ISO Comparison - 30D, 40D, 50D, all raw formats, all full stop ISOs - DPP and LR

I have assembled an album of ISO test shots covering the complete range of full stop ISOs from my 30D, 40D, 50D in all variations of raw formats and each processed through DPP and Lightroom.

In DPP the picture style was Standard with sharpening = 3 and the NR settings were as set by default within the DPP software (a new feature in the latest release).

In Lightroom I used the Camera Standard Beta 2 camera profile and left all sharpening and NR settings at defaults.

Lighting was from 2 X 150W Halogen worklights place approx 18" from the target at a diagonal either side of it.

The backdrop was my LCD TV, which makes a useful subject to judge noise in the transition zone from black to mid-grey, based on feathering of the light from the lamps.

Here is the album, containing 84 full resolution images. The album website will reduce the files dynamically to fit your screen, but you can click the magnifying glass icon to zoom in or download individual files or the whole album if you have Google's Picasaweb software installed. EXIF data accompanies each file and the file name is a dead giveaway for the camera body, resolution and ISO.

http://picasaweb.googl​e.com …Shots?authkey=7​KDmp1s3qLg#

Here is a thumbnail image taken from the album of the 50D 100 ISO and 12,800 ISO images processed in DPP, just so you can see what the test target looks like.

100 ISO

HTTP response: 404 | MIME changed to 'image/png' | Byte size: ZERO

HTTP response: 404 | MIME changed to 'image/png' | Byte size: ZERO

Thanks for the time and effort to do this. I will point out that the magnified views aren't 100% - as the images aren't big enough and 50D sRAW, 50D RAW and 40D are same size in that view which is obviously not 100%. I don't see major differences between those three at 3200 DPP versions.

Is it possible to post 100% crops of those three most relevant comparisons - 3200 ISO 40D vs 50D vs 50D sRAW1?

I actually started this thread originally over on DPReview, largely because of the broohahah following DPReview's own review. I then thought I'd really like to share with th POTN community so I copied the content here. You can check out the discussion on DPReview if you wish. The thread is here....

http://forums.dpreview​.com …orum=1019&threa​d=29918648

As you will note in that thread I have uploaded full resolution image files from each camera and raw format, grouped by ISO. The 3200 ISO results are here....

http://rapidshare.de/f​iles/40840795/3200.rar​.html

Alternatively, if you have Google's free Picasa software, you can download the original full resolution files and/or the whole album straight from the Picasaweb online album.

The thing is, I can prepare 100% crops, but of which section of the image? Do you want to check noise from the OOF background, or sharpness (and noise) of the point I focused on? What about colour tone and saturation? There s no colour in the area in which I focused. It is far easier if you simply have access to the full resolution images and then you can browse whichever part of the image you wish at 100%.

All those look very clean at 3200 ISO. The 50D looks impressive at 6400.

Thanks. Hard to do anything right now as at work, will look later. You did the shots and have the cameras... what were your own conclusions of 50D vs 40D, sRAW vs RAW?

Well first of all I'm not that interested in pixel peeping. My concern is whether I can get useable images, not useable pixels. If I can fill my 17" 1920 x 1200 laptop screen, for viewing from 12-18", and be pleased with the result in terms of sharpness and noise (and everything else) then that's good enough.

That said, judging the pictures in Lightroom at "Fit to Screen" size I'd say I can happily use 1600 ISO with any of the camera bodies, 3200 with care, and 6400 and 12800 only if I have to. sRaw1 helps IQ with the 50D at 6400 and could also be useable. Full resolution at 6400 and especially 12800 are not so nice. Following these test results I have disabled High ISO Expansion on the 50D. That's not to say that I will never use those higher settings but I don't want to get there by accident and without due consideration of what I'm doing and which raw format I am using.

As shot, with DPP applying some custom NR depending on ISO the DPP results are better at high ISOs - from 3200 and up. I don't know what Lightroom could achieve with some manual fiddling.

Lightroom has a big swing in colour balance between raw and sRaw versions of the same files. This is for both the 40D and 50D. I am using the beta 2 camera profiles so maybe the problem lies there, or perhaps with ACR itself. I don't know, but something is not right.

All in all the files from the 50D are entirely useable at high ISOs, if not the very top ISO, but Adobe need to work on their software to do the camera justice for all combinations of ISO and raw format.

Great analysis, thanks. I also am interested in usable shots as you describe them.

Tell you what. The 30D still preforms damn good. I may hold on to my 30D for a while longer before upgrading. I may just have to buy some L glass for my 30D. In fact I think I'll just keep my 30D as a backup when I do upgrade. I dont think it's worth selling for the 500 bucks I may get for the body.

I kept my 30D when I bought my 40D and will be keeping both now I have my 50D. I shoot with two bodies at weddings, and for vacation/travel. I really hate faffing about changing lenses so I normally have some sot of wide and some sort of long lens mounted and ready to at the same time. When I'm chasing wildlife I'll have my 70-200 f/2.8 IS for speed and my 100-400 for reach. I love shooting with two cameras handy.

So now I have a true backup in the event of equipment failure. I was actually surprised at the smoothness of the 30D 3200 ISO shots. I think the software may have come a long way since the 30D was released. Definitely worth keeping rather than selling for a few quid.

Thanks for your effort, I think I will stick with my 30D for a while longer.

Interesting...thanks.

I will be ordering the 50D soon, i don't have to worry about noise at all because i usally shoot during the day time in light so i will be sticking under 400 iso.

vancouver86 wrote in post #6727973
I will be ordering the 50D soon, i don't have to worry about noise at all because i usally shoot during the day time in light so i will be sticking under 400 iso.

Well, you have misunderstood the relevance of noise. If you shoot a high dynamic range scenery (try it for example in a forest in a dunny day), either the highlights get clipped, or some areas will be in the very-very dark region, and then the noise becomes interesting.

In other words: the noise characteristics reflects the dynamic range as well.