mounting Type: Four Thirds : Read ::
Intended For: Digital SLR. Focal Length: 14 mm - 35 mm. Lens Aperture: F/2.0. Minimum Aperture: F/22. Focal Length Equivalent to 35mm Camera: 28 - 70mm
http://www.ciao.com/Olympus_Zuiko_Digital_zoom_lens_14_mm_35_mm__15251952HOME

I tried to look up the specs for minimum aperture for that camera...but I had no luck.

However, I was thinking about it and you might be able to get a pretty deep DOF at only F8 because the sensor is much smaller than the 35mm film that you are used to. It would be pretty easy to test that out.

That's an f 2.8 lens... try shorter focal legnths (wide angle). I bet you start to see larger aperatures.

Cool lookin' camera.

Good luck!

-Pete Christie

Thanks, I have no problem with the larger apertures, 2.8 is fine, and I was conscious of that when I bought the camera as I do like to shoot in low light without flash at times. But I just assumed that f16, f22, even f32 would be available and it seems they're not. And I couldn't think of any reason why not, unless it was a limitation of the digital format. Anyway, I suppose I'll have to live with it until I eventually go SLR.

I'm pretty confident most 'prosumer' (non DSLR) have limits at F8- why? i have no idea but coyuld have something to do with the smaller chip, but then i guess you could still want the lnoger shutter speeds.... MY camera limits at F9 (at full wide) and is a fuji S5500 (same class as a Z3) if you decide to follow this up with the manufacturer or anythnig- just to find out why plkease post their reply. Ive never thought about this much and youve got me interested now

I'm pretty confident most 'prosumer' (non DSLR) have limits at F8- why? i have no idea but coyuld have something to do with the smaller chip
It has to do with the smaller chip and diffraction limit. And it binds to the same reason why f/64 club has the f/62 aperture.

Small sensor = small focal lenghts. If you have a 6-20mm zoom, you can't possibly go smaller than f/8

6/8 would give you an opening of 0.7 mm opening...

When f/22 of a 50mm SLR lens would give you around 2mm opening.

So, the max aperture of PS cameras is limited by diffraction. Therefore, they all lick goat balls.

QED mother!@#$ers! QED!

You mentioned changing shutter speed and ISO. What about using the aperture priority mode built into the camera. This mode simply allows you to change the aperture manually. Many photographers use this mode rather then full auto or shutter priorty. Obviously, auto mode or programmed auto will not allow you to change the apeture or shutter speed.

K