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505 vs. 505V - Histogram analysis

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There have been active discussions going on regarding if 505 creates more vivid or colorful images than 505V. I analyzed the Histograms of the similar photos taken by two camera with Matrox Inspector V2.0. I got the samples from Brent Boren's Zing album: http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293947523 .I assume that the photos are not altered out of the cameras. If the shots are taken apparently different lighting conditions, I didn't use them.

Now, I am pretty surprized at the results. I can see common or consistent patterns from the histograms. For example, the following two histograms are for the 505Image5 and 505VImage5 on his album. My analysis follows the picture.



1. 505 histograms are distributed from 0 to 255 while 505V range is smaller. This is common for almost every picture that I investigated. In other words, 505 INDEED creates more vivid and colorful pictures ! I think this is firmware diff. Here is my speculation. Usually, ordinary color monitors and TV's are not calibrated properly. They are usually brighter and more contrast than they should be. That's why 505 pictures look oversaturated, while they are perfectly balanced. SONY made counter-compensation for that - Duh !

2. This is interesting. 505 pictures lack "blue". I'm not sure if it was noticeable. But the blue histogram is slightly shifted to the left of green and red. That's why you saw dazzling flowers and plants with 505 ;-) Now, 505V seems to have fixed it. Well, is this just white-balance setting ? I noticed it from both in-door and out-door shots.

3. 505 has kind of flat histogram shape while 505V has steep peaks. I am just speculating that the firmware may be doing some kind of histogram based mappings inside ( or gamma correction ) and the algorithm changed.

My conclusion - 505 creates more colorful pictures. 505V has more precise white-balance.
 
Pondria - Great analysis.

Generally speaking, when we're talking about the ranges from 0 - 255 when looking at histogram diagrams, it doesn't exactly mean that there is "more color" in the image. (Someone else check me on this, please, because I do not want to be inaccurate in my reading of this graph.)

First of all, it does mean that the F505V images are more contrasty than the F505 images. In other words, the contrast between low levels and high levels of a given RGB color have been restricted to a narrower range than that of the F505. So the colors of the F505V SHOULD appear more vivid for one reason.

Secondly, the levels at the peaks as well as corresponding valleys reach a higher point in the F505V than do those of the F505. For example, the peaked curve on the extreme right reaches just over 45000 for the F505V, while the F505 reaches just under 30000. So the levels at that point in the graph appear to be more vivid in the F505V, not less.

So technically speaking, the graph appears to show that it's the F505V that is more full of color.

With the 12-bit A/D conversion of the F505V, I'm not sure how this impacts a histogram and what the results should be. But with other histograms I've worked with, it's the curve of the F505V that looks more dynamic in these two cases.
pondria said:
There have been active discussions going on regarding if 505 creates more
vivid or colorful images than 505V. I analyzed the Histograms of the
similar photos taken by two camera with Matrox Inspector V2.0. I got the
samples from Brent Boren's Zing album:
http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293947523 .I assume that the photos are
not altered out of the cameras. If the shots are taken apparently
different lighting conditions, I didn't use them.
Now, I am pretty surprized at the results. I can see common or consistent
patterns from the histograms. For example, the following two histograms
are for the 505Image5 and 505VImage5 on his album. My analysis follows
the picture.



1. 505 histograms are distributed from 0 to 255 while 505V range is
smaller. This is common for almost every picture that I investigated. In
other words, 505 INDEED creates more vivid and colorful pictures ! I
think this is firmware diff. Here is my speculation. Usually, ordinary
color monitors and TV's are not calibrated properly. They are usually
brighter and more contrast than they should be. That's why 505 pictures
look oversaturated, while they are perfectly balanced. SONY made
counter-compensation for that - Duh !
2. This is interesting. 505 pictures lack "blue". I'm not sure if it was
noticeable. But the blue histogram is slightly shifted to the left of
green and red. That's why you saw dazzling flowers and plants with 505
;-) Now, 505V seems to have fixed it. Well, is this just white-balance
setting ? I noticed it from both in-door and out-door shots.
3. 505 has kind of flat histogram shape while 505V has steep peaks. I am
just speculating that the firmware may be doing some kind of histogram
based mappings inside ( or gamma correction ) and the algorithm changed.

My conclusion - 505 creates more colorful pictures. 505V has more precise
white-balance.
Click to expand...
 
Pondria,

I have just read an comparison in a german magazin (good reputation) between the newest cams. And indeed the F505V had the worst color
reproduction of the cams. If it is from interest i will give the details.

Best regards,

Andreas
 
Two points,

(1) I think, being spread more in X-axis do mean that there are more colors. For instance, histogram of just one solid color board will give us 3 high peaks . On the sample hsitogram, say for red, 505 utilizes full 256 shades while 505V utilizes only 210-215. And this is consistent behaviour across the board.

(2) The absolute value of the Y-axis count is less meaning here. It simply means that One has more pixels than the other ( 2.6 vs 2.1 ). The relative or normalized value should be observed.
Ulysses said:
Generally speaking, when we're talking about the ranges from 0 - 255 when
looking at histogram diagrams, it doesn't exactly mean that there is
"more color" in the image. (Someone else check me on this, please,
because I do not want to be inaccurate in my reading of this graph.)

First of all, it does mean that the F505V images are more contrasty than
the F505 images. In other words, the contrast between low levels and high
levels of a given RGB color have been restricted to a narrower range than
that of the F505. So the colors of the F505V SHOULD appear more vivid for
one reason.

Secondly, the levels at the peaks as well as corresponding valleys reach
a higher point in the F505V than do those of the F505. For example, the
peaked curve on the extreme right reaches just over 45000 for the F505V,
while the F505 reaches just under 30000. So the levels at that point in
the graph appear to be more vivid in the F505V, not less.

So technically speaking, the graph appears to show that it's the
F505V that is more full of color.

With the 12-bit A/D conversion of the F505V, I'm not sure how this
impacts a histogram and what the results should be. But with other
histograms I've worked with, it's the curve of the F505V that looks more
dynamic in these two cases.
pondria said:
There have been active discussions going on regarding if 505 creates more
vivid or colorful images than 505V. I analyzed the Histograms of the
similar photos taken by two camera with Matrox Inspector V2.0. I got the
samples from Brent Boren's Zing album:
http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293947523 .I assume that the photos are
not altered out of the cameras. If the shots are taken apparently
different lighting conditions, I didn't use them.
Now, I am pretty surprized at the results. I can see common or consistent
patterns from the histograms. For example, the following two histograms
are for the 505Image5 and 505VImage5 on his album. My analysis follows
the picture.



1. 505 histograms are distributed from 0 to 255 while 505V range is
smaller. This is common for almost every picture that I investigated. In
other words, 505 INDEED creates more vivid and colorful pictures ! I
think this is firmware diff. Here is my speculation. Usually, ordinary
color monitors and TV's are not calibrated properly. They are usually
brighter and more contrast than they should be. That's why 505 pictures
look oversaturated, while they are perfectly balanced. SONY made
counter-compensation for that - Duh !
2. This is interesting. 505 pictures lack "blue". I'm not sure if it was
noticeable. But the blue histogram is slightly shifted to the left of
green and red. That's why you saw dazzling flowers and plants with 505
;-) Now, 505V seems to have fixed it. Well, is this just white-balance
setting ? I noticed it from both in-door and out-door shots.
3. 505 has kind of flat histogram shape while 505V has steep peaks. I am
just speculating that the firmware may be doing some kind of histogram
based mappings inside ( or gamma correction ) and the algorithm changed.

My conclusion - 505 creates more colorful pictures. 505V has more precise
white-balance.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Andreas P. said:
Pondria,

I have just read an comparison in a german magazin (good reputation)
between the newest cams. And indeed the F505V had the worst color
reproduction of the cams. If it is from interest i will give the details.

Best regards,

Andreas
Click to expand...
 
Please. We are all iterested.
Andreas P. said:
Pondria,

I have just read an comparison in a german magazin (good reputation)
between the newest cams. And indeed the F505V had the worst color
reproduction of the cams. If it is from interest i will give the details.

Best regards,

Andreas
Click to expand...
 
Okay,

(I hope i won't violate any copyrights!)

Don't forget i am german native and a lousy translator.
Here are 4 of the criterias they tested:

1:) Ability of resolution (Lp/Bh) determined by the MTF (modular transfer-function)
Higher value means sharper representation.

C3030: 1029
CP990: 1007
DSC-S70: 965
F505V: 885

2.)
Dynamic-Range

F505V: 3.0
CP990: 2.9
DSC-S70: 2.9
C3030: 2.75

3.)
Signal-Noise Ratio

CP990: 22.6
DSC-S70: 19.27
F505V: 16.85
C3030: 16.8

4.)
Color Reproduction (Delta E):
determined with an IT8 table under equivalent daylight conditions:
Smaller values = better color-reproduction

C3030: 8.36
DSC-S70: 10.1
CP990: 12.53
F505V: 15.37

Best regards,

Andreas
 
There is another factor that should be considered with this analysis. The perceived brightness by human eyes is not linearly propotional to the RGB values across the whole range. Around the middle range, it's reasonably proportional. But around the low and high limits, the colors look saturated - the same. What I mean is that , for example, for pure red, (R,G,B) = (255,0,0). We cannot distinguish it from less red, like ( 240, 0, 0 ). Both will look just same. So, if you map the ADC values from CCD to the full 0..255 range, you will get perceived saturation at both ends. In other words, you actually lose some visual information. I order to avoid the visual saturation, SONY may be consciously mapping the values to the reduced range.

If you look at the S70, 505 and 505V images from this perspective, you will see more visually saturated colors with S70 and 505. And in my personal opinion, 505V generates colors close the real colors - no exaggeration.
pondria said:
There have been active discussions going on regarding if 505 creates more
vivid or colorful images than 505V. I analyzed the Histograms of the
similar photos taken by two camera with Matrox Inspector V2.0. I got the
samples from Brent Boren's Zing album:
http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293947523 .I assume that the photos are
not altered out of the cameras. If the shots are taken apparently
different lighting conditions, I didn't use them.
Now, I am pretty surprized at the results. I can see common or consistent
patterns from the histograms. For example, the following two histograms
are for the 505Image5 and 505VImage5 on his album. My analysis follows
the picture.



1. 505 histograms are distributed from 0 to 255 while 505V range is
smaller. This is common for almost every picture that I investigated. In
other words, 505 INDEED creates more vivid and colorful pictures ! I
think this is firmware diff. Here is my speculation. Usually, ordinary
color monitors and TV's are not calibrated properly. They are usually
brighter and more contrast than they should be. That's why 505 pictures
look oversaturated, while they are perfectly balanced. SONY made
counter-compensation for that - Duh !
2. This is interesting. 505 pictures lack "blue". I'm not sure if it was
noticeable. But the blue histogram is slightly shifted to the left of
green and red. That's why you saw dazzling flowers and plants with 505
;-) Now, 505V seems to have fixed it. Well, is this just white-balance
setting ? I noticed it from both in-door and out-door shots.
3. 505 has kind of flat histogram shape while 505V has steep peaks. I am
just speculating that the firmware may be doing some kind of histogram
based mappings inside ( or gamma correction ) and the algorithm changed.

My conclusion - 505 creates more colorful pictures. 505V has more precise
white-balance.
Click to expand...
 
I have to take back the conspiracy theory that I fabricated - SONY incorporated anti-saturation algorithm with 505V ;-). I looked at the histogram of the firework shots that I took. In the shot, there are extreme brighness and darkness with some colors. The histogram came out as it should. There are dominant peaks at 255. There is no forbidden region.


pondria said:
pondria said:
There have been active discussions going on regarding if 505 creates more
vivid or colorful images than 505V. I analyzed the Histograms of the
similar photos taken by two camera with Matrox Inspector V2.0. I got the
samples from Brent Boren's Zing album:
http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293947523 .I assume that the photos are
not altered out of the cameras. If the shots are taken apparently
different lighting conditions, I didn't use them.
Now, I am pretty surprized at the results. I can see common or consistent
patterns from the histograms. For example, the following two histograms
are for the 505Image5 and 505VImage5 on his album. My analysis follows
the picture.

http://www.zing.com/picture/p83f4229ccb32d28b937050e62373120f/ff97ec24.gif.orig.gi f
1. 505 histograms are distributed from 0 to 255 while 505V range is
smaller. This is common for almost every picture that I investigated. In
other words, 505 INDEED creates more vivid and colorful pictures ! I
think this is firmware diff. Here is my speculation. Usually, ordinary
color monitors and TV's are not calibrated properly. They are usually
brighter and more contrast than they should be. That's why 505 pictures
look oversaturated, while they are perfectly balanced. SONY made
counter-compensation for that - Duh !
2. This is interesting. 505 pictures lack "blue". I'm not sure if it was
noticeable. But the blue histogram is slightly shifted to the left of
green and red. That's why you saw dazzling flowers and plants with 505
;-) Now, 505V seems to have fixed it. Well, is this just white-balance
setting ? I noticed it from both in-door and out-door shots.
3. 505 has kind of flat histogram shape while 505V has steep peaks. I am
just speculating that the firmware may be doing some kind of histogram
based mappings inside ( or gamma correction ) and the algorithm changed.

My conclusion - 505 creates more colorful pictures. 505V has more precise
white-balance.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
pondria said:

pondria said:
pondria said:
There have been active discussions going on regarding if 505 creates more
vivid or colorful images than 505V. I analyzed the Histograms of the
similar photos taken by two camera with Matrox Inspector V2.0. I got the
samples from Brent Boren's Zing album:
http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293947523 .I assume that the photos are
not altered out of the cameras. If the shots are taken apparently
different lighting conditions, I didn't use them.
Now, I am pretty surprized at the results. I can see common or consistent
patterns from the histograms. For example, the following two histograms
are for the 505Image5 and 505VImage5 on his album. My analysis follows
the picture.

http://www.zing.com/picture/p83f4229ccb32d28b937050e62373120f/ff97ec24.gif.orig.gi f
1. 505 histograms are distributed from 0 to 255 while 505V range is
smaller. This is common for almost every picture that I investigated. In
other words, 505 INDEED creates more vivid and colorful pictures ! I
think this is firmware diff. Here is my speculation. Usually, ordinary
color monitors and TV's are not calibrated properly. They are usually
brighter and more contrast than they should be. That's why 505 pictures
look oversaturated, while they are perfectly balanced. SONY made
counter-compensation for that - Duh !
2. This is interesting. 505 pictures lack "blue". I'm not sure if it was
noticeable. But the blue histogram is slightly shifted to the left of
green and red. That's why you saw dazzling flowers and plants with 505
;-) Now, 505V seems to have fixed it. Well, is this just white-balance
setting ? I noticed it from both in-door and out-door shots.
3. 505 has kind of flat histogram shape while 505V has steep peaks. I am
just speculating that the firmware may be doing some kind of histogram
based mappings inside ( or gamma correction ) and the algorithm changed.

My conclusion - 505 creates more colorful pictures. 505V has more precise
white-balance.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Pondria, Great job of detective work. Avery uneducated question is does your conclusion re; your firwwork photo analysis seem to suggest that there many be differences between individual new 505v cameras?
pondria said:

pondria said:
pondria said:
There have been active discussions going on regarding if 505 creates more
vivid or colorful images than 505V. I analyzed the Histograms of the
similar photos taken by two camera with Matrox Inspector V2.0. I got the
samples from Brent Boren's Zing album:
http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293947523 .I assume that the photos are
not altered out of the cameras. If the shots are taken apparently
different lighting conditions, I didn't use them.
Now, I am pretty surprized at the results. I can see common or consistent
patterns from the histograms. For example, the following two histograms
are for the 505Image5 and 505VImage5 on his album. My analysis follows
the picture.

http://www.zing.com/picture/p83f4229ccb32d28b937050e62373120f/ff97ec24.gif.orig.gi f
1. 505 histograms are distributed from 0 to 255 while 505V range is
smaller. This is common for almost every picture that I investigated. In
other words, 505 INDEED creates more vivid and colorful pictures ! I
think this is firmware diff. Here is my speculation. Usually, ordinary
color monitors and TV's are not calibrated properly. They are usually
brighter and more contrast than they should be. That's why 505 pictures
look oversaturated, while they are perfectly balanced. SONY made
counter-compensation for that - Duh !
2. This is interesting. 505 pictures lack "blue". I'm not sure if it was
noticeable. But the blue histogram is slightly shifted to the left of
green and red. That's why you saw dazzling flowers and plants with 505
;-) Now, 505V seems to have fixed it. Well, is this just white-balance
setting ? I noticed it from both in-door and out-door shots.
3. 505 has kind of flat histogram shape while 505V has steep peaks. I am
just speculating that the firmware may be doing some kind of histogram
based mappings inside ( or gamma correction ) and the algorithm changed.

My conclusion - 505 creates more colorful pictures. 505V has more precise
white-balance.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Very good point ! I'll analyze my other photos more tonight and post the results.
Curt A. said:
pondria said:
I have to take back the conspiracy theory that I fabricated - SONY
incorporated anti-saturation algorithm with 505V ;-). I looked at the
histogram of the firework shots that I took. In the shot, there are
extreme brighness and darkness with some colors. The histogram came out
as it should. There are dominant peaks at 255. There is no forbidden
region.

Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
I'm not purposefully being difficult. :)

But I'm not sure how this conclusion could necessarily be reached. We're talking about two totally different kinds of shots, metering and exposure (fireworks versus the other shots you looked at with the histogram).
pondria said:
Curt A. said:
pondria said:
I have to take back the conspiracy theory that I fabricated - SONY
incorporated anti-saturation algorithm with 505V ;-). I looked at the
histogram of the firework shots that I took. In the shot, there are
extreme brighness and darkness with some colors. The histogram came out
as it should. There are dominant peaks at 255. There is no forbidden
region.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
You seem to be right. As Curt A. suggested, I looked at my own images. guess what ! All of them I investigated have continuous distribution from 0 to 255. So, my original theoy was completely wrong. Then I have to ask Brent Boren what were his settings to take the 505V comparison shots or whether he altered the images somehow. As you may have seen my commnents on the Fruite shots of 70 and 505V, 505V generates more true colors.
Ulysses said:
But I'm not sure how this conclusion could necessarily be reached. We're
talking about two totally different kinds of shots, metering and exposure
(fireworks versus the other shots you looked at with the histogram).
pondria said:
Curt A. said:
pondria said:
I have to take back the conspiracy theory that I fabricated - SONY
incorporated anti-saturation algorithm with 505V ;-). I looked at the
histogram of the firework shots that I took. In the shot, there are
extreme brighness and darkness with some colors. The histogram came out
as it should. There are dominant peaks at 255. There is no forbidden
region.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Hi pondria,
Pondria #13290 said:
Then I have to ask
Brent Boren what were his settings to take the 505V comparison shots or
whether he altered the images somehow.
Click to expand...
Images were not altered in any way. Both cameras were set to the default autoexposure mode. Some shots were taken in macro focus, and I seem to remember taking some shots with spot metering (I would have to look through the 505V EXIF info to verify this).

Lighting: All indoor shots were taken at night with the same ambient lighting conditions. The shots from the garage (paint cans, saw, etc.) were all taken under fluorescent lighting both with and without flash. The house shots were all taken under incandescent lighting both with and without flash (image3 was the only incandescent shot taken without flash).

Brent
 
No, your English is just fine. It took time to digest. It's difficult to believe that s70 is the third at the resolution. Not that I don't believe the data but I wonder why the data is not aligned with the common perception. The color reproduction is also something that needs more explanation to understand what is measured how. But anyway, thank you for the data !
Andreas P. said:
pondria said:
Please. We are all iterested.
Click to expand...
Hmh. So it seems my english is terrible? Because there are no comments?!
Click to expand...
 
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