E5 vs other cameras - Studio test shots.

[Richard Smals]

...should learn how to expose the images right. I just looked at a few of them, to me the E-5 seems to be underexposed and the 7D, D300s overexposed. Whatever was the reason for overexposing the D300 images massively by +1.33EV and the 7D by +0.67EV I don't know, but I can't help noticing that the E-5 is set to 0EV. While the E-5 images seem to be underexposed, both the 7D and the D300 are definitely overexposed, blowing the details in the images.

It does not matter what the EV compensation is set too, you know the REAL exposure from the exif:

I checked the ISO 1600 files:

E-5 = f8 - 1/100s - ISO 1600
7D = f8 - 1/160s - ISO 1600
D3S = f11 - 1/40s - ISO 1600
D300s = f8 - 1/100s - ISO 1600

In this example the 7D is brighter with lesser light (2/3 stop) entering the camera then the light entering the E-5. The absolute amount of light entering the camera is determined by the Diafragma/Shutter speed combination... and nothing else.

So your statement doesn't hold any ground here.

--
Bye4now



http://www.indots.nl

I have the deepest respect for all those people who like me.

 

[AccidntlTourist]

Kent Moore wrote:

Someone who received their E-5 yesterday had posted a pic of the included Viewer software and it said version 2 on the DVD. I wonder if it is really 2.XX. Could someone who has the E-5 confirm if there is a newer version of Viewer included with the camera. > Thanks.

Aside from looking at the version number; we should also be able to see the new art filters listed as options - I think - with E5 files.

Just checked my OV = Olympus Viewer 2 version 1.0

I just had Viewer check for updates and it tells me I have the latest version.

So this could mean:

• We already have the Viewer version required for the E-5 (which seems doubtful)

• Oly will not make it available until the official ship date (apparently some have already shipped, but isn't the official date Oct 29?)

• Maybe a new program ships with the camera?

--
Will - AccidntlTourist
http://www.flickr.com/photos/accidntl/

(Please do not list equipment in your signature as this adversely affects searching. - dpreview)

 

[bobn2]

Surly a blind man can see that the images are exposed at severely different levels, even without looking at the EXIF.

Well, the output density of the images is a matter of processing, not exposure, so it's not really easy to make that assessment without the EXIF - they could have been equally exposed and differently processed.

Just an FYI: there is a reason I included the histograms in the crops I made.

The histogram should give a reasonable indication of correct (enough) exposure, or not.

It depends whether it is an output or an input histogram. In any case what is 'correct' and what is 'enough'?

Download the images and look at the histogram. I just did that, and CNX2 clearly shows the blown highlights.

I haven't checked the D300 samples. The D300s is the contemporary camera in the same class as the E-5, in any case.

Even CS shows clearly in the histogram. Call it whatever you like,

if there are blown highlights in the raw, I would call that 'over' exposure. The point is, though, that only negatively affects detail in the highlights. In the non-blown bits, the higher exposure gives a greater SNR, which will allow more detail, not less.

It emphasises the contrast in less bright areas, which is perceived as detail -- or "noise", or "moire". It isn't possible to check the actual items in the test shots, so we each make an estimation of how "correct" the shot looks, which can be coloured by our personal biases.

That is a perceptual effect of presenting the image 'brighter' or 'darker'. It has nohing to do with exposure.

You can argue that no comparison between images taken with different systems is valid. There are a lot of variables involved.

I wouldn't use the word 'valid' in a general context. In my view comparisons are only worthwhile if they serve a purpose, and that purpose will tell you what is the most productive comparison to make. As I've said before, supporting fanboy bragging rights is one purpose, and for that purpose, whichever comparison methods shows one's brand to be best is the most sensible one to use.

My purpose was to see how the extra detail from the E-5 compared with the best available 12 MPixel body, the D3s.

If that was your purpose, the method of comparison was not very well constructed, IMO.

I also don't think the D3s is the best available 12MP body. Which is 'best' depends on what you want to use it for, and while a great camera, there are definitely 12MP cameras which have advantages over it for some things. An E-PL1 for instance can be taken places you can't take a D3s, so is a better body for those situations.
--
Bob

 

[waqasm]

ISO 6400 on the E5 vs ISO51200 on the d3s..
d3s you can still read the text on the book. "Photodiode"

more than 3 stops! thats at least 1 stop of sensor technology difference on top of the 2 stops from area reduction.

 

[maboleth]

When I posted this I mentioned equivalence. Iso 3200 on a E-5 will not match iso 3200 on the best FF cameras. I should match the iso 800 samples of the best FF if the sensor and processing is as good.

Personally, when I saw E5's low ISO's from 100-400 I was delighted. Then I opened 800 and began to wonder... With 1600/3200/6400 the text in the dictionary was totally messed up.

Now, open the same image for Canon 7D.

It's a 1.6x crop camera with 18mpix. You can open up to 6400 and get a visible text lines (and no blue blotches). No wonder, it's a 18mpix after all. On low iso's it's silky smooth with VERY good sharpness. The lens used was EF-S 15-85 (24-136) that currently sells for 650eur new and is praised as one of the best EF-S do-everything zooms.

Basically, you can buy brand new Canon 7D AND this lens for the price of E5 alone.
You don't have to compare it to FF - even 1.6x crops outperform e5 on high iso.

E5 is a great camera and best 4/3 ever, but its price is ridiculous for what it delivers.
--
http://travelingnome.ivframes.com

 

[luisflorit]

It never cease to amaze me the large number of amateur photographers that believe that their own needs are the only ones that exist...

Yes, it's amazing that as soon as someone magnifies an image he is immediately called an idiot and a pixel peeper. I envy those people since they are perfect in composition and never need to crop. I am not that good and I admit I some times crop my images and have done so for 40 years now.

I crop because my subjects are tiny... and Oly never wanted to release that Zuiko 400mm F5.6!

BTW, how is your Nikon experience going? Waiting for the D400?

My experience is fine so far. Yes, I am waiting but not in a hurry to get the D400. I can wait and I don't mind that all I have is an old 12MP camera with a strong AA filter...

Poor you, I think imagine your depression now.

Cheers,
L.

--
My gallery: http://luis.impa.br/photos



Oly Ee3 + 12--60 + 50--200 + EeC-14 + Oly EfEl50R
Pany FZee50 + Oly EfEl50 + TeeCon17 + Raynx 150 & 250

 

[luisflorit]

From your photographs, I'm quite sure you know what you are doing. I was not trying to imply that my needs trump yours. I'm sorry it came across that way. I take your point about cropping.

No problem.

As for waiting for the D400, no, I'm not. But I have a mint E-3 I'd be happy to fly down to Rio.

The D400 comment was for olyflyer. He sold all his Oly gear some months ago to get a D300.

Cheers,
L.

--
My gallery: http://luis.impa.br/photos



Oly Ee3 + 12--60 + 50--200 + EeC-14 + Oly EfEl50R
Pany FZee50 + Oly EfEl50 + TeeCon17 + Raynx 150 & 250

 

[luisflorit]

I'd like to learn what it is that you, and others, are seeing in the noise in these photos that is troubling. When I look at the comparison at ISO 1600, I see the E-5 shot is sharper and cleaner than that from the E-3. Can you please explain? I have a lot to learn is this regard.

You're seeing correctly - the E5 is cleaner regarding and sharper. But it also has lots of nasty sharpening artifacts that are virtually impossible to remove. Halos and jaggies.

For example, look at the color chart. Look closely at the yellow square, at the edges of the yellow part. Do you see how the yellow borders are brighter? That's a sharpening halo, extremely difficult to remove, and not present on the E3 shot.

Now go to the green square at the top of the same color chart. Look at the edges of it. Do you see that the edges are not straight line, but look kind of broken? Another artifact. Look at the letters in the background book. Very strange, aren't they? Artifacts everywhere!

With the E3 shot, yes, you need to apply noise reduction and sharpening. With the E5 shot, you cannot do anything to clean those artifacts. Your only hope is to downsize the shot to hide the problems. Now, if you compare the E5 shot with the 7D shot, the difference is simply overwhelming.

Our hope is that all these artifacts come from incompetence of the shooter. Probably he applied sharpening and noise reduction in a stupid way (this is what I think). Let's hope...

Cheers,
L.

--
My gallery: http://luis.impa.br/photos



Oly Ee3 + 12--60 + 50--200 + EeC-14 + Oly EfEl50R
Pany FZee50 + Oly EfEl50 + TeeCon17 + Raynx 150 & 250

 

[Robert S2]

Thanks for the reply. I appreciate it.

I'm afraid I don't see exactly what you are seeing -- no halos, some slight subtle white lines evident in the edges of the colored squares, nothing odd in the letters.

Could be me. I'm looking forward to the reviews. Thanks again.

 

[olyflyer]

...should learn how to expose the images right. I just looked at a few of them, to me the E-5 seems to be underexposed and the 7D, D300s overexposed. Whatever was the reason for overexposing the D300 images massively by +1.33EV and the 7D by +0.67EV I don't know, but I can't help noticing that the E-5 is set to 0EV. While the E-5 images seem to be underexposed, both the 7D and the D300 are definitely overexposed, blowing the details in the images.

It does not matter what the EV compensation is set too, you know the REAL exposure from the exif:

I checked the ISO 1600 files:

E-5 = f8 - 1/100s - ISO 1600
7D = f8 - 1/160s - ISO 1600
D3S = f11 - 1/40s - ISO 1600
D300s = f8 - 1/100s - ISO 1600

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras. Since the images are taken at different occasions, we don't even know what the actual light level was, if it was equal or not, so what's the point in the above calculation?

In this example the 7D is brighter with lesser light (2/3 stop) entering the camera then the light entering the E-5. The absolute amount of light entering the camera is determined by the Diafragma/Shutter speed combination... and nothing else.

Yes. But it is the light meter of the camera which decides how much light you let in to expose the image. It is obvious that if you apply +1.33 EV compensation there will be more light hitting the sensor than the light meter thinks there should be.

So your statement doesn't hold any ground here.

Whatever rocks your boat is fine for me.

However, look at the images in a good enough editor which is able to show you the blown highlights. The Nikon images are just flashing all over the image area, which to my narrow minded head indicates overexposure of those areas. Even the histogram shows that the Nikon images were exposed way off to the right and blown quite a bit, no matter what you teoretical calculation will show you. As I said, you just need to look at the images, it is very obvious that the exposure, regardless of your calculations, was way off, you don't even need an editor or the EXIF to see that.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

 

[Rriley]

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras.

wow!
how come nobody noticed this before
thanks...

--
Riley

any similarity to persons living or dead is coincidental and unintended

 

[olyflyer]

The D400 comment was for olyflyer. He sold all his Oly gear some months ago to get a D300.

It's actually a D300s and is out of warranty by now, since "some months ago" was more than a year (13 months) ago.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

 

[olyflyer]

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras.

wow!
how come nobody noticed this before

Yes. How come?

thanks...

You're welcome.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

 

[olyflyer]

It never cease to amaze me the large number of amateur photographers that believe that their own needs are the only ones that exist...

Yes, it's amazing that as soon as someone magnifies an image he is immediately called an idiot and a pixel peeper. I envy those people since they are perfect in composition and never need to crop. I am not that good and I admit I some times crop my images and have done so for 40 years now.

I crop because my subjects are tiny...

I know that...

and Oly never wanted to release that Zuiko 400mm F5.6!

...and they probably never will. You have to get a Bigma, but it is heavy.

Cheers.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

 

[Rriley]

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras.

wow!
how come nobody noticed this before

Yes. How come?

thanks...

You're welcome.

maybe you should write your own essay in the area of equalambivalence

--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

--
Riley

any similarity to persons living or dead is coincidental and unintended

 

[olyflyer]

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras.

wow!
how come nobody noticed this before

Yes. How come?

thanks...

You're welcome.

maybe you should write your own essay in the area of equalambivalence

Had a bad day again? Sorry, not my fault. Maybe a cold beer is what you need in that heat... That might cheer you up a bit.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

 

[bobn2]

maybe you should write your own essay in the area of equalambivalence

Had a bad day again? Sorry, not my fault. Maybe a cold beer is what you need in that heat... That might cheer you up a bit.

It might be too many tinnies.
--
Bob

 

[Rriley]

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras.

wow!
how come nobody noticed this before

Yes. How come?

thanks...

You're welcome.

maybe you should write your own essay in the area of equalambivalence

Had a bad day again? Sorry, not my fault. Maybe a cold beer is what you need in that heat... That might cheer you up a bit.

sorry im still laughing about

" I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras." ,

so lets see, your notion is we should compare cameras that are exactly the same to see if the images are well, exactly the same !!!!!

have you even the first idea how completely nuts this sounds?

--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

--
Riley

any similarity to persons living or dead is coincidental and unintended

 

[bobn2]

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras.

wow!
how come nobody noticed this before

Yes. How come?

thanks...

You're welcome.

maybe you should write your own essay in the area of equalambivalence

Had a bad day again? Sorry, not my fault. Maybe a cold beer is what you need in that heat... That might cheer you up a bit.

sorry im still laughing about

" I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras." ,

so lets see, your notion is we should compare cameras that are exactly the same to see if the images are well, exactly the same !!!!!

have you even the first idea how completely nuts this sounds?

I don't get that from what he's saying. I don't think he's saying all comparisons are pointless, I think he's saying there is so much difference and we have so little information about what the differences are that this exercise is pointless, not all exercises. Experiment design is not trivial, and if you want a meaningful result you have to factor out the confounding variables and also know what it is you're trying to discover. Too many amateur and professional reviews don't pay attention to that, and are not very useful as a result.
--
Bob

 

[olyflyer]

I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras.

wow!
how come nobody noticed this before

Yes. How come?

thanks...

You're welcome.

maybe you should write your own essay in the area of equalambivalence

Had a bad day again? Sorry, not my fault. Maybe a cold beer is what you need in that heat... That might cheer you up a bit.

sorry im still laughing about

" I think to look at it this way is totally pointless since the cameras use different sensors and they are different cameras." ,

so lets see, your notion is we should compare cameras that are exactly the same to see if the images are well, exactly the same !!!!!

have you even the first idea how completely nuts this sounds?

I don't get that from what he's saying. I don't think he's saying all comparisons are pointless, I think he's saying there is so much difference and we have so little information about what the differences are that this exercise is pointless, not all exercises. Experiment design is not trivial, and if you want a meaningful result you have to factor out the confounding variables and also know what it is you're trying to discover. Too many amateur and professional reviews don't pay attention to that, and are not very useful as a result.

Exactly.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)