I did a comparison of high ISO images between the E1, E300, 20D, istDs
and D70 recently. To this I've added 400 iso images from the E1 and
E300, both out of the camera and then filtered with Noise Ninja.
My thinking in doing this exercise is that much has been made of the
poor high ISO performance of the E300. But comparisons have always been
made straight out of the camera, and I would always use a noise
reduction utility so it seemed to me a more useful comparison to make
after noise reduction.
Things to point out are:
I've used sample images from stevesdigicams.com, and unfortunately the
E300 images he took seem to be slightly underexposed. This in itself
will lead to more noise in an image. Not much to be done about this.
I have not taken steps to adjust for the different resolutions - I've
just cropped at 72dpi showing actual pixels - again this will work
against the E300, compared to the E1.
I tried to keep my messing around to a minimum so I used NN at whatever
it decided was the best approach after an image scan and used auto
levels. I'm sure better results are possible.
After I put my original comparison on dpreview someone told me they had
better results with NoiseWare, so I tried myself and have to agree with
the settings the software picks. I've put one of these in to show the
difference.
http://homepage.mac.com/royalljames/PhotoAlbum28.html
So as to the E300 having lower noise than the E1 at iso400; it doesn't
appear to from the out of the camera images, but this could well be
down to the resolution and exposure.
The E300 does have worse noise at higher ISO, but I just don't think
it's that big a deal, particularly when compared to film at similar
ISOs. It is extremely good value for money, especially as the kit lens
seems to be so good. And it's one of the smallet DSLRs out there. I'm
going to take Walt's view though and buy with the 14-54 lens as the
E300 is just becoming available as body only. Whatever camera I buy is
going to be bettered and I'm resigned to replacing it in a few years,
but the lens will not be outdated so quickly. Plus the extra speed
suits me, and it's only a difference of a bit extra weight.
Whatever I get at least I won't have to sit for hours feeding the
scanner any more - I thought the modern computer age was meant to rid
the human race of repetative, production line type, mind numbing monkey
work like that!
And I do intend to keep the OM4 for slides (my camera club still
includes them in competitions) and OM2n for b/w as without the flash
shoe and with a 50/1.8 it can't be beaten for size as a take anywhere
combo.
James
On 22 Jan 2005, at 6:29 am, Chris Barker wrote:
>
> I'll have a look, thanks CH.
>
> Chris
>
> On 22 Jan 2005, at 1:11, C.H.Ling wrote:
>
>> Actually, I mainly refer to his comment about the noise level of
>> E-300, I
>> have seen some side to side comparision of both E-1 and E-300 at
>> ISO400, it
>> looks like that the E-300 has even lower noise.
>>
>> C.H.Ling
>
>
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