Sony Cyber-shot DSC-F828Sony extends their high end to encompass 8(!) megapixels and a sharp 7x Zeiss zoom lens. - And Sony's new RGB+E sensor technology for more accurate color!<<Optics :(Previous) | (Next): Shutter Lag & Cycle Time Tests>> Page 6:Exposure & FlashReview First Posted: 08/15/2003, Updated: 02/05/04 |
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The F828 offers a full range of exposure controls, with options for Full
Auto, Program AE, Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority, and Manual exposure modes,
as well as a Scene mode position with Twilight, Twilight Portrait, Landscape,
and Portrait scene options. All exposure modes are accessed via the Mode dial
on top of the camera, and the Scene presets are accessed through the Record
menu in Scene mode. In Full Auto mode, the camera controls everything, with
the exception of resolution, flash, zoom, and capture mode. Program AE mode
lets you control everything except the aperture and shutter speed, though you
can select from a range of equivalent exposure settings by turning the Command
dial. Aperture and Shutter Priority modes provide user control over either aperture
or shutter speed (depending on the mode), while the camera selects the best
value of the other exposure parameter. Manual mode provides complete control
over the exposure, with the user selecting both shutter speed (1/2,000 to 30
seconds) and aperture (f/2 to f/8).
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In the Scene exposure mode, you have the option of shooting in Twilight, Twilight
Portrait, Landscape, or Portrait preset modes. Twilight mode sets up the camera
for shooting night scenes, using a slower shutter speed to capture more ambient
light. Use Twilight mode in any situation where the lighting is too dim to give
a good exposure in normal exposure mode, but be aware that the camera will be
using slower shutter speeds. Mount it on a tripod or otherwise provide stable
support. Twilight Portrait operates under the same guidelines, but automatically
uses the Slow Sync flash setting, so foreground subjects (people, for instance)
will be properly illuminated by the flash, while any natural illumination in
the background will show up in the shot as well. Landscape mode simply uses
a smaller lens aperture to increase the depth of field, keeping the foreground
and background in focus. Landscape mode typically uses slower shutter speeds,
so a tripod is recommended in all but bright lighting. Portrait mode works in
the opposite manner, using a larger aperture to decrease the depth of field.
This produces a sharply focused subject in front of a slightly blurred background.
The F828 employs a Multi-Pattern metering system as its default, dividing the
scene into several small sections and taking exposure readings for each section.
The readings are then evaluated (not necessarily averaged) to determine the
best overall exposure. Center-Weighted and Spot metering options are also available,
accessed by pressing the Metering button on the side panel and turning the Command
dial. You can increase or decrease the exposure with the F828's Exposure Compensation
adjustment, which ranges from -2 to +2 exposure values (EV) in one-third-step
increments and which is adjusted by pressing the Exposure Compensation button
on the top panel and turning the Command dial.
In addition to the F828's Night Shot and Night Framing low-light features (discussed
in detail in the Viewfinder section earlier), the camera also offers an impressive
Noise Reduction system, adding "Clear Color Noise Reduction" and "Clear
Luminance Noise Reduction" to the "NR Slow Shutter" found in
the F717. NR Slow Shutter is fairly conventional dark-frame subtraction noise
reduction, but appears to go a bit further than most. Judging by the camera's
operation, it looks like the F828 is shooting a "dark" frame after
each exposure when the noise reduction mode is active, and then subtracting
the noise in that dark frame from the captured image. It's obvious that the
camera is doing something like this, because it takes roughly twice as long
for it to complete a long exposure than the exposure time of the shot itself.
With dark frame subtraction, any hot pixel that saturated and went all the way
to white ends up black in the final image, since it was pure white in both the
actual photo and the dark frame itself. (By way of explanation, "white"
means a value of 255. If the hot pixel was white in both the image and dark-noise
reference frame, when the subtraction is done, 255-255=0, or black.)
Clear Color NR and Clear Luminance NR are a bit more mysterious. If I get further
details on their operation from Sony, I'll pass them along here. From their
names though, it sounds to me like Clear Color NR looks at color noise at higher
light levels, while Clear Luminance NR works on luminance (brightness) in darker
areas. AFAIK though, both are purely image processing techniques, not subtracting
noise patterns from the image data directly.
An AE Lock button on the rear panel lets you lock the exposure reading without
also locking the focus. (As happens when you half-press the Shutter button.)
AE Lock works well with Spot and Center-Weighted metering, as you can base the
exposure on a particular area of the subject without also having to lock the
focus on that area as well. Simply aim the center of the viewfinder at the portion
of the subject you want properly exposed and press the AE Lock button. The exposure
will be locked until the Shutter button is fully depressed or until the AE Lock
button is pressed again.
ISO can be adjusted to 100, 200, 400, or 800 sensitivity equivalents, or set
on Auto. The F828's White Balance adjustment offers seven settings: One-Push
(manual), Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Fluorescent, Incandescent, and a new Flash
setting. The One-Push Set option lets you manually set the white balance, based
on a white card held in front of the lens. The 10-second Self-Timer mode is
activated via the Self-Timer/Index button on the rear panel. Once in Self-Timer
mode, a full press of the Shutter button kicks off the timer, which counts down
10 seconds before firing the shutter.
The F828 also offers a versatile Picture Effects menu, a standard feature on
Sony digicams. The menu offers three creative options: Negative Art, Sepia,
and Solarize. Negative Art reverses the color and brightness of the image. Sepia
changes the image into brown, monochromatic tones. The Solarize option is really
more of a level-slicing function, dividing the image into areas of fairly "flat"
color. (Not really a "solarization" effect as old-line film types
would understand the term.) These effects are "live" in Record mode,
so you get a preview of the effect on the LCD monitor before you record the
image. The F828 also offers a Sharpness function, as well as Saturation and
Contrast adjustments that weren't previously on the F717 model. A Color adjustment
offers Real and Standard settings, with "Standard" apparently producing
slightly more saturated images.
| What's up with RAW? | |
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Flash
The pop-up flash on the F828 features true TTL (Through The Lens)
metering, for more accurate flash exposures. (This is surprisingly rare in
the current digicam market. Many cameras from "camera" companies
that you would think surely would have TTL metering do not.) The flash operates
in Auto (no icon), Forced, Suppressed, and Slow-Sync modes, with a Red-Eye
Reduction mode that can be enabled through the Setup menu. Auto mode lets
the camera decide when to fire the flash, based on existing lighting conditions.
Forced means that the flash always fires, regardless of light, and Suppressed
simply means that the flash never fires. Slow-Sync mode times the flash with
a slower shutter speed, allowing more ambient light in to balance the flash
exposure. Red-Eye Reduction mode tells the camera to fire a small pre-flash
before firing the full flash to reduce the effect of red-eye. Once enabled
through the Setup menu, the Red-Eye Reduction flash fires with both Auto
and Forced modes. Flash intensity can be manually controlled via the Record
menu with choices of High, Normal, and Low. A sliding switch on the side
of the flash compartment releases the flash. However, through the Setup menu,
you can set the flash to automatically pop up whenever an active flash mode
is enabled.
The F828 features a true hot-shoe external flash connection on top of the
camera. This greatly increases the options for connecting an external flash.
The F828 also has the ACC Sony accessory flash/remote trigger input socket
on the side of the lens. (Note though, that the ACC connection is proprietary
to the Sony external flash units.) Thanks to an array of extra contacts in
its hot shoe (and associated camera smarts to go along with them), the F828
supports Sony's neat new HVL-F32X external flash unit, which offers the higher
power capability of an external unit, while still retaining the advantages
of true TTL flash metering. (This combo of TTL flash metering with an external
flash unit is even more rare than TTL flash metering itself.)
Special Recording Modes
Like many Sony digicams, the F828 offers a number of special recording modes,
including RAW, TIFF, Voice, E-Mail, Exposure Bracketing, and Burst. The TIFF
option saves a high-resolution uncompressed TIFF version of each image, in
addition to the standard JPEG version, at whatever image size you've
selected. Voice mode lets you record a five-second sound clip to accompany
a still image, with the audio recording starting immediately after the image
capture. The E-Mail option records a still image at the 320 x 240-pixel JPEG
size for easy E-mail transmission, again in addition to a full-resolution
file, at whatever image size you've selected in the menu system. This lets
you capture full-resolution images for storage and printing, while at the
same time recording smaller versions that you can just drop into an E-mail
to share with others.
While many other digicam makers offer their own versions of it, RAW mode is new to the Sony line with the F828. RAW mode simply records all the picture data, exactly as it comes from the image sensor. RAW files are generally losslessly compressed, so they take up less space than TIFF images, but don't exhibit the artifacts and data loss that characterizes JPEG-compressed files. RAW-mode file formats are prized for the ability they give photographers to make color balance and even minor exposure adjustments after the fact, working with the exact data that the camera captured originally. As of this writing, Sony hadn't yet released their software for manipulating the F828's RAW-mode images but we're told it will be available by the time the cameras ship to retail stores this fall. (2003)
Exposure Bracketing captures three images with one press of the Shutter button
(one at the normal exposure, one underexposed, and one overexposed). The
amount of variation between exposures is adjustable through the Record menu,
with options of 0.3, 0.7, and 1.0 EV steps. "Burst" mode captures
a rapid series of seven images. (The actual frame rate and the number of
images in the series may be limited by available memory card space, depending
on the resolution and quality settings, though.) Through the Drive setting,
you can opt for Speed Priority Burst mode or Framing Priority Burst mode.
Speed Priority blanks the viewfinder display to improve cycle time slightly,
while Framing Priority keeps the display live so you can see what the image
is pointed at. As it turns out, there isn't a huge difference between the
two modes, but Speed Priority is indeed a little faster.
Movie Mode
The Movie mode is accessed via the Mode dial on top of the camera, by selecting
the film frame icon. You can record moving images with sound at either 640
x 480 or 160 x 112 pixels, with Fine and Standard quality options for the
640-pixel size. (Full 640x480 movies are very rare in the digicam world,
and even more rare is the F828's ability to record them nonstop at 30 frames/second.
(Note though, that this recording rate can only be sustained when using a
Memory Stick PRO or IBM/Hitachi Microdrive CFII card. Even very fast chip-based
CF cards won't work, the camera apparently checks specifically for a Microdrive
before it will let you use this mode when the CF slot is selected.) The F828
employs Sony's MPEG VX technology, which lets you record for as long as the
memory card has space. (The amount of available space varies with the quality
setting and resolution.) A timer appears in the LCD monitor to let you know
how long you've been recording and approximately how much recording time
is available.
The F828 also provides limited movie editing capabilities. While most digicam
users won't be looking for full A/B roll video editing from their cameras,
I've often found that I wanted to trim off material from the beginning or
end of a video I've recorded, or to extract an interesting bit of action
from the middle of a much longer clip. The F828 provides for this via an
option on the Playback menu called Divide. As its name suggests, Divide works
by dividing movies into two segments. Do this once to trim away spurious
material at the front of the clip you're interested in, and do it a second
time to remove unwanted footage at the end. Once you've split the movie into
parts like this, throw away the segments you don't need, or keep them around
to show your viewers how lucky they are that you're only showing them the
"interesting" parts. ;-) The screenshot at right shows the Divide
function in action.
After enabling the Divide function through the Playback menu, the F828 starts
to play back the movie. You simply press the center of the Multi-Controller
to stop the playback where you'd like to make an edit. From there, you can
scroll backward or forward frame-by-frame until you find the point where
you'd like to divide the movie. You can then either delete the unwanted portion
of the movie or keep it on the memory card. As noted, the Divide function
is great for "editing" out the best part of a movie file, given
that you can make an unlimited number of divides. You just can't put the
pieces back together again in the camera. For that, you'll have to use the
included software.
Multi Burst
Also accessed through the Movie option under the Setup menu, the F828
features a Multi Burst mode, which captures a rapid burst of 16 images. Once
captured, the images are played back as a movie file. Because image capture
is so fast, the effect is of a slow-motion sequence. Three frame interval
rates are available through the Record menu, 1/7.5, 1/15, and 1/30. You can
also set image quality (Fine or Standard), Picture Effects, and Sharpness.
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