Should I return this Sony RX100 ? Need advice !

Iuma said:

Iuma wrote:

I got my RX100 a few weeks ago and I'm wondering if it's a bad copy or not. I see lots of great shots on this forum with great sharpness and details. But my photos are always soft and top right corner is really soft. I never managed to get a good close up shot either. Do you think I should return it ?




Shooting in the street, focus is on the girl's head in the center




100% crop




Beautiful church with lots of details




100% crop of the focus area




I expected this one to be really sharp




100% crop




Testing for corner sharpness




100% crop. Left crop is from top center, right crop is from top right

I'm OK with corners being a bit soft. 20 MP + 1 inch sensor in a so small body can't break the laws of physics. But here I see a huge amount of decentering... Or maybe I'm expecting too much ?

Click to expand...

I don't see anything wrong with the first photo, cloudy day, ISO 400, this is a 100% crop of 20MPs you're looking at. Second looks fine too, but most people set their RX100 sharpness to +2. Do try it as they come out less sharpened in-camera than other cameras. For the third I'm not sure...

The last one definitely has a problem. Unfortunately mine has it too, again on the top right corner. I personally decided to keep it as stopping down to f/7-f/8 reduces the problem to minor. I just thought I can't be bothered returning 2-3 cameras till I find a perfect one. So when I use full zoom and there's detail in the top right corner I try to stop it down. But I would perfectly understand you if you want to return it.

Iuma said:

Iuma wrote:

I got my RX100 a few weeks ago and I'm wondering if it's a bad copy or not. I see lots of great shots on this forum with great sharpness and details. But my photos are always soft and top right corner is really soft. I never managed to get a good close up shot either. Do you think I should return it ?


















100% crop. Left crop is from top center, right crop is from top right

I'm OK with corners being a bit soft. 20 MP + 1 inch sensor in a so small body can't break the laws of physics. But here I see a huge amount of decentering... Or maybe I'm expecting too much ?

Click to expand...

I don't have the cam, but Yes I would RETURN it Immediately. I would return a $200 cam for that matter. Unacceptable lens! That is not a minor issue but a major one IMO. Then again...I once wanted a P&S for my wife and bought 7 cameras taking a roll of film/having it developed/ till I found the cam that gave great pics!


--
Bill
Bill's Photo's

Hmm, the picture with that woman is backfocused, detail of the background is quite fine. AF cameras often snap on subjects near the AF frame if these subjects have stronger contrast than the subject that should be focused on. So there I see no problem of the camera.

On the last sample I wonder if that the real performance of a RX100. Maybe you got a bad sample, maybe you have to stop down little more in full tele!

Below there is a sample of my first RX100 (top) and below of the second. It had both cameras at the same time and the crop was taken of the very same position in the left middle of the frame. No question my first RX100 was returned!

Unluckily we often see sample variation, even in high price lenses from Nikon, Canon and others.

I think I was expecting too much from the RX100 in not-so-good light. It's not a DSLR after all but sometimes it can come close and that's awesome for a compact.

Anyway, judging from all your responses, I've decided to return it. Maybe I could have lived with the decentering but for 650$ I want a good lens. I hope my second copy will be as good as yours Roland ! I should receive it at the end of the week.

Tried to reproduce this phenomenon and here is the result: really mushy in the top right corner @ full tele

I also still testing the cam. The best camera in the size I have ever used. Still not sure if I am completely happy with it (given the price tag).

Hunibu said:

Hunibu wrote:

Tried to reproduce this phenomenon and here is the result: really mushy in the top right corner @ full tele

Click to expand...

Hmm, yes, right corner definitely worse than left.

Hunibu said:

I also still testing the cam. The best camera in the size I have ever used. Still not sure if I am completely happy with it (given the price tag).

Click to expand...

I feel you...I was on the same situation but I was leaving for holidays two days after I bought it so didn't have time to exchange it and I really wanted to have it with me. So I kept it after I saw that stopping it down to f/8 makes it a lot better. Did you try this? Normally I would've returned it immediately, I had returned my previous camera (a Canon SX220) 3 times, only the fourth copy had a properly centered lens! And it was a lot cheaper too. But with the RX100 I was so thrilled by the detail overall that I decided to keep the damn thing since it only affects the full tele and is reduced by stopping down. Plus I was leaving and didn't have time.

Even now sometimes I think I should have returned it, but overall I have had a lot of fun with this toy and have forgotten about this imperfection.

Now I don't know, if you can easily exchange it, then why not? If I were you I'd return it and try another one. Let me know how it goes.

P.S. Also the corner has to be far away for this to become a problem. If the detail in the corner is closer than the center/focus area, then the corner goes in focus and no problem, simple optics I presume I didn't have any photo like that from my holiday, but maybe I was subconsciously avoiding them!

I choose between the RX100 and Fuji X100. Now that the X100S is out, you can find the X100 for around 800. Its a great camera with a really nice lens on it....if you can live without the zoom.

My problem is probably not having a reasonable comparator. I have not owned a compact camera in five years and exclusively shoot with Olympus m43 primes. I might simply be expecting too much from the camera. Some pictures are awesome, but some turn our really mushy.

High ISO is also very variable. In some situation ISO3200 delivers astonishing quality, in other situation ISO 400 looks like my cellphone cam. Image stabilization also seems to be somewhat less effective than I expected.

And then there are shots like this one @ ISO125 f5.6 1/320th that turn out sub-optimal for no apparent reason IMHO. Correct me if I am wrong, but the center crop looks almost like motion blur (which should be impossible at this focal length/shutter speed).

I am not saying there is something wrong with my cam, it could simply be that the RX100 is a bit more of a character

Hunibu said:

Hunibu wrote:

My problem is probably not having a reasonable comparator. I have not owned a compact camera in five years and exclusively shoot with Olympus m43 primes. I might simply be expecting too much from the camera. Some pictures are awesome, but some turn our really mushy.

High ISO is also very variable. In some situation ISO3200 delivers astonishing quality, in other situation ISO 400 looks like my cellphone cam. Image stabilization also seems to be somewhat less effective than I expected.

And then there are shots like this one @ ISO125 f5.6 1/320th that turn out sub-optimal for no apparent reason IMHO. Correct me if I am wrong, but the center crop looks almost like motion blur (which should be impossible at this focal length/shutter speed).

I am not saying there is something wrong with my cam, it could simply be that the RX100 is a bit more of a character

Click to expand...

Hey there,

Well I certainly see some variability with the results from my RX100 too. Whether it is greater than other cams is the question I guess. I think at least part of this impression we've got might be that we do expect too much from it and thus end up scrutinizing each shot more than with other cams? I don't know.

In this center crop you're right, it does seem as if there was some vertical shake of some sort, horizontal edges seem slightly blurred..very weird. Vertical edges are fine. Corners are OK I think given the center "shake". There is also more grain than I would expect, but to be honest I never pixel-peep at rainy day shots. I don't know what to say. One thing I would do for sure would be to take the exact same shot with the 4/3 camera and compare. Then we could see if the variability also exists in that camera and you just didn't look for it, or if it's more of an RX100 issue, or your RX100 copy?

Overall I think you should be expecting more or less the same from your RX100 as you would from a 4/3 camera (unless it's a current generation 16MP one). I would do some comparison shots first, but given the fact that you seem to have a decentered lens (at full tele), I would maybe exchange it anyway.

Thanks for the comments, folks. I was shooting some more today in nicer weather. The right corner is mushy at different focal lengths and stopping down to f8 does not eliminate (but only reduces) the problem.

Also found a purple tree one of the pics And that is not even in the corner.

Long story short, the cam is going back. The lens is too off for my taste. Might pick one up from Best-Buy and give it a try later today and hope for a less troubled copy.