paulraphael
Member
To Doug's point, I think it would be helpful if manufacturers and testers were more clear about their dynamic range methodology. It doesn't have to be too complex; we just need a standard that makes sense.
DR is always measured with some notion of acceptable noise. You can always add more gain to the shadows—the question is, at what point does the noise become objectionalbe?
People call DXOmark innacurate. They aren't; they've just chosen a S/N standard that is much lower than what most photographers would find acceptable. As a result, they tell me my camera captures 14 stops of DR. In my experience, it captures 10 stops. Maybe 12 optimistically.
This is just a disagreement over standards. If you were using my camera for surveillance, you could indeed dig useable details from shadows in a 14 stop DR image. You could not get shadows that look nice in any conventional sense.
DR is always measured with some notion of acceptable noise. You can always add more gain to the shadows—the question is, at what point does the noise become objectionalbe?
People call DXOmark innacurate. They aren't; they've just chosen a S/N standard that is much lower than what most photographers would find acceptable. As a result, they tell me my camera captures 14 stops of DR. In my experience, it captures 10 stops. Maybe 12 optimistically.
This is just a disagreement over standards. If you were using my camera for surveillance, you could indeed dig useable details from shadows in a 14 stop DR image. You could not get shadows that look nice in any conventional sense.