Finally the D800E bests the RX-1

I have been shooting a lot with my new 24-70 F2.8G lens on the D800E of late, prior to writing a review which I have just published here.

I avoided this lens for a while: the 24-120 F4 VRII has a more useful range for me, and has VR, but in the end and after several attempts I could not get a copy that performed well enough and so I switched to the Trinity mid-range zoom, rather curious to see how it would perform since it has a mixed reputation on the D800.

Pleasantly surprised! Despite some serious problems at 24mm, it is very useful and often excellent through the rest of the zoom range and offers a very clear step up.

Then I thought I'd compare it at 35mm (where it does very nicely other than the extreme corners) to the RX-1 at f5.6 - a very impressive performer.

The reason this interests me is that until now, the RX-1 has been the best choice for work at this focal length. I have only tried the 24-120 and the Sigma 35mm F1.4 Art lens (two copies) on the D800E but both were notably weaker at the edges than the RX-1, even when down-resed to the same resolution.

The result of my new comparison is that the D800E/24-70 combo clearly beats the RX-1 in the mid parts of the frame and, though the RX-1 is slightly better at the far edges and extreme corners, overall the Nikon kit gives the better result. This is a testament to the performance of the 24-70 F2.8G and something I was quite surprised and very pleased to see.

For the curious, here is the same scene (nearly: sometimes parked boats stop me positioning exactly where I want) shot on both and then both down-resed to 3000 on the long side so as to equalise them and to emulate roughly a 200dpi print.

Sony

Nikon

Ideally the methodology would have been to shoot both frames at the same time but I have built up a large library of reasonably comparable files shot using this scene and 'good technique' and I trust this result - it confirms what I am seeing in daily use with the 24-70, despite the fact that I have been a huge advocate of the RX-1...

--
Gallery & Blog : http://www.timashley.com