Now, it's not noise-FREE, but, that looks damn good for 6400 no? Almost noise free? I'd have no problem making big prints out of that without any additional NR. I'm assuming these have no additional NR on them, and that they're actually what they say they are.
There's also a couple 25,600 shots posted that do look quite noisy, but not unsuable, especially if you run some NR on them.
There's a good amount of noise in the shadows (look at his shirt) which is where you generally see it. It'll be nice to see some raw samples with chroma noise reduction
fugu wrote:
There's a good amount of noise in the shadows (look at his shirt) which is where you generally see it. It'll be nice to see some raw samples with chroma noise reduction
Would you call that a 'good' amount? There's clearly some there, but this is 6400... this looks like ~2 stop advantage over the 5d, does it not?
The term "noise-free" makes me laugh. There's always noise, even in low-ISO shots (where it tends to hide in the shadows). Having the noise inconspicuous to the level that you don't care about it is great, but it won't be "noise-free".
I'm seeing a lot more color noise in your shadows than in the 5d2's. Maybe it's due to more aggressive NR in camera? Are your shots 100% crops? The second link you've posted does seem to be very close. Granted, it's also 10 v. 21mp, so I'm still pretty impressed.
ajkessler wrote:
I'm seeing a lot more color noise in your shadows than in the 5d2's. Maybe it's due to more aggressive NR in camera? Are your shots 100% crops? The second link you've posted does seem to be very close. Granted, it's also 10 v. 21mp, so I'm still pretty impressed.
The OP's example photo is VERY nicely lit, hiding a lot of noise. I want to see more photos with more shadows to see its true dynamic range.
Will Patterson wrote:
The OP's example photo is VERY nicely lit, hiding a lot of noise. I want to see more photos with more shadows to see its true dynamic range.
It is very nicely exposed. Still nice to see what this is capable of.
I understand your reaction to this example. However, the noise is less apparent in the blown out background. It will be much more noticiable in low light / well-exposed high ISO photos.
Noise is not the real issue, it's nothing that a little PP can't take care of. Look how much detail is retained in that shot, and look at the DR.... IMHO that is where it matters. Most people obsess too much over a little chroma noise and whatnot. The sharpness and color rendition is what will make your shot.
It seems to me, based on a small but consistent sample, that 1DsMk3 owners really, really want the 5D II not to outperform the 1DsMk3 at high ISO. This isn't terribly surprising, as somebody who's shelled out nearly $8K for a camera would naturally be put off if a camera costing $5300 less were better in some important way.
That said, I'll reserve judgement on whether it is actually better until I see side-by-side samples from production copies of both bodies. I do think it's telling that the 5D II supports ISO 6400 as a native ISO, but it remains to be seen whether that translates into a real-world difference.
For now I'll point out that DPR has posted some interesting sample photos made with the 5D II, containing large swaths of black and a color chart. Too bad they didn't shoot the same images with a 1DsMk3. Warning, these are links to the full-resolution JPEGs... probably best to open them in a new browser tab.
ISO 3200 is basically noise-free, and looks like ISO 800 on my original 5D:
Finally, ISO 25600. Noise looks roughly equivalent to the results I get when I shoot ISO 3200 on my 5D with -1 EC (a way to approximate ISO 6400 with that camera).
That 3200 shot is really, really good looking. The 6400 shot you linked to looks far more realistic than the one I linked to, but still damn good.
The 25600 doesn't really look good enough for magazine prints (anyone think differently?) I would guess with minor NR they definitely look good enough for web display though.
