The gigapixel photo site works that way because it downloads and displays new tiles as you zoom in, just as satellite image map sites do. On the other hand, law enforcement shows such as CSI start with a still from a security camera recorded at 300 lines, zoom in on a tiny license plate that's maybe a 225 pixel area in the image, if that, and in a few seconds, their software "cleans it up" to reveal the plate number.