It's better than the 7D and the 600D. (650D hasn't been tested, but I'd be surprised if it's better than that.). It's virtually identical to the Pentax K-r.
A little behind the NEX 5N and 7, but not much if you look at the metrics. Similarly behind the Nikon D7000.
It's got better base ISO dynamic range than the 5D Mark III....
Yeah, it's really good. The area where it falls the most behind imo is in dynamic range. Compared to the Pentax K-5, it's almost two stops worse. That's pretty noticeable.
I suspect the sensor generation/ technology in the Sony m43 sensor used in the E-M5 is maybe ahead of what is currently in APS. Seems like maybe we should expect a huge jump in some of the forthcoming APS Sony sensor based cameras. Of course, Olympus - like Pentax- is really good at optimizing so that can't be dismissed either.
It supposedly uses the same Sony sensor! If so, it will be interesting indeed to see how it matches up to the E-M5. Guess Panasonic is bowing to Sony's superiority in sensors.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
Yeah, it's really good. The area where it falls the most behind imo is in dynamic range. Compared to the Pentax K-5, it's almost two stops worse. That's pretty noticeable.
The newest Sony APS-C and full frame sensors have crazy good DR..
But I don't think it's fair to say that it's really falling behind. I mean, the DR on the E-m5 appears to be better than any Canon camera in existence, and I don't hear constant complaints of people with their 5D IIs and IIIs having issues with DR.
One thing I noticed when shooting my E-M5 with the NEX-7 side by side, is that it was virtually impossible to get either camera to have a natural scene where it couldn't get the whole scene in the DR of the camera. I'd imagine the only situations where this would happen is shooting directly into the sun with shaded areas the foreground...but no sensor can capture that in one shot.
For myself, there have only been a handful of cameras in APS size that offered DR I was really happy with (and accustomed to getting from larger sensors - FF and MF) - and all had Sony sensors. In normal scenes, a DR deficiency is most noticeable in the subtle highlight tones, say for instance in white clouds. Such subtlety does not readily show up in a histogram but is very noticeable when comparing output. So, more total DR to me almost always offers a noticeable increase in subtle highlight tones while avoiding too much noise in the shadows (whether that means underexposing a little and pulling the shadows up or exposing to the right - rare with most cameras except the Sony a900 in my experience).
Fantastic performance. Overall it’s even better than the D800 sensor on a per-area basis.
These results explain why people have been so enthusiastic about this sensor over the last few months. I hope for the sake of Micro Four Thirds that photographers don’t stay away because they once used a GF1 and thought it too noisy. This is clearly a different league.
Jman13 wrote:
The newest Sony APS-C and full frame sensors have crazy good DR..
But I don't think it's fair to say that it's really falling behind. I mean, the DR on the E-m5 appears to be better than any Canon camera in existence, and I don't hear constant complaints of people with their 5D IIs and IIIs having issues with DR.
I actually do see and hear a lot of complaints about banding in the 5Dii's shadows, but I agree with you overall. There isn't much between the NEX-7 and OM-D from ISO 200 on, for the most part. Maybe a little in color sensitivity, and the NEX-7 has that ISO 100 option and more resolution, but it's a good showing for the OM-D. Pretty close.
Seeing as how the OM-D has pixels just a little bit smaller than the NEX-7, this may point to a slightly newer tech in the OM-D sensor, or it could just be down to internal processing, sensor topping choice, etc. The NEX-7's color sensitivity and metamarism is higher, so it could be that Sony is using a slightly denser CFA, but who knows?
When you compare the OM-D to the K5, the differences are closer to what one would think, considering the sensor size difference.
In my experience, the OM-D files are great if exposed properly but not as much room to push or pull as my 5N, C3, and 7 files. It clips much sooner. Also noticeably more noise visible in solid areas of colors especially skies. Still, it's incredible for it's sensor size. Add that with big selection of amazing lenses, IBIS, and dramatic tone filter and it's a keeper for me.
I had expected the OM-D sensor to be as good as the Canon 7D but am pleasantly surprised to see that it's actually better.
With this report the OM-D sales will continue to be robust as more skeptics are persuaded that this m43 micro DSLR is a viable alternative to the over-weight APS-C DSLR.
I've been hearing that GH3 output (DR) is better than OM-D ... let's see .
Tariq Gibran wrote:
It supposedly uses the same Sony sensor! If so, it will be interesting indeed to see how it matches up to the E-M5. Guess Panasonic is bowing to Sony's superiority in sensors.
Javier Munoz wrote:
Good performance overall and excellent on m43, but Olympus concept of ISO is rather "creative"
No, actually it is DxO's concept of ISO that is "creative". Olympus ISO is spot on as is its meter. You'll want to read up on what ISO actually is. Articles about that both on DxO and DPR.
What is going on here is that Olympus is protecting highlights more than the other manufacturers. That choice of highlight headroom has noting to do with ISO as the standards specify it. DxO has its own definition of ISO based on the saturation level of the RAW file, there is no standard that specifies that at all they just made it up as it was one useful way to compare sensor performance.
S Dilworth wrote:
Fantastic performance. Overall it’s even better than the D800 sensor on a per-area basis.
These results explain why people have been so enthusiastic about this sensor over the last few months. I hope for the sake of Micro Four Thirds that photographers don’t stay away because they once used a GF1 and thought it too noisy. This is clearly a different league.
Here are some of my quick back-of-napkin calculations of the EM-5 vs the D3s @ ISO 3200 for 18% SNR based on the DxoMark numbers:
D3s: SNR 31.1db, actual measured ISO is 2525
E-M5: SNR 24.1db, actual measured ISO is 3024
The SNR difference is 7db, which is 2 1/3 stops. The E-M5's nominal ISO is 1/3 stop brighter, meaning the actual SNR difference is 6db, about 2 stops. The D3s's FF sensor is 4x the area of the E-M5's 4/3, so it collects 4x the amount of light, which is 2 stops....so it looks like the E-M5's Quantum Efficiency (QE) is very close to the D3s @ 57%, not discounting any CFA differences.
aleksanderpolo wrote:
Both Olympus and Pentax are capable of squeezing more out of the sensor, after getting stuck with Panasonic and Samsung sensors.
I wouldn't say they're really squeezing any more out of the Sony sensor than Pentax is. Sony's own cameras traditionally score a little lower in some metrics than other brands that use their sensors, partly because Sony uses denser CFAs, from what I understand, which makes things a bit noisier.
.