Why not the darkness captured when the shutter closes?

To all you "no photos in darkness" people... you sure about that? True darkness (absolutely zero light) is pretty hard to come by.

I have a photon counting device. Problem is that I can't read it because it's always dark where I'm trying to use it.

Finding true total 100% darkness is difficult but not impossible. It's pretty common in deep caves from my understanding. Finding virtually unmeasurable darkness isn't that hard, the inside of a film camera comes pretty close ;)
 
To all you "no photos in darkness" people... you sure about that? True darkness (absolutely zero light) is pretty hard to come by.

I have a photon counting device. Problem is that I can't read it because it's always dark where I'm trying to use it.

Finding true total 100% darkness is difficult but not impossible. It's pretty common in deep caves from my understanding. Finding virtually unmeasurable darkness isn't that hard, the inside of a film camera comes pretty close ;)

Try deep underwater, in a cave with all your lights turned off.. it is a wonderful feeling! ;)
 
To all you "no photos in darkness" people... you sure about that? True darkness (absolutely zero light) is pretty hard to come by.

I have a photon counting device. Problem is that I can't read it because it's always dark where I'm trying to use it.

Finding true total 100% darkness is difficult but not impossible. It's pretty common in deep caves from my understanding. Finding virtually unmeasurable darkness isn't that hard, the inside of a film camera comes pretty close ;)

:lol:

Yeah, but "pretty close" isn't total darkness.
 
Don't want to hijack the thread, but reading this raises a question. Is there a reason that on electronic DSLR cameras, it would not be possible that the 'shutter speed' only controls the amount of time that the sensor is powered up and therefore receiving light? In that case, there would be no need for a physical shutter.
 
Don't want to hijack the thread, but reading this raises a question. Is there a reason that on electronic DSLR cameras, it would not be possible that the 'shutter speed' only controls the amount of time that the sensor is powered up and therefore receiving light? In that case, there would be no need for a physical shutter.

Pretty sure this is how digital point & shoot cameras work - there is no mechanical shutter.
 
In layman's terms, a mechanical shutter is used to control how long the pixels on an image sensor collect light. A simple mechanical shutter can be used to turn the entire sensor array on/off during the exposure. This eliminates the need for added electronics at each pixel location that would be used to turn on/off the pixel and store the charge (accumulated light). By using a mechanical shutter, a simpler, less expensive, and more efficient sensor can be used: one that has a higher fill factor (uses more of each pixel to actually capture light). Of course, nothing is ever cut and dried. Some cameras use both a mechanical and an electronic shutter! In these cases, the electronic shutter is used to supplement the mechanical shutter by providing features like a faster flash sync speed where mechanical shutters are just not fast/accurate enough. Most digital SLR cameras that use a mechanical shutter, however, use the mechanical shutter to control the amount of charge accumulated on the sensor as this simple mechanical device can be used to simplify the circuitry on the sensor itself thereby generally improving image quality and reducing noise.
from http://www.steves-digicams.com/knowledge-center/why-digital-cameras-have-mechanical-shutters.html#b
 
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Yeah, but "pretty close" isn't total darkness.
It's kind of like playing with hand grenades. You reach a point where "Pretty Close" is close enough (or too close, depending on your point of view).

Yeah, but I'm trying to argue this whole cool philosophical point here and "some light" more than 0 totally works to bolster my argument. :)
 
Best way to start an argument with artistically-minded people is to give them a science-based question...

It's NOT hard to find or create an environment with complete darkness. Complete darkness is used in many many applications. Many anechoic chambers, for instance, have the ability to completely eliminate the UV, vis, and IR radiation. Also, there are artificial environments created for purposes of human sensory deprivation that eliminate the visual spectrum and do a very good job at absorbing noise (no echoes).
 
To work, the image sensor has to have power applied to it. When the poser is turned off the image sensor quits working.
Many people don't know that the image sensor in a camera is not digital - It's an analog device.

Many P&S cameras don't have shutter curtains. Shutter speed is just turning the image sensor on and off.

Some DSLR cameras, like Nikon's D40 and D70, use both methods.
Up to the cameras x-sync speed of 1/200, which has both shutter curtains fully open, the shutter curtains control the shutter speed. At faster shutter speeds, which would be the slit Josh mentioned, the D40/D70 shutter curtains are left completely open and turning the image sensor on and off controls the exposure time. That's how those cameras can sync flash at speeds of 1/500 to 1/4000 -8000 without using Nikon's high speed sync system.

In todays DSLR's the front/first curtain drops down towards the bottom of the camera to start the exposure, and the rear/second curtain drops down towards the bottom of the camera to stop the exposure.
Both curtains then return to their starting position.
If burst mode is used, that same sequence happens repeatedly. Jeffrey Friedl's Blog » Nikon D3 Shutter Release in Super Slow Motion

 
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Well then if the exposure can be controlled without a shutter, why have one? What is the benefit of augmenting an electronic device with a mechanical one, which will eventually fail?
 
I hate it when people turn off the poser.
 

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