Pen-F : the best Olympus ever for image quality ?

According to who? Not according to dpreview, not according to DxO (1/3 of a stop at best), not according to mirrorless comparison (extensive review that only gives Fuji a lead beyond ISO6400) and where DR of the Em1.2 is visibly better according to them (and noise is worse). not according to Gordon Laing (although that is JPG and not so extensive, but still), not according Petapixel (albeit only measured DR, where the EM1.2 wins from Fuji..again...bnut slightly).

You can't pick and chose DXo when it suits you. DXo clearly shows about 1 stop more DR on the Fuji.

? DxO never ever tested any Fuji. So you are quite right that I cannot pick and chose since there is nothing to pick and chose there.

As for mirroless- they clearly mentioned in their comparison that the shadows could lift more on the Fuji- DR range is total DR. For DXo, ok, 1/3rd of a stop better ISO, though other places have mentioned more, but let's go by Dxo.

Let's look at their conclusion to keep it simple: "In terms of image quality, many will assume that a larger sensor is better, but the E-M1 II proves that Micro Four Thirds can hold its own even in the company of the best APS-C sensors on the market. While high ISO performance remains an advantage for the APS-C X-Trans sensor, particularly past 3200, the Olympus camera doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to dynamic range."

Holding its own against the best APS-c sensors on the market....doesn't sound like your assertion which was and is "The new Sony/Fuji sensor pulls ahead of EM1.2. The ISO difference is about one stop where it normally has been between m43rds and APS-C. And the DR of best APS-C (or even old APS-C like the sensor in Pentax K-5) is much better still."

Or does it...?

So you get 1/3rd better stop ISO on Fuji, ~1 stop better color sensitivity, ~1 stop better DR. That's Dxo.

? No? Where? There is no Dxolabs score. We do have photphotons who do something with Dxo scores....And here is what they found...

First table...Fuji is not better at al at DR

But I have a feeling you are talking about something else may be. Can you  give me a link to DXO tests of the Fuji?

The mirrorless comparison website as good as it was missed the point that if you have more shadow range, well, that's more total DR range.

No. They note more information in the brighter areas on the OMD and more information in the darker areas with the Fuji.

Also: DR of K5 at base ISO is much better. And that is the only thing. It is worse elsewhere..

Actually the K5 still does better DR across the range for the most part, but the print value gives better DR.

Only the printvalue matters really. Note that if you use screenvalue D810 has the same colour sensitivity as the EM1m2 and K5 etc....I used D800E...the printvalue is clearly the better indicator.

K5 is signifcantly better at base ISO and may be ISO200. And then it stops with  about 1/5th off a stop. That is not close at all to your claim and apart from base DR it is never  ever close to even  1/2 a stop.

Only problem there is if you clip highlights the print won't save you. So will have to expose a bit more consciously on the Olympus and rely on more noise at high resolution to sample down to compare. But still, ok, fair point.

https://www.dxomark.com/Cameras/Compare/Side-by-side/Olympus-OM-D-E-M1-Mark-II-versus-Sony-A6500-versus-Olympus-PEN-F___1136_1127_1070

Better DR, better color sensitivity by about that.

BTW, this is the Sony A6500 sensor which is the base the Fuji sensor derives from.

True...but it is not the same. There is variation from camera to camera inspite of the same sensor due to hwo the signal is treated by the electronics.

All of this said, I can say that the PenF is the closest I have ever seen m43rds get on Fuji. I would still rank Fuji higher but I am very satisfied with the PenF raws & jpegs.

Yep it never was a big gap at all. PenF is not lacking in IQ at all.

It's still bizarre the color of PenF at higher ISO's is better than the EM1.2 in some ways. I would imagine some high ISO shots may show this a bit. But yeah, the Em1.2 sensor overall is at least better in some situations than the Pen-F's/GX8.

Not in some ways. In one way but probably in no way. COlour sensititivty...look at the chart..something went wrong here. The base ISO of PenF is ISO91. We can see a value here fro DR, noise and tonal range. But we see no value here for colour sensitivity.

Actually they explained that in their review.

"The PEN-F records the same 23.1-bit color depth at measured ISO 180 (manufacturer 400) as it does at its LOW ISO setting."

No they  explain nothing here. Where is ISO91 gone? Out of the window?

If we take this literally the PenF has no colour range at ISO 91.

That would be a very faulty interpretation

Quite!

When we look at the GX8 sensor as a proxy we see its CS is well below EM1.2. Since the CS of PenF mysteriously is also better than all APS-c and CS is strongly related to DR (when you compare cams and look at DR you can predict the outcome in CS 9 out of 10 times).

But we are looking at the Pen-F, not the GX8.

Bith use the exact same IM279 sensor. Some difference is possible, a huge difference not. And this is a huge difference.

SO The measurement at ISO180 should be at ISO 91, the etc. You can do this in your head looking at the graphs and take GX8 in there too. You can easily see that now the PenF CS graph compares almost identical to the graphs fro DR...A little worse than GX8 at the lower ISO's, a little better at the higher ISO and overall worse than Em1.2 and almost all APS-c sensors.

The graphs are indeed similar to the GX8, *except* in color sensitivity. And this is a highlight that DXo mentions. From my own experience with the PenF, I can indeed say that I noticed something rather strange (for the better) at high ISO. The color sensitivity advantage is at high ISO of 1600 and up.

The few who actually own both PenF and Em1.2 note the latter being the better and they would actually be pleased if they could swap the  sensors....May we can  ask them how it deals with  colours. Having  said that: compared to my GH4 Em1.2 retains colours better at higher ISO and that has been noted in many reviews so it seems to be a trait shared by the 20 MP sensors.

I also saw a comparison through different ISO's of EM1.2 and Pen-F and, yes indeed, somehow the PenF was retained better color in the 3200+ (or was it maybe 5000+) up region. I was pretty surprised.

I wonder where. I know dpreview showed something like that with  ACR beta. Otherwise most reviews conclude the best sensor is the one in  Em1.2 and almost surely GH5. We'll see how that one willl score...

In the end I expected GX8/PenF performance from Em1.2. So actually I am more surprised that the Em1.2 scores so much better on all other parameters (well...MUCH only when it comes to noise).

alexzz wrote:

I'm really surprise but face to face, in DPReview 'Image quality', the Pen-F has better sharpness and better contrast than the EM1 MKII.

At 100 or 3200 iso, in raw or jpeg, ...

So I decide to compare to other Olympus (EM10, EM5, EP5, ...), and everytime the Pen-F gives the best image quality.

Any explanation ?

That if the Pen fits your needs and works for you then there is absolutely no reason to buy an E-M1.

Kinda like asking why the Nikon D810 has better image quality than the D5 at 3 times the price.

Well first of all that CS score is a true outlier which  can happen but I wonder which  cams with  same sensors (GX8 here) have such hugely different scores all over the range.

What makes me more suspiscious is the fact that ISO91 is gone. Not measured? When I move all the scores one position to the left (so ISO180 becomes ISO91) etc we see CS line that sits between GX8 and EM1.2. That seems more likely, but I don't know for sure.

Jorginho wrote:

We are heading for another barrage: the Sony A9. One article after another, Gods gift to the photographic world it seems. Sure I understand it is interesting and exciting, I share this and enjoy what Sony has done. But now here we go...keeping the attention as long as possible just as with A7RII...And Fuji GFX 50S...well...where they could they were trying to deter you there is not other around it.

Where is EM1.2 HiRes RAW shots? Where are the HiRes shots in bulb mode. Where is the comparison between HiRes and D810. Pentax 645Z and Sony A7RII? Not there. Well I can tell you that it would not look good for any of these cams with the possible exception of the 645Z. Then they use a 45 mm f1.8 on a flagship Em1.2 mFT cam...Right.

As has been already pointed out at the aperture they use for their test shots the difference between the 42.5mm F/1.2 and the 45mm F/1.8 are insignificant , why they choose that aperture is a different question .

Hires is not a photo it is an 8 photo composite so why would they compare an 8 shot merge from one camera with a single shot from another ? The hires mode while capable of great results in its niche is very limited in its utility, just as taking multi shot images with other cameras are limited in their utility .

Too coincidental for my liking. No I have no proof, but the list is endless and surely doesn't stop with the above. Sony A6300 overheating...Not a word, not a word on the review only when compared two lines on this serious problem..Etcetc. Yuck.

I actually think given the cost of the E-M1II it was given an easy ride by DPreview considering the rather extensive list of cons and their conclusion "Not so good for Those expecting image quality in-line with comparably priced cameras" does not shout gold award to me

1) You say Fuji and Sony should perform roughtly the same since they use the same substrate. Which I agree with and it is correct.
But these sensors have a different array. One Bayer, the other Xtrans so that is a clear difference and it means colours are treated differently.
2) What I do not agree with is that when it comes to GX8 and PenF, which we know both IM279 we see a huge difference when it comes to colour sensitivity.

Noise, tonal range and dynamic range are within 1/3 of a stop.

Colour sensitivity between the two amounts to 1 stop at ISO200 (ISO200 on GX8 CS = ISO400 DR on PenF) and from that point onwards the gap widens to an enormous size.
CS at ISO3466 on GX8 is 14,3 bits. ISO11200 on PenF is marginally lower at 13,9 bits. That is at least, from the graph 1,5 stops.

Now you say Olympus puts some special sauce on it. Well...it cannot be both. You cannot say Sony A6500 and Fuji are roughly the same so we can  take A6500 as a proxy whereas this absurd difference between PenF and GX8 is attributed to "some special sauce" by Olympus.

Now here is the corrected version where ISO180 value becomes the nonexistant ISO91.

That seems far more logical given these are the exact same sensors...

If there was a ISO91 value I would not have argued. But it is missing where it is not in the other graphs. Moreover you will find no sensors that are exactly the same that have such an enormous gap all along the ISO range...

I have looked at imaging resource which are JPGs though...But I see no colour difference at all between PenF or Em1.2. I can't read what seems to be  Japanese looking at the characters but these look like JPGs too.

But now we do have the RAWs from dpreview. And if anything it seems like GX8 retains its colours a bit better at high ISO than the PenF. Look at the yellows in the various places for instance. GX8 has somewhat deeper colours.

Finally....our friends over at mirrorless comparisons have a quicky between GX8 and PenF...And apart from a different white balance there is no difference to be found in their output (RAW)

GX8 vs PenF

Jorginho wrote:

1) You say Fuji and Sony should perform roughtly the same since they use the same substrate. Which I agree with and it is correct.
But these sensors have a different array. One Bayer, the other Xtrans so that is a clear difference and it means colours are treated differently.
2) What I do not agree with is that when it comes to GX8 and PenF, which we know both IM279 we see a huge difference when it comes to colour sensitivity.

I think it's the IMX 269 used in the GX8 and Pen F.

Noise, tonal range and dynamic range are within 1/3 of a stop.

Colour sensitivity between the two amounts to 1 stop at ISO200 (ISO200 on GX8 CS = ISO400 DR on PenF) and from that point onwards the gap widens to an enormous size.
CS at ISO3466 on GX8 is 14,3 bits. ISO11200 on PenF is marginally lower at 13,9 bits. That is at least, from the graph 1,5 stops.

Now you say Olympus puts some special sauce on it. Well...it cannot be both. You cannot say Sony A6500 and Fuji are roughly the same so we can take A6500 as a proxy whereas this absurd difference between PenF and GX8 is attributed to "some special sauce" by Olympus.

Now here is the corrected version where ISO180 value becomes the nonexistant ISO91.

That seems far more logical given these are the exact same sensors...

If there was a ISO91 value I would not have argued. But it is missing where it is not in the other graphs. Moreover you will find no sensors that are exactly the same that have such an enormous gap all along the ISO range...

I have looked at imaging resource which are JPGs though...But I see no colour difference at all between PenF or Em1.2. I can't read what seems to be Japanese looking at the characters but these look like JPGs too.

But now we do have the RAWs from dpreview. And if anything it seems like GX8 retains its colours a bit better at high ISO than the PenF. Look at the yellows in the various places for instance. GX8 has somewhat deeper colours.

Finally....our friends over at mirrorless comparisons have a quicky between GX8 and PenF...And apart from a different white balance there is no difference to be found in their output (RAW)

GX8 vs PenF

DPR did an awful job of shooting with the E-M1 mk2 in their studio comparison. It's clearly not in focus and they have been asked to retake them from the beginning but they never did for some reason. I'm really not even sure why they got published to begin with when it would have been very easy to reshoot with a better lens/tripod or both. The Pen does look much better and that's because they did a better job.

If one goes by the studio comparison here to buy the Mark2, it would never have sold at all and neither would any other camera if they had done as bad of a job.

Yes! My fault, thx for spotting it and correcting it!

Jorginho wrote:

We are heading for another barrage: the Sony A9. One article after another, Gods gift to the photographic world it seems. Sure I understand it is interesting and exciting, I share this and enjoy what Sony has done. But now here we go...keeping the attention as long as possible just as with A7RII...And Fuji GFX 50S...well...where they could they were trying to deter you there is not other around it.

Where is EM1.2 HiRes RAW shots? Where are the HiRes shots in bulb mode. Where is the comparison between HiRes and D810. Pentax 645Z and Sony A7RII? Not there. Well I can tell you that it would not look good for any of these cams with the possible exception of the 645Z. Then they use a 45 mm f1.8 on a flagship Em1.2 mFT cam...Right.

Too coincidental for my liking. No I have no proof, but the list is endless and surely doesn't stop with the above. Sony A6300 overheating...Not a word, not a word on the review only when compared two lines on this serious problem..Etcetc. Yuck.

Don't know about the Sony A9, but I can talk about the A7ii (regular, not R), as I traded it in on an E-P5 and am now on a Pen F. Much nicer camera to use, less of a headache to carry and the image quality is good enough for me, an amateur. I don't need the headache of carrying a huge amount of gear around. Been there, done that. The Pen F is an awesome camera, with great IS and excellent image quality. However, as has been said, YMMV...