Steve Huff - GXR vs NEX-7

semordnilap said:
..... Not only is the review sloppy but it doesn't even test corner vs. center sharpness.......
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........because, unfortunately, his notion of 'real world testing' is fixated on widest aperture shooting; which frequently limits his picture construction to a lone object of interest plonked in the middle of the image [it's a kind of widget photography], surrounded by gobs of out-of-focus [bokeh crud]. Guess which lenses are optimized for on-centre resolution, and guess which lenses Steve Huff favors?

I don't feel anything personal against Steve Huff and I happily read his site which costs me nothing, but the severe limitations of his gear appraisals could easily lead an unweary reader to draw an incorrect conclusion about an item of equipment. That said however, his appraisals are accurate for him, and anyone else fixated on handheld wide-open shooting with a tendency for a single object of attention centered in their images. Me? I think f8, and constructing relationships within the image is a significantly greater photographic challenge, and requires more rigorous equipment review procedure than Steve's [to uncover, for example; issues like field flatness, corner resolution, focus shift ......].

But I'll still read him, with wariness though.

.............. Chris
 
When SONY releases. NEX-M adapter, then I will believe SONY intended the NEX to be a M lens platform.

The GXR seems the obvious choice for M lens owners. Maybe the tragic flood will give SONY some time to improve M lens compatibility via firmware image correction. Of course this is unlikely to solve edge smearing with short focal length M lenses.
 
rxmd said:
The article, I'm sorry to say, is an unreadable breathless piece of crud. The man is so sloppy that and careless that he can't spell the name of his sponsor right.

That's not even mentioning how he forgets adapters at home and uses a sloppy replacement instead and can't be bothered to go back and get his proper equipment do the "test" again.
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RE SLOPPY, YOU BETTER CHECK YOUR TYPING AND GRAMMAR BEFORE FINGERPOINTING:rolleyes:
 
Things are looking up about the NEX 7 for me!!.......

Now it's officially a piece of **** people are cancelling their orders all over the place so I might now be able to get one at a decent price sooner than I hoped and I'm pretty sure I can make good images with it if my NEX 3 is any indicator........
 
michel v said:
You can't really blame the magenta shift on a bad adapter, seriously.
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Exactly right. You don't need to blame the adapter. It's the camera / lens dynamics. But the NEX-7 isn't the only camera to suffer from this.

The Ricoh, uncorrected, suffers from color shift. So does a Leica M9.

I've always thought Steve Huff's articles are crudily written and his sample shots are boring, but here there's no denying that an annoying problem still happens with the Nex 7 and does not anymore with the 5N.
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If color shift is the *only* problem the NEX-7 suffers from then I would buy one in a second. Wait, I am buying one.

Color shift is solved in software. If Ricoh can solve it in their firmware, if Leica can do the same, if an open source software package can fix it, then so can Sony.

The guy just saved me hundreds of euros, as I was *this* close to buy into the hype and get the 7.
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Maybe Huff saved you money but not by informing you properly.

Instead of all the "hype" you are buying into the fear mongering Huff is spreading without regard at all for the far more important issue of edge sharpness.

You can fix color shift in software - everyone does. You can't fix smeared details. Huff hasn't informed people, he is, intentionally or not, engaged in misdirection.
 
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stompyq said:
Hmm.. almost feel like huff and ken rockwell are related.....
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both simply bad seed of the master: Rock Huffwell :)

It's incredible with all the guys who have had their hands on the 7, there are no flat samples of the retro wides up for close inspection.

Even a simple long distance infinty shot with nothing close in the foregorund would be fine.

Sony's advance men are not exactly the tip of the spear ;)
 
Or... maybe Sony is too smart by half wanted to whittle down the pre-orders and intentionally employed Huff to do that. ;)

Whether everyone who claims to have ordered one really has or not, and really has cancelled said order or not, is another matter. I have my doubts but am getting more cynical about the whole affair by the second. I'm giving up on trying to reason with people on dpreview.
 
Adanac said:
Huff hasn't informed people, he is, intentionally or not, engaged in misdirection.
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For what possible reason would Steve Huff intentionally engage in misdirection? The guy tested the camera, he posted his results. Question his methods and disagree with his conclusions, sure, but why insinuate a sinister motive behind them?

"Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence," as Napoleon said.
 
I did say "intentionally or not". I'm not assigning motive, just describing the outcome that has resulted from his choices.

If you read through Huff's comment stream you'll see calls for an examination of edge to edge performance. He chooses to ignore this much more important issue while allowing some amount of hysteria build over corner casts.

Intentionally or not, incompetence or not, his posting and the wide distribution it has received is certainly serving to spread confusion. He is in a position to address this and educate and in doing so he would actually provide a great service to his readership.
 
I'm not sure that he is the best one to take on this task. He doesn't seem to own any wide quality glass. His wide lenses and the camera itself are on short term loan. In another month many people will have the camera and all questions will be answered.
 
Some people seem to really dislike this guy - I'm not sure what all the aggressiveness is about, but it all seems a little too personal. I find him ill-equipped for the task of reviewing the NEX-7 for rangefinder enthusiasts (lack of good glass and a proper adapter) or for pixel peepers (lack of corner sharpness test shots, or any test shots for that matter.) I really don't know who his demographic is, as his reviews don't seem to focus on either group. That said, I admire his enthusiasm, and I'm not sure I could do a better job of coming off as genuinely excited about cameras as he does. It's a key ingredient that, for me, is missing from review sites like dpreview.com and the like.

There was some disagreement on this earlier, but I fully agree with the sentiment that if he pisses you off, don't bother reading his site. The internet affords us the luxury of so many free-to-read review sites. That said, there's nothing wrong with critiquing his reviewing style - it's really just the tone of a few posts here (and in the previous NEX-7 thread) that irks me.
 
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Adanac said:
I'm giving up on trying to reason with people on dpreview.
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Yes, that is Don Quixote territory.

The stuff about Huff's sinister intention is just jest, obvioulsy the guy means well---and to report the colorshift is good.

But he is not doing his homework, or he would understand what most care about is corner resolution 7 vs 5n vs gxr.

Now, supposedly he had the production firmware in that camera--or so some people who have followed the affair closely tell me. I can't find where he says that--

But bottom line, the fact the 7 has been in so many hands and we still don't know about retro wide corner performance is ridiculous.

What we have are blind men describing an elephant. Hard to really get the picture.

In fact, at this point anyone cancelling an early pre-order is pure folly---since the camera will shortly be at a premium. Nothing will be easier to sell in early december than a Nex-7.
 
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uhoh7 said:
It's incredible with all the guys who have had their hands on the 7, there are no flat samples of the retro wides up for close inspection.
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It's odd isn't it? Reminds me of how experts managed to test the Leica M8 in the field pre and post production but no one happend to notice that blacks were bright magenta, and moire was on every window sill, wedding dress and suit. :bang:
Pete
 
uhoh7, you'll find that there was earlier discussion of this issue, based on posted images taken with ZM lenses. See, for example, messages 8 and 9 here: http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?t=30414 . Message 8 directs you to the ZM images and to the dpreview forum where there was a little further analysis. Thus, there were well founded suspicions circulating about about a fortnight ago. The results reported in Steve Huff's review are therefore not particularly surprising, although valuable in providing further evidence. Nettar
 
Nettar you are right - there were hints about colour cast prior to Huff's article, so that's al the more reason people should not be surprised by Huff's "revelation".

Rob Skoech's shots (the house and lawn) weeks earlier did point out the colour shift; that was a pre-production camera and while I didn't have a lot of hope in seeing the shift disappear by the time camera and firmware went production, one can always hope.

As for performance in the edges, I'd like to see more before coming to a conclusion.
 
uhoh7 said:
In fact, at this point anyone cancelling an early pre-order is pure folly---since the camera will shortly be at a premium. Nothing will be easier to sell in early december than a Nex-7.
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That's my conclusion; take delivery and test the heck out of it and sell it quickly if necessary.

My Hawk's adapter should be here before the 7 arrives. I'll do my part and test at least the ZM Biogons 25/2.8, 35/2 and Sonnar 50/1.5 and with a bit of luck a number of others depending on whether I can sync up with a compatriot at the right time. I don't have anything wider in M glass myself.
 
Agreed, Nettar. Rob from the Picture Desk's numerous photos with ZM lenses were concerning, but most of us, including myself, blew them off as user error. Steve's shots really dont look much better, so now I'm getting worried. Still, I preordered the 7 on day one, and I ordered a 5N yesterday, so I'll just have to check them myself.

FWIW, as someone who has followed Sony since 2006 and spent way to much time on Sony forums in that time discussing past Sony preproduction cameras, my crystal ball is telling me that the 5N will be the way to go with M lenses, which will really blow. The 7 body looks about perfect.
 
Adanac said:
Nettar you are right - there were hints about colour cast prior to Huff's article, so that's al the more reason people should not be surprised by Huff's "revelation".

Rob Skoech's shots (the house and lawn) weeks earlier did point out the colour shift; that was a pre-production camera and while I didn't have a lot of hope in seeing the shift disappear by the time camera and firmware went production, one can always hope.

As for performance in the edges, I'd like to see more before coming to a conclusion.
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Exactly. It was impossible to judge smearing from Rob's shots, though we begged him in that thread to shoot some flat shots.

He was the guy who put up soft OOF samples from a ZM50/1.5 and postulated it was focus shift. I don't think he ever touched a nex until the 7 fell in his hands.
 
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