A7RIII from Sony: Dpreview is impressed by Pixel shift

[xps]

As this body is still not available, posted in this subforum.

Dpreview seems to be impressed by this feature....

https://www.dpreview.com/news/5645755619/sony-a7r-iii-pixel-shift-lifts-a-veil-off-your-landscapes

If you modify the studio scene with the 5DSR, the pixelshift feature seems to work quite well.
Not in every area of the picture (seems to create CAs)

 

[raptor3x]

It looks good, although it seems to my eye that Pentax gets the best results out of all the pixel shift implementations as the moment, at least for the studio test scene as presented.

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

It is likely useful for still life photos, its my impression that any movement spoils the effect.

That's a example of how something like the still scene at DPR could mislead less experienced photographers into believing that all their photos will benefit.

I know that some, including me, have a camera support that's bolted down (mine is literally bolted down) In that case I could benefit, except that most of my product photos are drastically downsized for the internet, so my support is bolted down for convenience and to prevent accidental bumps rather than ultra high resolution.

 

[9VIII]

Even Tony Northrup said pixel shift was effectively useless for landscape.
The fastest it can take the four shots is about four seconds. Your effective motion blur is the same as a four second exposure.
Trees, waves, traffic, clouds, all move too much for it to be effective, and good luck getting a human being to sit still enough.

This feature is about as useful as Canon’s dual pixel focus shift.

 

[privatebydesign]

Even Tony Northrup said pixel shift was effectively useless for landscape.
The fastest it can take the four shots is about four seconds. Your effective motion blur is the same as a four second exposure.
Trees, waves, traffic, clouds, all move too much for it to be effective, and good luck getting a human being to sit still enough.

This feature is about as useful as Canon’s dual pixel focus shift.

At least the Canon version has an extra stop of DR in it and is taken at the some exposure, it just takes some work to get it out of the RAW file. But if you do you have wider DR from the 5D MkIV than the Nikon D850 and the Sony A7RIII.

 

[Loswr]

I've shot static landscape scenes. Maybe two of them. Things move, which renders this feature effectively useless outside of the studio.

I'm unsurprised that Rishi loves it, his nose is that special Sony shade of brown.

Having said that, I've used pixel shift in photomicroscopy for a long time. It was quite innovative when implemented on my Zeiss AxioCam...around the turn of the century.

 

[9VIII]

The really funny thing is you could just take a four shot burst in a fraction of a second and use regular multi-shot noise reduction to get most of the same benefit with an order of magnitude less movement in the environment.

I’m actually really surprised that cameras don’t commonly have a super quick automatic bracketing mode.
I’ve seen auto bracketing modes, but they never seem to be very fast. Any 8fps burst camera today should be able to take four shots in half a second (with a different exposure for each frame).

 

[privatebydesign]

The really funny thing is you could just take a four shot burst in a fraction of a second and use regular multi-shot noise reduction to get most of the same benefit with an order of magnitude less movement in the environment.

I’m actually really surprised that cameras don’t commonly have a super quick automatic bracketing mode.
I’ve seen auto bracketing modes, but they never seem to be very fast. Any 8fps burst camera today should be able to take four shots in half a second (with a different exposure for each frame).

I've commented before that has been an unexpected (but obvious with hindsight) benefit of the 1DX MkII over my old 1Ds MkIII's. Shooting brackets fast helps me a lot in post, the less movement of foliage the easier time the software has.

The 1DX MkII can shoot five shot brackets in well under half a second.

 

[9VIII]

The really funny thing is you could just take a four shot burst in a fraction of a second and use regular multi-shot noise reduction to get most of the same benefit with an order of magnitude less movement in the environment.

I’m actually really surprised that cameras don’t commonly have a super quick automatic bracketing mode.
I’ve seen auto bracketing modes, but they never seem to be very fast. Any 8fps burst camera today should be able to take four shots in half a second (with a different exposure for each frame).

I've commented before that has been an unexpected (but obvious with hindsight) benefit of the 1DX MkII over my old 1Ds MkIII's. Shooting brackets fast helps me a lot in post, the less movement of foliage the easier time the software has.

The 1DX MkII can shoot five shot brackets in well under half a second.

Does it actually progressively adjust the shutter speed at maximum burst or do you just spin the command dial while holding down the shutter release?

 

[privatebydesign]

The really funny thing is you could just take a four shot burst in a fraction of a second and use regular multi-shot noise reduction to get most of the same benefit with an order of magnitude less movement in the environment.

I’m actually really surprised that cameras don’t commonly have a super quick automatic bracketing mode.
I’ve seen auto bracketing modes, but they never seem to be very fast. Any 8fps burst camera today should be able to take four shots in half a second (with a different exposure for each frame).

I've commented before that has been an unexpected (but obvious with hindsight) benefit of the 1DX MkII over my old 1Ds MkIII's. Shooting brackets fast helps me a lot in post, the less movement of foliage the easier time the software has.

The 1DX MkII can shoot five shot brackets in well under half a second.

Does it actually progressively adjust the shutter speed at maximum burst or do you just spin the command dial while holding down the shutter release?

If you are in Av it changes shutter speed, if you are in Tv it changes the aperture. If you put safety shift on and set shutter speed preferences it will adjust ISO.

I use it mostly in Av and have it vary shutter speed.

I have also done 9 frame high speed shots with the same settings and averaged them for the combination of higher shutter speed and comparatively low noise, I just haven't had an actual reason to do that on a paid shoot though.

 

[weixing]

The really funny thing is you could just take a four shot burst in a fraction of a second and use regular multi-shot noise reduction to get most of the same benefit with an order of magnitude less movement in the environment.

I’m actually really surprised that cameras don’t commonly have a super quick automatic bracketing mode.
I’ve seen auto bracketing modes, but they never seem to be very fast. Any 8fps burst camera today should be able to take four shots in half a second (with a different exposure for each frame).

I've commented before that has been an unexpected (but obvious with hindsight) benefit of the 1DX MkII over my old 1Ds MkIII's. Shooting brackets fast helps me a lot in post, the less movement of foliage the easier time the software has.

The 1DX MkII can shoot five shot brackets in well under half a second.

Does it actually progressively adjust the shutter speed at maximum burst or do you just spin the command dial while holding down the shutter release?

If you are in Av it changes shutter speed, if you are in Tv it changes the aperture. If you put safety shift on and set shutter speed preferences it will adjust ISO.

I use it mostly in Av and have it vary shutter speed.

I have also done 9 frame high speed shots with the same settings and averaged them for the combination of higher shutter speed and comparatively low noise, I just haven't had an actual reason to do that on a paid shoot though.

Hi,
I thought this is a common feature... just set AEB, high-speed continuous mode and press and hold the shutter button. The camera will auto stop shooting once the bracketing shots is completed. The max number of bracket shots available will be depend on the number your camera can support... M5 is 3 and 7D2 is 7.

Have a nice day.

 

[privatebydesign]

Hi,
I thought this is a common feature... just set AEB, high-speed continuous mode and press and hold the shutter button. The camera will auto stop shooting once the bracketing shots is completed. The max number of bracket shots available will be depend on the number your camera can support... M5 is 3 and 7D2 is 7.

Have a nice day.

Yes it is, not sure why 9VII is new to it. Just that the higher burst rates of newer cameras has an advantage when using it.

 

[raptor3x]

I've shot static landscape scenes. Maybe two of them. Things move, which renders this feature effectively useless outside of the studio.

I'm unsurprised that Rishi loves it, his nose is that special Sony shade of brown.

Having said that, I've used pixel shift in photomicroscopy for a long time. It was quite innovative when implemented on my Zeiss AxioCam...around the turn of the century.

I find it kind of funny that Rishi writes:

[quote author=DPReview]
What's more: Sony's recent lenses have enough resolving power to take advantage of this mode. You see the resolution increase at least partly because the lenses have enough resolving power to take advantage of the extra pixel-level sampling (theoretically, increasing the resolution of any part of the imaging chain has the potential to increase sharpness, but your lens needs to resolve enough to begin with to see the dramatic differences we're seeing here). You can't always take that for granted (see the limited increase in resolution of Pixel Shift modes on Micro Four Thirds cameras in our studio scene, for example).[/quote]

even though the m43 pixel shift models show a much more dramatic increase in resolution than what Sony is showing. They don't reach quite the same final resolution as Pentax or Sony since they're starting with a much lower resolution sensor but the increase is much more noticeable.

 

[moreorless]

I notice the "landscape" chosen was actually a cityscape with limited potential for movement, DPR generally do seem rather suspect for me when Sony products are involved these days.

even though the m43 pixel shift models show a much more dramatic increase in resolution than what Sony is showing. They don't reach quite the same final resolution as Pentax or Sony since they're starting with a much lower resolution sensor but the increase is much more noticeable.

Given that there does seem to be a lot more potential for resolution increases in m43 optics it does seem a little strange there sticking with 20 MP. I spose you could argue that the higher end sales have naturally tended to move towards action shooting with the size saving on optics it offers where lower resolution aids FPS but there seems plenty of room to up things to say 28-30 MP without getting into diminishing returns.

 

[9VIII]

Hi,
I thought this is a common feature... just set AEB, high-speed continuous mode and press and hold the shutter button. The camera will auto stop shooting once the bracketing shots is completed. The max number of bracket shots available will be depend on the number your camera can support... M5 is 3 and 7D2 is 7.

Have a nice day.

Yes it is, not sure why 9VII is new to it. Just that the higher burst rates of newer cameras has an advantage when using it.

Personal experience is limited to the 5D2 at best, and video reviews have never demonstrated this feature (at least not the usual “TCS/Kai/Fro/Northrup” type).
(Actually I do seem to remember seeing a demonstration, but the impressoin given was that the feature was mostly useless, thus my surprise when suddenly I hear someone say they’re reasonably satisfied with it.)

 

[9VIII]

I've shot static landscape scenes. Maybe two of them. Things move, which renders this feature effectively useless outside of the studio.

I'm unsurprised that Rishi loves it, his nose is that special Sony shade of brown.

Having said that, I've used pixel shift in photomicroscopy for a long time. It was quite innovative when implemented on my Zeiss AxioCam...around the turn of the century.

I find it kind of funny that Rishi writes:

[quote author=DPReview]
What's more: Sony's recent lenses have enough resolving power to take advantage of this mode. You see the resolution increase at least partly because the lenses have enough resolving power to take advantage of the extra pixel-level sampling (theoretically, increasing the resolution of any part of the imaging chain has the potential to increase sharpness, but your lens needs to resolve enough to begin with to see the dramatic differences we're seeing here). You can't always take that for granted (see the limited increase in resolution of Pixel Shift modes on Micro Four Thirds cameras in our studio scene, for example).

even though the m43 pixel shift models show a much more dramatic increase in resolution than what Sony is showing. They don't reach quite the same final resolution as Pentax or Sony since they're starting with a much lower resolution sensor but the increase is much more noticeable.
[/quote]

The worst part is that clearly the new G9 has a much better pixel shift implementation, even taking 8 shots it looks much faster than Sony’s 4 second minimum.
If the G9 has a regular 4 shot mode it’s probably much more practical (and it should be able to do regular bracketing at 60fps). Which is not to say that it negates the lack of sensor size on M4/3 (though the pixel shift does sound great for Macro, and Panasonic arguably does the best 4k), but as far as feature implementation goes Sony should be getting hammered for releasing this with such a slow shot to shot pace.

I think “shill” has become too kind of a word to describe the way DPReview behaves with Sony products.

 

[Mikehit]

One problem with FF sensor stabilisation is the momentum from the size of the sensor - it will be much easier for Panasonic/Olympus to change direction of the sensor because the sensor is one quarter the size.

No fanboy-ism, no shills needed - just plain old common sense and an understanding of high school physics.

 

[privatebydesign]

One problem with FF sensor stabilisation is the momentum from the size of the sensor - it will be much easier for Panasonic/Olympus to change direction of the sensor because the sensor is one quarter the size.

No fanboy-ism, no shills needed - just plain old common sense and an understanding of high school physics.

But a small one needs to move faster and be four times more accurate, more high school physics.

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

I've shot static landscape scenes. Maybe two of them. Things move, which renders this feature effectively useless outside of the studio.

I'm unsurprised that Rishi loves it, his nose is that special Sony shade of brown.

Having said that, I've used pixel shift in photomicroscopy for a long time. It was quite innovative when implemented on my Zeiss AxioCam...around the turn of the century.

Back in or around the early1990's, I bought a gadget at EggHead computers (remember them?) It converted video to high resolution still images by merging multiple frames. The principle was basically pixel shift, so a video needed to be hand held rather than on a fixed mount. It consisted of a box with a composite video input and RS-232? output. It required a video where the camera was held steady, but still had a slight movement, the subject could not move. The software then merged frames to put out a image with resolutions as high as 1080 pixels. This was just shortly before Apple released their digital camera, but put out higher resolution images when things went just right(which was not a common happening for me). I used a Panasonic SVH-c camcorder for the video.

 

[Mikehit]

One problem with FF sensor stabilisation is the momentum from the size of the sensor - it will be much easier for Panasonic/Olympus to change direction of the sensor because the sensor is one quarter the size.

No fanboy-ism, no shills needed - just plain old common sense and an understanding of high school physics.

But a small one needs to move faster and be four times more accurate, more high school physics.

And yet it appeared on MFT before FF. Go figure.