SD14 thoughts...

sharpvision said:

So we no longer can use the top LCD to select the ISO?

Click to expand...

Dominic Groß said:

First of all, just to be very clear about it, this is not any sort
of preview just some rather incomplete impressions and thoughts.

Overall the Camera feels better than the SD9 / SD10. It is heavier
than it looks and the size is just about right, based on the leaked
images some people said that it might too small. Imho the size is
pretty good, for those who want it a bigger camera the new power
pack should be a very nice addition, it feels really solid.

The rubber and overall grip is very good and I really love the
shutter and mirror mechanism, they are smooth and leave a very
"pro" feel, both mirror slap and noise are considerably reduced.
Also the new Viewfinder is pretty good, bright and big, it is not
as big as the D200 but it gets very close.

The AF is also quite a step forward. I did not really pay attention
to the specifics here since my priority was to get pictures, my
limited impression is that in low contrast it is better but still
can't match the performance of Canon or Nikon. In low light I did
not notice any of the specific AF problems of the SD9/10 in such
conditions. Overall I did not have any trouble with the AF and
liked how it performed, accuracy was good.

In conclusion one can say that the camera feels a lot more
responsive and snappier, mainly because of the speed up of AF,
faster burst rate and so on.

The big LCD is good to have, it is ok for a DSLR but a bit higher
resolution would certainly be nice.
At first I was not really happy about the ISO selection through the
menu on the LCD screen, but once used to it it works ok. One
advantage of this is to give quicker access to settings like WB
than before, without introducing a few hundred buttons like Minolta
did on the Dynax 7D.

The layout of the other buttons and dials is good and well
thought-out, for example the awkwardly placed shutter speed dial is
gone and in manual mode the EV button switches the front dial
between aperture and shutter speed.

Battery life seems to be another area with big improvements, the
Battery problems we read about all the time here are history, I
think it was the right way to go with a dedicated battery.

Finally, the pop up flash can indeed be useful to fill in a bit
light when you have nothing else at hand, also the flash
performance seemed to be far improved as far as automatic modes,
that many seemed to have trouble with, are concerned.

There have been some complaints about image quality from people who
tried the Camera at the Sigma booth at Photokina, these opinions
were based on the LCD preview. Imho the LCD preview is not a good
representation of the final image in many situations right now.

Much of the success will imho depend on how reviewers judge the
image quality, I think it is best to wait for a more final version
of the camera before making any conclusions, but in many areas, for
example longtime exposures, the improvements are already clearly
there.

It looks like Sigma is trying catch up on their weak points very
hard, and we can expect the camera to have the usual strong points.
So the major downside so far seems to be the list price, not that
much for the people who are already into the System but for Sigma
gaining a bigger market share. The price at which it will be sold
can of course be a lot lower, imho the market situation will adjust
the price sooner or later, so the "problem" that many see with the
price right now might be non existent once the camera will be
available.

It is amazing to see how many people that have not actually touched
the camera, or seen any image from it can praise or bash it. Don't
get me wrong, discussions are ok but what we see here is sometimes
rather extreme, the result of this can only be a bunch of premature
judgments that might or might not be valid once the camera is
actually in stores.

--
http://www.pbase.com/dgross (work in progress)
http://www.pbase.com/sigmadslr/dominic_gross_sd10

Click to expand...

Scott P said:

Is the IQ better than the SD10's in every respect?

--
http://srpluta.zenfolio.com/

Click to expand...

Dominic Groß said:

First of all, just to be very clear about it, this is not any sort
of preview just some rather incomplete impressions and thoughts.

Overall the Camera feels better than the SD9 / SD10. It is heavier
than it looks and the size is just about right, based on the leaked
images some people said that it might too small. Imho the size is
pretty good, for those who want it a bigger camera the new power
pack should be a very nice addition, it feels really solid.

The rubber and overall grip is very good and I really love the
shutter and mirror mechanism, they are smooth and leave a very
"pro" feel, both mirror slap and noise are considerably reduced.
Also the new Viewfinder is pretty good, bright and big, it is not
as big as the D200 but it gets very close.

The AF is also quite a step forward. I did not really pay attention
to the specifics here since my priority was to get pictures, my
limited impression is that in low contrast it is better but still
can't match the performance of Canon or Nikon. In low light I did
not notice any of the specific AF problems of the SD9/10 in such
conditions. Overall I did not have any trouble with the AF and
liked how it performed, accuracy was good.

In conclusion one can say that the camera feels a lot more
responsive and snappier, mainly because of the speed up of AF,
faster burst rate and so on.

The big LCD is good to have, it is ok for a DSLR but a bit higher
resolution would certainly be nice.
At first I was not really happy about the ISO selection through the
menu on the LCD screen, but once used to it it works ok. One
advantage of this is to give quicker access to settings like WB
than before, without introducing a few hundred buttons like Minolta
did on the Dynax 7D.

The layout of the other buttons and dials is good and well
thought-out, for example the awkwardly placed shutter speed dial is
gone and in manual mode the EV button switches the front dial
between aperture and shutter speed.

Battery life seems to be another area with big improvements, the
Battery problems we read about all the time here are history, I
think it was the right way to go with a dedicated battery.

Finally, the pop up flash can indeed be useful to fill in a bit
light when you have nothing else at hand, also the flash
performance seemed to be far improved as far as automatic modes,
that many seemed to have trouble with, are concerned.

There have been some complaints about image quality from people who
tried the Camera at the Sigma booth at Photokina, these opinions
were based on the LCD preview. Imho the LCD preview is not a good
representation of the final image in many situations right now.

Much of the success will imho depend on how reviewers judge the
image quality, I think it is best to wait for a more final version
of the camera before making any conclusions, but in many areas, for
example longtime exposures, the improvements are already clearly
there.

It looks like Sigma is trying catch up on their weak points very
hard, and we can expect the camera to have the usual strong points.
So the major downside so far seems to be the list price, not that
much for the people who are already into the System but for Sigma
gaining a bigger market share. The price at which it will be sold
can of course be a lot lower, imho the market situation will adjust
the price sooner or later, so the "problem" that many see with the
price right now might be non existent once the camera will be
available.

It is amazing to see how many people that have not actually touched
the camera, or seen any image from it can praise or bash it. Don't
get me wrong, discussions are ok but what we see here is sometimes
rather extreme, the result of this can only be a bunch of premature
judgments that might or might not be valid once the camera is
actually in stores.

--
http://www.pbase.com/dgross (work in progress)
http://www.pbase.com/sigmadslr/dominic_gross_sd10

Click to expand...

michael przewrocki said:

cant match performance of nikon/canon in low light. speed or
image-quality? or both?

Click to expand...

Christopher Parthier said:

As for the navigation through ISO and WB I had my difficulties.
Correct me if I'm wrong but as i noticed there is just one
direction you can jump to the next level. When I changed the
direction I jumped to an other function e.g. from ISO to setting
the WB. So if you missed the setting you wanted, you have to make
another round. Am I right?

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

First, let me say I've been a long-time SD9 owner WAITING for
something significantly new to come out of Sigma and the Foveon
folks to give me a good reason not to jump ship and get the Canon
5D. I was hoping the news of a new updated Sigma SD? would be my
salvation.

And when it debuts it's got a new sensor that's......35% larger??
Honestly, I was hoping for something in the 24 mp range (8mp final
image) MINIMUM to keep me happy, let alone in the 30-40mp range to
compete with the 5D and the other +10mp DSLRs.

[begin of mild rant]
But what got me REALLY thinking was my recent experience with my
new Canon A700 P&S camera. I bought this camera just a couple of
days before heading out on a 10 day motorcycle trip to the Colorado
Rockies (I live in NC) with a buddy of mine. I wanted to document
the trip for a potential article I was going to write for a Ducati
owners club magazine. My camera phone wasn't going to cut it and
the SD9 is simply too bulky for a tank bag so I broke down and got
the little 6mp Canon P&S. After a quick scan of the owners manual
and a few of the features, I simply set it for super fine JPEGs,
auto WB and photographed the trip. When I got back and downloaded
the images, I was BLOWN AWAY by the detail and ESPECIALLY the color
quality. In the 3+ years with my SD9 I've never gotten color
quality close to what the Canon seemed to get almost by accident.
(I've jumped through all sorts of RAW converter hoops with the SD9
and can honestly say I've NEVER gotten a good fleshtone out of it
yet - always greenish-yellow - without massive corrections either
in Adobe Camera RAW or in Photoshop). Bottom line, this little
Canon P&S right out of the box was able to outperform what I've
struggled to get out of my SD9 after 3 years of frustration.

Right now I feel like even if they did offer a 24/8mp foveon sensor
DSLR but either didn't fix the color or had similar color rendering
to my SD9, I'd have to abandon my SD9 and go with either the Canon
5D or perhaps the new 10mp Pentax K-something (I'm really a Pentax
guy at heart).

Somebody, please, give me a good reason to stick with Sigma. As an
aside, I've never had issues with the overall sharpness of the
foveon sensor (it's outstanding) but I'm ready to move up to
something that can handle larger than 11x14 prints and still hold
up.
[end of rant]

thanks for listening,


Terry Wyse

Click to expand...

Chunsum J Choi said:

11x14 is not a problem with ths SD9/10 and it certainly will not be
a problem for the SD14..

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

Naturally, there can be a wide range of opinions on what is
acceptable/unacceptable resolution for photographic quality prints.
In my own mind and after lots of evaluations, I've settled on
240ppi as photographic quality printing and 180ppi as near-photo
quality prints.

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

If you go with the conventional wisdom that the previous generation
10.2mp(3.4x3) sensor is roughly equivalent to a 5-6mp mosaic
sensor in terms of apparent sharpness, the new 14mp(4.7x3) sensor
offers apparent sharpness equivalent only to a 7-8.5mp mosaic.
Hardly enough in my book to justify a new camera purchase.

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

Chunsum J Choi said:

11x14 is not a problem with ths SD9/10 and it certainly will not be
a problem for the SD14..

Click to expand...

Naturally, there can be a wide range of opinions on what is
acceptable/unacceptable resolution for photographic quality prints.
In my own mind and after lots of evaluations, I've settled on
240ppi as photographic quality printing and 180ppi as near-photo
quality prints. Below 180ppi, you get into a the gray area of
"pleasing quality" prints which very much depends on the subject
matter as to what minimum resolution you can get away with. Fact
is, my SD9 is at 180ppi at around 8"x10" prints (cropped from
8x12.5). Even at 180ppi, the SD14 is unable to fill an 11x14 area
(I calculate about 10x14.5).

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

If you go with the conventional wisdom that the previous generation
10.2mp(3.4x3) sensor is roughly equivalent to a 5-6mp mosaic

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

sensor in terms of apparent sharpness, the new 14mp(4.7x3) sensor
offers apparent sharpness equivalent only to a 7-8.5mp mosaic.
Hardly enough in my book to justify a new camera purchase. Like I
said in my rant, I'd personally want to see something in the
18-24mp range before I'd consider it enough of a jump in quality to
justify the purchase. It's like buying computers to me...if the
increase in CPU speed isn't at least a factor of 2 compared to what
I'm currently running, I'm not likely to notice the difference in
real terms.

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

And besides, the issues I've had with my SD9 have been less about
sharpness and more about color fidelity issues. I do a lot of
shooting (almost 100%) in a controlled studio environment doing
portraits and figure studies and I've simply never been happy with
the fleshtone rendering AND the posterization/contouring artifacts
with this camera (if I'm doing something wrong, please help me!).
At the same time, I see some of the outstanding portrait and nude
work done digitally on photo.net and what do see more often than
not under the photo? Canon 5D. Of course, one never know how much
post-processing was done but lack of
smoothness/contouring/posterization is not something that's easy to
hide after the fact.

Click to expand...

TerryW said:

I don't want to come across as some kind of Sigma-basher and Canon
advocate. Up until the purchase of the little Canon A700 P&S I
bought for my recent trip, my SD9 was the first and only digital
camera I've ever owned. It just sort of urked me that the little
Canon, after basically tripping over the user manual, did a better
job than had I lugged my SD9 along on this trip. The real test
(someday) will be to shoot the pee-wee Canon next to the SD9 in the
studio and see what comes up. And I'm not so sure I want to find
out the results of that test! Next thing I know, I'll have to
answer to my wife as to why the $300 pee-wee photos look better
than the $2,000 Sigma photos after lobbying hard for the SD9 a
couple of years ago! That may not help my cause when I start my
lobbying effort for my next DSLR.

Click to expand...