Sony NEX5N & Zeiss24mm vs. Fuji X10

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Location
North Carolina
Name
Dan
OK I realize that on the face of it this is an unfair comparison given the difference in sensor size. Nevertheless, here is what I did. Each camera was used to take a picture of the fire station in our small town this morning standing in the same place for both. The NEX image with its 36mm effective focal length, and the X10 zoomed out between 85 and 112 (approximately 100mm). Both images were opened in Photoshop and no post processing was done to either one. The NEX image was then severely cropped to match the field of view of the X10 image. Then both were reduced to 1024px and saved as jpegs. Both cameras were set to Auto ISO and aperture priority. Curiously the X10 chose 400 ISO and then overexposed the scene. The NEX chose 100 ISO and exposed beautifully. You make your own judgment about resolution, but my opinion is that the NEX with fine glass can be cropped severely and maintain better resolution than the X10 not cropped. I make no claims that this is a completely scientific comparison, but I find it interesting. What do you think? The X10 file is first. Click on images to see larger view.

X100619.jpg


NEX5N00524.jpg
 
The X-10 does tend to overexpose. I often click the exposure compensation down a notch, especially when shooting in sunlight. As for the cropping, that would be an area where the smaller size of the X-10 sensor will most matter, so I'm not really surprised by this result. The X-10 is an excellent compact camera that's easy to tote around but the 5N is essentially a DSLR in terms of IQ.
 
Interesting comparison! What was the metering mode of the X10? What about the DR setting? If you leave the X10 on auto DR or anything other than DR 100%, the camera will increase the ISO and then do whatever it does to expand the dynamic range. This is separate and apart from the EXR mode, so it would apply when the camera is set on AV and large jpgs or raw. Not sure if that's the case here, but the X10 appears to have metered for the shadows.
 
Good point, Armanius. You can tell that I did not think through this comparison in advance. It was rather spontaneous. The DR was set to Auto. It certainly did meter for shadows, and chose a totally unnecessary 1/900 of a sec. shutter speed. All the other relevant settings are on Standard, but now I will change the DR to Auto 100 for future use. Thanks for the tip.
 
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