Olympus E-100 ZOOM RS - Manual (Page 9)

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Most consumer and professional digital cameras are not
designed to be “digital specific” like the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM
RS is for action and sports event photography. The majority of
digital cameras have a maximum shutter speed of 1/500 th of
a second due to their incorporation of an interlaced CCD
sensor. The CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS incorporates a pro-
gressive scan CCD with 1/10,000 th of a second capability.
Why does this matter? An interlaced CCD digital camera has
a fast enough shutter speed for most typical applications, but
falls short if you are trying to capture lateral movement in
sports or event photography.
A progressive scan CCD refers to a very simple and
intuitive operation of the sensor when all lines are output in
ascending order. In order to accomplish this progression, a
digital camera must not have a frame store within the CCD
sensor, or have a frame transfer CCD or a full-frame, interline
transfer CCD.
The full-frame interline transfer CCD sensor incorporated in
the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS with an interlined frame store
has the same resolution as the sensor area. Simpler inter-
laced cameras with a standard interline transfer CCDs have
frame stores with only half the vertical resolution.
The line scan order is really not the most relevant issue.
Whether a digital camera is able to capture a moving object
with full resolution, is. There is no mechanical shutter in a
CCD sensor and so the term “progressive scan” has been
used instead of the term “full frame shutter”. Let’s concen-
trate on what this means in an actual shooting situation.
Imagine that you are about to photograph an event where
there are World-class athletes running laterally in front of you
The Benefits of the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS’s The Benefits of the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS’s The Benefits of the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS’s The Benefits of the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS’s The Benefits of the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS’s
Progressive Scan CCD Progressive Scan CCD Progressive Scan CCD Progressive Scan CCD Progressive Scan CCD
and you want to stop the action with your digital camera with-
out causing blurring. Or the situation could be college or pro-
fessional football, or your local children’s soccer game. Un-
less the action is coming straight to you, the chances that
blurring will occur when following fast action are great.
Ask any professional NFL football photographer and they will
tell you that they would prefer to shoot at higher shutter speeds
than 1/500 th of a second, light permitting. At 1/500 th of a sec-
ond there is a risk that some of their images that show lateral
motion will be blurred and unusable.
In summation, cameras with a full frame shutter, such as
the CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS are designated as “progres-
sive scan” cameras and have the ability to capture moving
objects with full horizontal and vertical resolution. This allows
them to capture at much higher shutter speeds than stan-
dard interlaced CCD digital cameras, which can only capture
moving objects with half the vertical resolution (but full
horizontal resolution).
The CAMEDIA E-100 ZOOM RS allows the user to capture the
fastest action possible without blurring, even shooting 200-
MPH race cars while panning.