Does this look right to you?
Discussion
After many years with my trusty Ixus 800, I thought I'd upgrade this year.
The usual fortnight was spent on the web, reading every review I could find. In the end I plumped for a Sony HX20V, which has a great range of features, cracking optical zoom and got rave reviews about image quality. I took it on holiday last week and it appeared to have taken some great pictures. However, now that I am back and editing the pictures, this is what I find (100%, cropped):
To me, this looks really blocky, almost as it a watercolour effect was being used. I don't see the point in 18M pixels if there is so much noise I could have taken the picture with a calculator. For reference, the settings the camera used were:
1/1600 sec
F3.5
ISO 100
Zoomed almost all the way out
The full photo (2 of the kids aren't mine, hence the blurring):
Really grateful for any thoughts anyone has. The results are the same on all camera settings, for unedited pictures in a range of colours, focal lengths etc.
The usual fortnight was spent on the web, reading every review I could find. In the end I plumped for a Sony HX20V, which has a great range of features, cracking optical zoom and got rave reviews about image quality. I took it on holiday last week and it appeared to have taken some great pictures. However, now that I am back and editing the pictures, this is what I find (100%, cropped):
To me, this looks really blocky, almost as it a watercolour effect was being used. I don't see the point in 18M pixels if there is so much noise I could have taken the picture with a calculator. For reference, the settings the camera used were:
1/1600 sec
F3.5
ISO 100
Zoomed almost all the way out
The full photo (2 of the kids aren't mine, hence the blurring):
Really grateful for any thoughts anyone has. The results are the same on all camera settings, for unedited pictures in a range of colours, focal lengths etc.
NoisyGriff said:
Really grateful for any thoughts anyone has. The results are the same on all camera settings, for unedited pictures in a range of colours, focal lengths etc.
Yeah - first thoughts: what in-camera processing settings, either by default or user-selected, are in action? Obviously the default settings might be much more aggressive in one camera ( and one camera brand ) compared to another....sharpening, saturation, noise reduction et cetera ....... (or am I missing the point and these were RAW?)Where is the focus point? The near child is probably close to the front edge of the DoF range and being off to one side may not be in the sharpest part of the FOV. Add aggressive NR and it won't help - especially with that sort of hair detail.
Is the camera trying to do any Face Recognition too? If so there woould seem to be plenty of scope for confusion in that composition - the sort of real world shooting variable that I have my doubts can be well handled by FR technology.
On the other hand, though it doesn't look great at the zoomed in level does it sort of look aceptable at normal size and distance? (I assume that it the are options in the settings you have it set to the best quality image available?)
Is the camera trying to do any Face Recognition too? If so there woould seem to be plenty of scope for confusion in that composition - the sort of real world shooting variable that I have my doubts can be well handled by FR technology.
On the other hand, though it doesn't look great at the zoomed in level does it sort of look aceptable at normal size and distance? (I assume that it the are options in the settings you have it set to the best quality image available?)
K12beano said:
eah - first thoughts: what in-camera processing settings, either by default or user-selected, are in action? Obviously the default settings might be much more aggressive in one camera ( and one camera brand ) compared to another....sharpening, saturation, noise reduction et cetera ....... (or am I missing the point and these were RAW?)
The images are not RAW and I cannot see any settings anywhere that process the shot before download onto the computer.I know that to get 18MP onto a sensor small enough to fit this sort of camera and lens could make the images noisy, but this is just daft. This is another 100% taken direct from the camera:
There are no straight lines and no detail. Do you think the camera could be faulty or is this what I should expect from such a camera? That would be frustrating, as it is larger than the Ixus it replaces and about 6 years younger!
LongQ said:
Where is the focus point? The near child is probably close to the front edge of the DoF range and being off to one side may not be in the sharpest part of the FOV. Add aggressive NR and it won't help - especially with that sort of hair detail.
Is the camera trying to do any Face Recognition too? If so there woould seem to be plenty of scope for confusion in that composition - the sort of real world shooting variable that I have my doubts can be well handled by FR technology.
On the other hand, though it doesn't look great at the zoomed in level does it sort of look aceptable at normal size and distance? (I assume that it the are options in the settings you have it set to the best quality image available?)
Good thoughts. The camera does do face recognition, but that is all turned off. Everything else is set to the best quality. The image in my post above was definitely focused on the girl's head. It does almost look acceptable when viewing the whole photo, but on others it is very obvious. It is almost as though too much compression has been applied or the images are massively over-sharpened.Is the camera trying to do any Face Recognition too? If so there woould seem to be plenty of scope for confusion in that composition - the sort of real world shooting variable that I have my doubts can be well handled by FR technology.
On the other hand, though it doesn't look great at the zoomed in level does it sort of look aceptable at normal size and distance? (I assume that it the are options in the settings you have it set to the best quality image available?)
At a bit of a loss...
NoisyGriff said:
There are no straight lines and no detail. Do you think the camera could be faulty or is this what I should expect from such a camera? That would be frustrating, as it is larger than the Ixus it replaces and about 6 years younger!
As I read this review (or at least certain parts of it) from dpreview it became clear that you seem to have captured exactly what the camera delivers.http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sony-cybershot-dsc...
Oh dear.
Doesn't look good at all, esp given the conditions/ settings.
No real idea how to decipher the issues here and make suggestions about remedial action. Most cameras have an (unofficial) group on flickr, you could post in there to see how yours compares to others the same.
Different conditions but here's 100% crop (w/ exif) from my iPhone to show what's possible on smaller sensors. It's the only pic I've got really with a tangle of hair in it to compare against yours. Much closer to the subject (my youngest, with a mouthful of cake as the principle subject...) but I don't think the distance should be causing too much of an issue to the quality of your camera's image rendering.
Direct link: http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8322/8000929251_330f...
No real idea how to decipher the issues here and make suggestions about remedial action. Most cameras have an (unofficial) group on flickr, you could post in there to see how yours compares to others the same.
Different conditions but here's 100% crop (w/ exif) from my iPhone to show what's possible on smaller sensors. It's the only pic I've got really with a tangle of hair in it to compare against yours. Much closer to the subject (my youngest, with a mouthful of cake as the principle subject...) but I don't think the distance should be causing too much of an issue to the quality of your camera's image rendering.
Direct link: http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8322/8000929251_330f...
This is quite interesting as I was asked to look at some picture a colleague took with his new Sony camera, which he had bought because the specs were good and he his results were very similar to yours, the images just lacked in sharpness. He was shooting on auto mode, so it could have been the camera making poor decisions, but surely something should have been sharp!
Is it the case that images from Sony cameras just need a bit of sharpening?
Is it the case that images from Sony cameras just need a bit of sharpening?
Craikeybaby said:
This is quite interesting as I was asked to look at some picture a colleague took with his new Sony camera, which he had bought because the specs were good and he his results were very similar to yours, the images just lacked in sharpness. He was shooting on auto mode, so it could have been the camera making poor decisions, but surely something should have been sharp!
Is it the case that images from Sony cameras just need a bit of sharpening?
In this case (and as the DPReview review observes) Rob D hit the target with his observation about noise reduction algorithms. Is it the case that images from Sony cameras just need a bit of sharpening?
Keep the images small and they should look OK. Dive in and peak at pixels and there is scope for disappointment. Sharpening will be unlikely to help much (or at all) once the fine detail has been blurred away.
At very high ISO such a compromise may be acceptable. At base ISO (100) as reported by DPR and the OP it is, to my mind, a joke and one has to wonder what reason Sony have for such a strong NR implementation at that level.
No idea if it can be adjusted through a preference setting but if it can a huge change should be applied.
Does that camera have an auto-iso setting which overrides what you believe to be an ISO100 setting?
http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/sony/dsc_hx20v-r...
If you look a the samples above ISO3200, the smudging looks awfully familiar....
http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/sony/dsc_hx20v-r...
If you look a the samples above ISO3200, the smudging looks awfully familiar....
UPDATE...
Thank you for your input - really appreciate the time people have taken to think about this snag.
I took the camera back into John Lewis, who spent ages with me looking through images already taken and taking more to confirm that this was a consistent issue. The outcome was that this example must be faulty, so would you like to replace it? Yes - but I was keen to take some pictures with another example just to confirm that the issue wasn't with all HX20Vs. The display model was exactly the same. We were all amazed by the lack of clarity, even at low ISO.
With that in mind, it's time for a change. Having looked around a little more and played with one in the shop, the replacement will be a Canon S100 - that looks much better!
Fingers crossed, that will be a problem-free experience. I've had a bunch of Canons in the past and they have all been excellent.
Thank you for your input - really appreciate the time people have taken to think about this snag.
I took the camera back into John Lewis, who spent ages with me looking through images already taken and taking more to confirm that this was a consistent issue. The outcome was that this example must be faulty, so would you like to replace it? Yes - but I was keen to take some pictures with another example just to confirm that the issue wasn't with all HX20Vs. The display model was exactly the same. We were all amazed by the lack of clarity, even at low ISO.
With that in mind, it's time for a change. Having looked around a little more and played with one in the shop, the replacement will be a Canon S100 - that looks much better!
Fingers crossed, that will be a problem-free experience. I've had a bunch of Canons in the past and they have all been excellent.
NoisyGriff said:
Having looked around a little more and played with one in the shop, the replacement will be a Canon S100 - that looks much better!
Fingers crossed, that will be a problem-free experience. I've had a bunch of Canons in the past and they have all been excellent.
Hmm. I know ther are several S90/S95 users posting here and I seem to recall there are some S100 users around but I don't remember seeing many examples of their results. So if you have an opportunity post something, especially from a RAW file, that would be of some interest to quite a few here. Fingers crossed, that will be a problem-free experience. I've had a bunch of Canons in the past and they have all been excellent.
Should be much more satisfying than the pics you posted earlier.
LongQ said:
Hmm. I know ther are several S90/S95 users posting here and I seem to recall there are some S100 users around but I don't remember seeing many examples of their results. So if you have an opportunity post something, especially from a RAW file, that would be of some interest to quite a few here.
Should be much more satisfying than the pics you posted earlier.
Will do. Should be much more satisfying than the pics you posted earlier.
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