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Author Topic: Sony A900  (Read 65560 times)

andyptak

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Sony A900
« Reply #120 on: December 21, 2008, 08:07:56 am »

On many forums, high ISO processing always seems to be a hot topic. But for me, if I can't shoot at 200/400, I don't shoot. There seems to be less interest and info on RAW processing for more normal ISO's. Sony often seem to have quirky, proprietary formats (Betamax anyone?) that take a bit of a workaround with third party products. The basic question, for me, is, are Sony RAW and ACR a good match at even normal ISO's, or do folks like Capture One and Bibble have a point?
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michael

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« Reply #121 on: December 21, 2008, 08:22:56 am »

At normal ISOs (say under 800) there is little to see in terms of noise performance differences between raw converters.

There are always other visible differences though because each will do their Bayer decoding differently, each will choose a slightly different gamma curve, and each will likely use a different camera profile, either inbuilt or external. Many of these differences can be equalized by the user in post processing, some can't.

If you're the type of photographer who can see these differences and cares about extracting subtile nuances from your files then choose a raw processor based on your own tests with your own files. If you care more about workflow, convenience and such then use the one that you like best. There's no one simple answer.

Michael

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Kenneth Sky

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« Reply #122 on: December 21, 2008, 08:25:22 am »

For those of you not from around the Toronto area, the winter solstice has arrived with a series of major snowstorms. It's quite bleak outside. I guess that accounts for the delay in the release of this highly anticipated test. There aren't as many opportunities to photograph right now and you definitely have to wear gloves. So printing becomes the number one photographic preoccupation. That's why I raised this question. It's not to cut off scientific inquiry but rather to keep the test at a practical level.
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ErikKaffehr

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« Reply #123 on: December 21, 2008, 03:19:10 pm »

Hi Michael,

Thanks for good input, as always!

For my part I'm really sold on parametric edits, AFAIK it means either Aperture or Lightroom. Lightroom is supposed to work on both Macs and Windoze, I had more than my share of problems on both platforms recently. I would like Adobe to:

- Make Lightroom stable and add some error messages telling the customer whats going on.
- Add distortion correction as a parametric edit.
- Add perspective correction as a parametric edit.
- Support a heavy weight noise reduction like "Noise Ninja" as a parametric edit with contour masks.
- Let Lightroom utilize all memory under 32-bit Windows. 32 bit Windoze may be an oxymoron, but one that is the only option on about 98% of the notebok PC sold.

I did try out Aperture but it doesn't seem to work with my files from the Apha 900.

Best regards
Erik





Quote from: michael
At normal ISOs (say under 800) there is little to see in terms of noise performance differences between raw converters.

There are always other visible differences though because each will do their Bayer decoding differently, each will choose a slightly different gamma curve, and each will likely use a different camera profile, either inbuilt or external. Many of these differences can be equalized by the user in post processing, some can't.

If you're the type of photographer who can see these differences and cares about extracting subtile nuances from your files then choose a raw processor based on your own tests with your own files. If you care more about workflow, convenience and such then use the one that you like best. There's no one simple answer.

Michael
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ziocan

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Sony A900
« Reply #124 on: December 21, 2008, 10:00:56 pm »

There actually is a nice Sony hand-strap to be used with the battery grip. It is often out of stock in USA.
I was able to get mine during a trip to Tokyo.

It is called grip belt.

http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores...552921665295951

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BernardLanguillier

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Sony A900
« Reply #125 on: December 22, 2008, 12:06:01 am »

Quote from: EPd
A word on the battery performance with the Alpha 900.

Have you had the chance to shoot in cold weather yet (like -10c or colder)?

Any idea how many images you are getting from a fully charged battery?

Thank you.

Cheers,
Bernard

barryfitzgerald

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« Reply #126 on: December 22, 2008, 05:00:06 am »

I think looking at the samples, on the A900 update, aka raw..it is very obvious what is going on.

I have raised this in the past, and will continue to do so. The reason ACR produces what appears to be, a larger grain pattern, or what I would call splodges..rather than a tight grain effect, is the apparent base level NR going on in the software. I see this effect in my MRW files too, though as they are less pixel dense, it's not as bad, but still present.
I find it easier to remove noise from a tighter grain pattern myself (if indeed you want to remove it), and I would suggest adobe consider allowing users to switch off the noise reduction effect. This extends further than pure pixel peeping, whilst it's no big deal for smaller prints, for larger ones it is.


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Bill Caulfeild-Browne

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« Reply #127 on: December 22, 2008, 03:27:25 pm »

Quote from: BernardLanguillier
Have you had the chance to shoot in cold weather yet (like -10c or colder)?

Any idea how many images you are getting from a fully charged battery?

Thank you.

Cheers,
Bernard


I've just "finished" my first fully charged battery. I got 732 shots before "Battery Exhausted" appeared on the LCD, though the yellow low battery warning was on from exposure number 500 or thereabouts! Sony obviously provide for a considerable reserve in their warning signal.

My shooting was about 50/50 indoors and out - though the "out" was in very cold conditions averaging around -10C.

I have Power save set at one minute and the LCD review at 10 seconds - though as I did a lot of chimping, magnifying the image and generally admiring the huge screen etc etc I suspect the LCD was on far more than 10 seconds.

I charged the battery for 4 full hours. My second battery is now installed and if it performs significantly differently, I'll post it.

Bill
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Tony Beach

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« Reply #128 on: December 22, 2008, 10:55:59 pm »

Quote from: billcb
I've just "finished" my first fully charged battery. I got 732 shots before "Battery Exhausted" appeared on the LCD, though the yellow low battery warning was on from exposure number 500 or thereabouts! Sony obviously provide for a considerable reserve in their warning signal.

My shooting was about 50/50 indoors and out - though the "out" was in very cold conditions averaging around -10C.

I have Power save set at one minute and the LCD review at 10 seconds - though as I did a lot of chimping, magnifying the image and generally admiring the huge screen etc etc I suspect the LCD was on far more than 10 seconds.

I charged the battery for 4 full hours. My second battery is now installed and if it performs significantly differently, I'll post it.

Bill

Thanks for the test, it's very informative.  I would avoid draining the battery that much if possible though, the optimal amount of drain is around 60%, or about where Sony started telling you to recharge the battery.
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Ulf

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« Reply #129 on: December 23, 2008, 06:32:08 am »

Just wondering if anyone has any experience with the AF performance of Sigma lenses on the a900 (with the 70-200 for instance)? I like many of the lenses in the sigma lineup but always found AF to be rather bad on Canon..

cheers, Ulf
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aaykay

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« Reply #130 on: December 23, 2008, 05:05:17 pm »

Quote from: Ulf
Just wondering if anyone has any experience with the AF performance of Sigma lenses on the a900 (with the 70-200 for instance)? I like many of the lenses in the sigma lineup but always found AF to be rather bad on Canon..

cheers, Ulf

This user, who uses the Sigma 70-200 HSM on the A700 feels the AF is fast:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp...essage=30133321

The body he uses it on is the A700 and the A900 should only be faster.
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Fine_Art

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« Reply #131 on: December 23, 2008, 09:41:24 pm »

Quote from: Tony Beach
Thanks for the test, it's very informative.  I would avoid draining the battery that much if possible though, the optimal amount of drain is around 60%, or about where Sony started telling you to recharge the battery.

The Sony InfoLithium battery is supposed to be memoryless. Its longevity shouldn't be impacted by how much you drain it.
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Thwack

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« Reply #132 on: December 23, 2008, 10:41:00 pm »

Lithium Ion batteries across the board don't have a memory.  Nothing to do with Sony.

But you don't want to deep cycle them.  The deeper you cycle them, the more often, the shorter the life of the battery.  If you run a lithium cell deep.  Depending on the specific chemistry of it, you might only get a couple hundred cycles.

The best thing to do is have multiple batteries, swap them before they get very low.  And if you then run out, go back and use them more.  By doing this you increase the life of a battery massively.

Quote from: Fine_Art
The Sony InfoLithium battery is supposed to be memoryless. Its longevity shouldn't be impacted by how much you drain it.
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Tony Beach

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« Reply #133 on: December 24, 2008, 12:24:18 am »

Quote from: Thwack
Lithium Ion batteries across the board don't have a memory.  Nothing to do with Sony.

But you don't want to deep cycle them.  The deeper you cycle them, the more often, the shorter the life of the battery.  If you run a lithium cell deep.  Depending on the specific chemistry of it, you might only get a couple hundred cycles.

The best thing to do is have multiple batteries, swap them before they get very low.  And if you then run out, go back and use them more.  By doing this you increase the life of a battery massively.

Right, as I understand it you could theoretically get a 1000 recharge cycles if you charge them only after using them about 10%, you might get 600 cycles by draining them 50%, and only a couple of hundred if you drained them 90%.  Indeed, the fact that they have no memory gives you the option to take any of these approaches.  What I did was calculate the total number of shots (based on a website I read on this topic a year or two ago) and figured that the optimum was around 60% drain -- for the D200 that works out to 40,000 shots over the life of the battery, and that camera is a battery hog.  It should be noted that these batteries have a somewhat limited shelf life; so while I could get more total shots by recharging on shorter cycles, I would have to keep more batteries on hand and they would all end up being thrown away long before the 1000 charge cycles was attained since 1000 charge cycles is about 1.5 charges per day per battery over a two year period.  Two to four batteries is about the right number of batteries to have for an A900, depending on how much you shoot before you can charge them up again.
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Fine_Art

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« Reply #134 on: December 24, 2008, 01:02:51 am »

Quote from: Tony Beach
Right, as I understand it you could theoretically get a 1000 recharge cycles if you charge them only after using them about 10%, you might get 600 cycles by draining them 50%, and only a couple of hundred if you drained them 90%.  Indeed, the fact that they have no memory gives you the option to take any of these approaches.  What I did was calculate the total number of shots (based on a website I read on this topic a year or two ago) and figured that the optimum was around 60% drain -- for the D200 that works out to 40,000 shots over the life of the battery, and that camera is a battery hog.  It should be noted that these batteries have a somewhat limited shelf life; so while I could get more total shots by recharging on shorter cycles, I would have to keep more batteries on hand and they would all end up being thrown away long before the 1000 charge cycles was attained since 1000 charge cycles is about 1.5 charges per day per battery over a two year period.  Two to four batteries is about the right number of batteries to have for an A900, depending on how much you shoot before you can charge them up again.

Thats good to know. I was running mine to about 10% before swapping it out.
I'll do the 60%, thanks.
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JeffKohn

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« Reply #135 on: December 24, 2008, 12:50:26 pm »

Hmm, recharging at 60% seems to miss the benefit of a high-capacity Lion battery. You may get more recharge cycles, but you have to recharge more often and you're likely to need more backup batteries. I know you're not supposed to completely discharge them but I run them down to about 25%, sometimes maybe a little lower. The batteries I got at the time of my original D2x purchase (over 3 years ago) are still going strong so I don't think I'm harming their lifetime.
« Last Edit: December 24, 2008, 12:51:06 pm by JeffKohn »
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Tony Beach

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« Reply #136 on: December 24, 2008, 01:07:11 pm »

Quote from: JeffKohn
Hmm, recharging at 60% seems to miss the benefit of a high-capacity Lion battery. You may get more recharge cycles, but you have to recharge more often and you're likely to need more backup batteries. I know you're not supposed to completely discharge them but I run them down to about 25%, sometimes maybe a little lower.

I'm sure it's a bell curve in terms of whether you would drain the battery by 60% or 80%.  Anyway, I actually just run with the battery I have in the camera and with my D300 I almost always use the same battery for two days of shooting before replacing it with a fresh battery and recharging the old one -- for me that often works out to about 70%, but knowing the actual amount of drain is probably similar to knowing how much gas is left in my car by looking at the gas gauge.  Also, if we truly optimized two or three batteries then the shutter would probably give out first.
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ziocan

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« Reply #137 on: December 24, 2008, 04:12:37 pm »

Quote from: Fine_Art
Thats good to know. I was running mine to about 10% before swapping it out.
I'll do the 60%, thanks.
by the time all the batteries come to an end, you may have saved 100$ and spent a few grands of wasted time, taking all those precautions.
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Thwack

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« Reply #138 on: December 24, 2008, 05:36:23 pm »

You're not carrying more batteries, your just using what you have better.

Most of us probably do the same thing.  Head out the door to go someplace with 2 batteries for the day, fully knowing 1 battery will be more than good.    So you have 2 batteries.  Instead of using the one all day and taking down to 20% SOC.   Just swap it out around 50% with the other and go on with that one.   You have used the same amount of energy, and carried the same number of batteries,  but increased the life and reliability of the batteries a little bit.  If you drain the second battery down to the same mark, just keep using it.   It's not that your try to never go below a certain amount, that would be silly.  You are just trying to spread your usage among the batteries, and not put the deep cycling on a cell if you don't need to.    You may end up coming home with both batteries completely consumed.  But more than likely you will come home with both batteries partially used.   Which is a better situation than coming home with one dead, one un-touched.

Quote from: ziocan
by the time all the batteries come to an end, you may have saved 100$ and spent a few grands of wasted time, taking all those precautions.
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