Top all-time · #11184
Mark Kasson
Personal blog · blog.kasson.comhardwarescience
Mark Kasson writes the last word, a personal blog at blog.kasson.com about hardware and science. Since 2017, 7 different Hacker News readers have linked it 10 times, most often “How modern camera shutters work”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-11-01, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (5) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN commenters link Mark Kasson's blog as technical camera analysis: raw and DNG transforms, Sony long-exposure noise and bit-depth behaviour, and test charts. The links are cited as sources, not praised.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 5 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Photography meets digital computer technology. Photography wins -- most of the time.
Most-linked posts?
- How modern camera shutters work2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2024-02-26
What Hacker News says?
I don’t think that’s true in general. As a sibling comments points out, this is not true for some DNGs - for example, the output of an iPhone is in DNG, but with many, many transforms already baked in. A DNG might even be debayered already. GFX 100s II’s apply a transform to RAW data at iso 80, see: https://blog.kasson.com/gfx-100-ii/the-reason-for-the-gfz-10... I don’t know much about ARW, but I do know that they o…
Comment linking /gfx-100-ii/the-reason-for-the-gfz-100-ii-iso-80-unusually-good-read-noise/
on “We asked camera companies why their RAW formats are all different and confusing”Submitted Are DOF calculators useful? – part 1 as a story · 15 points
HN discussionEven with the digital technology, we still need the test pictures and both the human faces and the cards in them: http://www.thehurlblog.com/film-education-testing-your-camer... http://niximages.com/blog/?page_id=20207 http://www.colour-science.com/quality%20test%20tools/test%20... http://www.gballard.net/photoshop/pdi_download/ http://blog.kasson.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/generic-ca... http://previews.123rf.co…
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/2012/09/generic-calibration-image.jpg
on “The Forgotten 'China Girls' Hidden at the Beginning of Old Films”Submitted How modern camera shutters work as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThe camera drops to 12 bit when shooting in some modes such as continuous, bulb, or long exposure. This is true all the way to the A7rIV and the A9II as far as I know. Here's an article with analysis: https://blog.kasson.com/a7riv/sony-a7riv-edr-in-continuous-c... Here's a Sony site with the breakdown of the different bit depths you get in different modes for different cameras (note that ILCE-7RM4 is the A7rIV): htt…
Comment linking /a7riv/sony-a7riv-edr-in-continuous-compressed-mode/
on “The Sony “Star Eater” (2017)”Submitted Repeated JPEG compression doesn't ruin images as a story · 2 points
HN discussionIt still exists on A7 III: https://blog.kasson.com/a7iii/a7iii-long-exposure-spatial-fi... Those are noise power density graphs that show that signal went through a low-pass filter. On Sony cameras without 'star-eater' and cameras from other manufacturers it is flat. But I admit that this issue is most noticeable on S-series (low resolution/high sensitivity) cameras, as their lower resolution makes it easier to reso…
Comment linking /a7iii/a7iii-long-exposure-spatial-filtering/
on “The Sony “Star Eater” (2017)”Submitted How modern camera shutters work as a story · 1 points
HN discussionThe TV is a good example because the light from TV is transmitted light, like a stained glass window. The TV can create the widest range of perceptual experience if it has R, G and B colors that are precise spectral lines. If I'm looking at color prints in a book or on the wall that is reflective light and it is dependent on the spectrum of the room. My main TV room has RGB Hue lights that can simulate "warm" or "co…
Comment linking /the-last-word/metameric-failure/
on “There's something off about LED bulbs”Submitted Effect of camera resolution on small prints as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
