"Big Pig" <big_cochino@go.com> wrote in message

news:8b7fce41.0312141818.24c679d5@posting.google.com...

> "David Ruether" <rpn1@no-junk.cornell.edu> wrote:

> > The edge resolution and illumination evenness in the

> > image and overall color fidelity (not to mention low-light

> > range and better ability to render near-vertical lines smoothly)

> > is superior in the Sony cameras you mention.

> David,

>

> I respectfully disagree in regard to your assessment above about

> "illumination evenness". In my opinion, and I regularly use both

> the VX2000 & the MX3000, one of the MX3000's strengths is it's

> ability to handle contrast. Note the difference in the girl's

> face in the example photo web page below. Which one looks most

> "natural" to you....honestly?

>

> http://www.dvworld.com.tw/product/panasonic_mx3000_vs_tb02.htm

>

> Yes...yes...I know that one can adjust the settings to correct

> for the Sony's over exposure, but these tests were done in complete

> auto mode to showcase the difference between the cameras when

> totally unadjusted.

Uh, this URL is for both the flower images and the girl's face - and in the

flower images, the differences are quite clear, and they "clearly" favor the

two Sony entrants over the MX3000. If you look at these, the Panasonic

has very little differentiation in the red flower - it is just a mass of the same

bright red (both Sonys [especially the VX2000] show tonal variation in

the flower). Look also at the shadow areas of the leaves - in the MX3000

image, the shadow areas go black; in the Sony images, shadow detail is

retained (again, with the VX2000 being better). People often like overly

contrasty video images, mistaking it for sharpness; I prefer to see a greater

tonal range, and I prefer to depend on inherent resolution in the image for

the appearance of the presence of picture fine detail. Exaggerated contrast

is a characteristic also of the GL1, the TRV950, and most 1-CCD

cameras; greater tonal range is characteristic of better cameras...

As for the face, the exposure differences predominate, with the color and

tonality of the VX2000 being preferable to the MX3000, and TRV900

being second best, but with some tendency to burn out the highlights. As

for face color, none is perfect, but the slightly too red VX2000 and the

nearly-neutral (but a bit too light in the highlights) of the TRV900 are

preferable to the cyan tinge of the MX3000 face image. I'm surprised to

see this predominance of blue-green in the MX3000 image in this sample,

since the MX3000 often tends strongly toward red...

BTW, as for "illumination evenness", this is the ability to present a uniformly

even tone in the image when shooting an even subject tone - in other words

(for example), a sky does not show darkening towards edges unless this

occurs in the subject - and these samples do not reveal illumination evenness

characteristics for these cameras...

On a monitor set up to best-match a good monitoring TV, this is what I

found with these images on that monitor (and the VX2000 appears to have

the best exposure of the three, with the MX3000 having the worst). BTW,

the VX2000 face image shows camera motion; the other two do not. These

are not ideally set up samples, but they still show useful characteristics - but

these definitely show me the order of image quality to be 1) VX2000, 2)

TRV900, 3) MX3000...

--

David Ruether

d_ruether@hotmail.com

http://www.David-Ruether-Photography.com