I did some exposure and noise testing over the weekend, comparing the results of the F717 with the Konica KD500Z because it seemed to me that my F717 exposures generally looked noisier in shadow areas. What I found was that the Konica's centerweighted AE matched my Sekonic L328 incident meter's readings almost exactly in three different lighting while the Sony F717 in P and A modes (those are the only ones I tested) tended to evaluate the required exposure to between 0.3 and 0.7 EV less for the same scene and lighting. Unfortunately, my F707 is on loan to a friend who lives in NY so I cannot test against it directly, but I suspect the same would be true.
How does this relate? Well, some of the 'pop' of the F707 images comes from lower apparent noise and full saturation, which requires with adequate exposure past a threshold point. The F717 has tested to have a little less red sensitivity... It looks like they've calibrated the meter to read a bit higher as well. As a result, the F717 images have a flatter, more neutral appearance but they show noise more rapidly.
I walked around with the camera yesterday on A setting, set the ISO to 100 and the exposure compensation to +0.3EV, and didn't touch it after that. After making a variety of exposures in a range of lighting situations, I'd say that the overall noise and color balances look much better, much more pop to them like the KD500Z or F707. The histograms all look significantly better than the average with EV compensation set on 0. It may be that setting the sharpness to -1 will help even further to ensure a smooth, finely textured, low noise image, but it might require a bit more post-processing to get the kind of sharpness you are looking for.
Give it a shot, I'm interested to hear others' experiences with this adjustment.
Godfrey
(A sidebar to the F717 improvement is that I found the KD500Z produces images identical in noise and density when compensation is set to -1.5EV if compared with the F717 at ISO 200 and 0 compensation. That means I can get a little more low light versatility out of the Konica by just telling it to underexpose, thereby keeping the shutter speed a little higher. The images show some noise but they're quite usable.)
Have you tried increasing the in-cam sharpening? I use 0 because
I'm concerned more about the noise. But, when I used to use +1 or
occassionaly +2 the pics were definitely more 707-ish (sharpness
and saturation).
I see a big difference between the two cameras. Especially on
images "right from the camera". There's just no equal to the
707's output. But, I think I get an end result, with the 717,
that's every bit as sharp, and has less noticeable noise, than my
707 edits.
. I just want to duplicate the SHARPNESS of my old 707 which I miss dearly. It isn't the colors that bother me, it is the image sharpness. I have to really hit the UM to get anywhere near the quality of sharpness of my 707. Almost like the focus is always just a "tad" off.