E5 vs other cameras - Studio test shots.

http://www.photographyreview.com
This site does simple camera reviews and a standard studio shot.

http://www.photographyreview.com/samplephotoscrx.aspx



There are many equivalence threads from Nikon and Canon owners explaining the limits of 4/3rds cameras when it comes to depth of field.

The flip side of that is that when you want some depth of field you need to stop down a 4/3rd camera 1 stop less than a crop camera and 2 stops less than a FF camera.

To keep the same shutter speed you need to shoot a crop camera at 1 stop higher iso and a full frame camera at 2 stops higher iso speed.

To compare equivalent high Iso pictures you need to look at:

olympus E5 at a given iso speed (for example iso 800):
http://reviews.photographyreview.com/blog/olympus-e-5-sample-photos/

A crop camera at one stop higher (iso 1600):
http://reviews.photographyreview.com/blog/canon-eos-7d-studio-sample-photos/

http://gallery.photographyreview.com/showgallery.php?mcats=518&si=&what=allfields&name=&when=0&whenterm=&condition=and&crproducts=409329:Nikon+D300 |

A FF camera at 2 stops higher (iso 3200):

http://reviews.photographyreview.com/blog/canon-eos-5d-mark-ii-studio-sample-photos/

http://reviews.photographyreview.com/blog/nikon-d3s-studio-sample-photos/

I think the E5 does really well.

for comparison this is the other Olympus DSLRs:

E-3

http://gallery.photographyreview.com/showgallery.php?mcats=518&si=&what=allfields&name=&when=0&whenterm=&condition=and&crproducts=410541:Olympus+E-3+ |

E-620

http://gallery.photographyreview.com/showgallery.php?mcats=518&si=&what=allfields&name=&when=0&whenterm=&condition=and&crproducts=439417:Olympus+E-620 |

E-30

http://gallery.photographyreview.com/showgallery.php?mcats=518&si=&what=allfields&name=&when=0&whenterm=&condition=and&crproducts=428820:Olympus+E-30 |

E-520

http://gallery.photographyreview.com/showgallery.php?mcats=518&si=&what=allfields&name=&when=0&whenterm=&condition=and&crproducts=418674:Olympus+E-520 |

Add in the advantages of in body IS of all lenses and the E-5 looks really good. I have the PL25mm f1.4. A usable iso 1600 / clean iso 800 and in-body IS will be very useful.

IS does not help will all subjects but is is useful. If it wasn't Canon and Nikon would not use it on their high end lenses.

--
Jon

Looking at the ISO 800 shot, the loss of detail in the bear's fur is rather depressing.

I've seen other E-5 shots that do have fine low-contrast detail at ISO 800, which leads me to guess that the NF was cranked up higher than it should have been.

I'd like to see a NF Off (or Low) E-5 shot of the same scene; I suspect that it'd look a lot better.

mmmmmm.... ugly blue blotches in iso3200 and iso6400 shadows... not seen in other samples until now...

erdipurdi said:

mmmmmm.... ugly blue blotches in iso3200 and iso6400 shadows... not seen in other samples until now...

Click to expand...

I'm guessing these were shot using tungsten lighting, so the blue channel has been amplified quite a bit for white balancing.

Simon

Studio tests are bad - they don't serve any purpose.

As for the NR, I'd stay clear of in-camera NR (or set it to lightest possible) if using JPEG.
Otherwise, for low light shooting, RAW is definitely preferred.
--
Cheers,
Marin

hi john this forums are crazy

few days ago i have seen a comparison E5 Vs 1D mark IV and the photo and comment were that at 3200 iso the noise details was similar

now i just see the 5D MII 3200iso (worse then 1DMIV in noise performance ) that its 100 times better then E5

E5 look like from a compact camera compared to 5DMII

sorry if this is the real difference i doubt someone will spend 1700 euro for a E5

its better compare with a LX5 then with other refelx looking at this site output/tests...

really horrible
--
angel

Im considering purchasing the e5. I'm a bit concerned from the raw samples, ive downloaded. I'm seeing lots of noise in blacks especially, purple, yellow blotches at iso 1000 and above. Even at lower iso, 400, in jpegs high noise is still evident in the blacks. I hope these are just teething problems.

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1022&message=36682414

But it uses a different workflow... NR is OFF and taken care outside of Olympus Viewer 2.

--
Cheers,
John Arvee
http://www.flickriver.com/photos/johnarvee/popular-interesting/

They processed from RAW with Olympus Viewer 2 and it looks like Default NR on Olympus Viewer seems to behave differently than from the image engine from the samples I've seen. If this is the case, update on the software should be in progress.

Well, in any case, it's always better to develop in Olympus Viewer 2 with NR Off and take care of it in other software:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1022&message=36682414

--
Cheers,
John Arvee
http://www.flickriver.com/photos/johnarvee/popular-interesting/

Here are 100% crops of the E-5 test shot against the D3s. The Nikon D3s is still, AFAIK, the "gold standard" in 135 format for low noise, high ISO, capability.

First two crops at ISO 100

Note the playing card logo detail and lettering:





Note the stitching in the foot and the bow:





Then two at ISO 1600

Note that the D3s has now pulled ahead in detail, and the E-5 has colour blotches in the shadows:





Note that the D3s has held onto detail, while the E-5 has colour blotches and detail loss:





My view is that the E-5 at least holds it's own at ISO 100. At ISO 1600, the D3s easily beats the E-5 on detail and also the E-5 has some serious colour blocking / blotching issues.

Another point is that the D3s is slightly over-exposed. I believe this will cause a loss of detail in the D3s shot.*

This is still a pretty impressive performance.

(* While "bobn2" will have to come along and claim that is doesn't to be consistent with his earlier claims. )

boggis the cat said:

Another point is that the D3s is slightly over-exposed. I believe this will cause a loss of detail in the D3s shot.*

Click to expand...

Just like the slightly underexposed E-5 images, this resulted in lack of detail in the shadow parts of every image.

It is obvious that the exposure was different in those images, which in my opinion makes the test and comparison useless.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

This comparison to the D3s is pretty interesting (even though there are WB and exposure differences) None of those differences would be anywhere close to noticeable in 99% of the prints that I make.

I will be very happy if it proves to be that close the the D3s at ISO 1600 in real world usage.

--

...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.

I also can't help noticing that the book is practically unreadable in the Oly images, even though the aperture was set to f/8, which should give enough DOF and detail. This is for any ISO, not just ISO800 and higher. I am pretty sure if I take an image from that distance the book is readable, but I'll have to test to be certain. Never the less, because the images are unevenly exposed the tests have very limited values, if any at all.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

olyflyer said:

It is obvious that the exposure was different in those images, which in my opinion makes the test and comparison useless.

Click to expand...

I disagree that it's useless. It is fairly obvious that the exposure differences (and white balance) aren't enough to make a huge difference over much of the test shots -- the logo on the deck of cards would not be affected by either to any meaningful extent, as an example.

I detect a theme for the E-5: any samples that show the E-5 favourably are the result of flawed tests, favourable opinions are from fanboys, and "moire" can be seen everywhere on E-5 samples (but the same effect on other cameras isn't moire, or isn't really there, or something).

gbbiv said:

This comparison to the D3s is pretty interesting (even though there are WB and exposure differences) None of those differences would be anywhere close to noticeable in 99% of the prints that I make.

Click to expand...

The differences are obvious already at the smallest web size... You have to work hard not to notice them.

gbbiv said:

I will be very happy if it proves to be that close the the D3s at ISO 1600 in real world usage.

Click to expand...

Dream on...

Than again, it depends on what you call "close".
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

olyflyer said:

While the E-5 images seem to be underexposed, both the 7D and the D300 are definitely overexposed, blowing the details in the images.

Click to expand...

"Bob" would claim otherwise. You can argue over it with him when he turns up.

olyflyer said:

I also can't help noticing that the book is practically unreadable in the Oly images, even though the aperture was set to f/8, which should give enough DOF and detail.

Click to expand...

You need your eyesight checked. The text is more legible in the E-5 shots than the D3s.

boggis the cat said:

Another point is that the D3s is slightly over-exposed. I believe this will cause a loss of detail in the D3s shot.*

(* While "bobn2" will have to come along and claim that is doesn't to be consistent with his earlier claims. )

Click to expand...

Indeed I will. More exposure increases signal to noise ratio, which allows an increase in detail, not a loss.
--
Bob

boggis the cat said:

olyflyer said:

While the E-5 images seem to be underexposed, both the 7D and the D300 are definitely overexposed, blowing the details in the images.

Click to expand...

"Bob" would claim otherwise.

Click to expand...

I think that's a deliberate attempt to needle me, "boggis", not that I'm particularly irritated, but just worth noting next time you come over all righteous about your own behaviour.

boggis the cat said:

You can argue over it with him when he turns up.

Click to expand...

The detail doesn't get 'blown' unless the image is into saturation (i.e. the highlights are blown) and then the only blown detail is in the highlights. What dose happen is that the detail is mapped to different brightness levels, so it's harder to make a straightforward comparison, but the detail 9apart from the actually blown highlights) is still all there, in fact, more of it due to the higher SNR, if the so-called 'over exposure' was caused my more exposure and not just a different presentation of the image.
Exposure is very often misunderstood.

Edit: It's difficult to see if the exposure is indeed different, because I can't find the EXIF attached to the file. So, hard to see whether either of you has a point, at all.
--
Bob

boggis the cat said:

olyflyer said:

It is obvious that the exposure was different in those images, which in my opinion makes the test and comparison useless.

Click to expand...

I disagree that it's useless. It is fairly obvious that the exposure differences (and white balance) aren't enough to make a huge difference over much of the test shots the logo on the deck of cards would not be affected by either to any meaningful extent, as an example.

Click to expand...

It was the deck of cards which made it obvious for me that there was something wrong. That's when I started to look at the other parts...

Yes, +1.33EV overexposure, like the D300 images was overexposed with would totally destroys an image, no matter how much you disagree. You should know that, and if you don't, than you should try it out with your camera. In studio tests where you have 100% control over the situation if you are good enough you should be able to produce consistent exposures, not just ad hoc over/underexposed images.

I bet you that if any tester would do the same, i.e. use a Nikon and a Canon camera which is exposed at 0EV and compared with an Oly at +1.33EV the Olympus forum would scream unison against such useless test.

boggis the cat said:

I detect a theme for the E-5: any samples that show the E-5 favourably are the result of flawed tests, favourable opinions are from fanboys, and "moire" can be seen everywhere on E-5 samples (but the same effect on other cameras isn't moire, or isn't really there, or something).

Click to expand...

The pattern I see is that fanboys always try to produce proof of Oly cameras being "near" or some times even "better" than any other brand, preferably an FF. They always try looking for "evidence" and justification to proof that their camera is better than, or almost as good as an FF. I never had that desire, neither when I was an Oly shooter nor now. I don't care if a Canon or Nikon, or a Sony FF is better than my cr@ppy D300s, in fact, not even if the E-5, 7D or the D7000 would turn up to be better in some respect.

Never the less, if a test is not done right than the proof is worthless.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)

boggis the cat said:

olyflyer said:

While the E-5 images seem to be underexposed, both the 7D and the D300 are definitely overexposed, blowing the details in the images.

Click to expand...

"Bob" would claim otherwise. You can argue over it with him when he turns up.

Click to expand...

If he turns up, that's fine, but my comment was not addressed to him, so why drag him in here? If he likes to comment or correct me in any way he is of course welcome, never the less, overexposing an image without reason is wrong.

boggis the cat said:

boggis the cat said:

I also can't help noticing that the book is practically unreadable in the Oly images, even though the aperture was set to f/8, which should give enough DOF and detail.

Click to expand...

You need your eyesight checked.

Click to expand...

I don't think so.

boggis the cat said:

The text is more legible in the E-5 shots than the D3s.

Click to expand...

I didn't compare with the D3s, but the 7D and the D300. Apparently, even though you quoted my text you did not seem to have seen it, so it is probably your eye sight which needs to be checked.
--
Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream.
(Malcolm Muggeridge)