Ken Rockwell's comments on Sony's color rendition

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2eyesee
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Ken Rockwell's comments on Sony's color rendition
6 months ago

There is a separate thread about Ken Rockwell's review of the NEX-5R (http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3338417), but one of the controversial comments that Ken made was about Sony's color rendition:


Color Rendition

Sony's ability to render colors, highlights and shadows is much less mature than higher-tier manufacturers like Nikon and Canon. If you're as critical as I am about color (few people are), Sony's color rendition simply lacks the polish shown by Canon and Nikon's images. Images from this Sony simply lack the better (more exciting and more pleasant) color rendition I get from Canon and Nikon cameras.

Sony lacks the deep resources Canon and Nikon have when it comes to developing the trade-secret algorithms and color matrices required to get great colors as completely and as often as I do with Nikon and Canon.

Great color is not accurate color. That's why Kodak was put out of business by Fuji. Any scientist can get accurate color. Great color is what looks good when photographing real subjects, and I just can't get colors as good from this Sony as I do from my pro cameras. Color rendition is delicate and subjective, and critical when you get serious. You can't just tweak it in a computer; each brand of camera, like each type of film, interprets colors differently.


Now to my untrained eye, I don't know what he's talking about. I used to own an entry-level Canon DSLR, and if I look at the jpg's from them compared to me NEX-F3 I don't see anything more pleasing about the Canon colors.

I would probably dismiss the guy as being pompous, but there were a a couple of posters on the other thread that agreed with him on this.

Does anyone care to explain - or better still post some comparison shots if you have a Canon/Nikon that shows the supposedly inferior color rendition of the Sony?

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