Photography News | Issue 31 | absolutephoto.com
Camera test 36
Performance: ISO
ISO 200
ISO 800
The X-E2S’s sensor is the same as its predecessor; it is a known quantity and is known to be capable when you start to scale the ISO range. Our test shots were taken at twilight using Raw and JPEG quality settings within the native ISOrangeof200-6400.Theimages shown here within this speed range are from Raws processed through Adobe Lightroom with no noise reduction. In-camera noise reduction was set to 0. Beyond the native range and there’s the JPEG option only. To give you some idea of the existing light conditions, the ISO 200 exposure was 3.7secs at f/8. Images are very clean up to ISO 800 when noise starts to appear.
The noise does have a very filmic feel and fine detail does not suffer though. Detail rendition remains good through ISO 1000 and 1250 and is still more than respectable at ISO 1600. The grain pattern is more obvious but it is not offensive and again it is still filmic and some noise reduction in software would make a significant benefit. For critical use you could still get away with ISO 2000 but above that and the higher levels of noise would probably detract from the picture although fine detail remains impressive to ISO 3200. Venture into the ISO expansion zone and image quality is nothing to shout about with heavy noise levels and detail is on the mushy side even at ISO 12,500.
ISO 3200
ISO 1600
ISO 6400
ISO 12,800
Full-frame image
ISO 25,600
ISO 51,200
Above High-contrast scene well handled. Shot with the 18-55mm at 50mm, 1/450sec f/4, ISO 200. Above right Straight-out-of-the- camera JPEG shot with 55-200mm at 164mm, 1/180sec at f7.1, ISO 200. Far right A dark subject came out marginally light. Shot with 18-55mm at 34mm, exposed at 1/250sec at f/3.6, ISO 400. Right Southwold pier at late evening with a 18mm f/2 lens well captured with good highlight and shadow details. Exposed at 1/250sec at f/8 and ISO 200. Noise starts to appear at ISO 800. The noise does have a filmic feel and fine detail does not suffer though
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