Photoclubalpha

Sony has made a press release announcing two Point & Shoot models, the DSC-WX1 and the DSC-TX1. Both feature back-illuminated Exmor R CMOS sensors with a claimed 2x sensitivity over conventional sensor designs, as well as a lot of the new features and functionality from the DSC-HX1 Superzoom. The exciting part? The DSC-WX1 features a wide 24-120mm equivalent zoom starting at a fast f/2.4 aperture. I remember asking for something like this on Sony's Backstage 101 (though I begged for just a 3x zoom).

Sony Press Release wrote:The 10.2 mega-pixel WX1 camera has a 2.7-inch Clear Photo LCD Plus display and is just over three quarters of an inch thin—an ideal choice for DSLR owners who also want to carry a compact, high performance digital still camera.

The WX1 camera features a Sony G lens with an extraordinary wide angle 24-120mm 5x optical zoom. This lens’ f/2.4 maximum aperture offers nearly twice the light gathering capability of conventional lenses, and works together with the “Exmor R” imager and low-light shooting modes to provide low-light photography beyond the abilities of other compact cameras.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0908/09080 ... tx1wx1.asp

I have posted a resume on this release which I also got this morning.

The sensor is VERY small (that lens is only 4.25mm at the short end!) and I guess we will not really see what Exmor R is capable of with the pixel pitch involved. Possibly exceptional by p&s standards, but I would suspect it still will fall short of DSLR quality at any ISO.

David

No Raw, and still little manual control. Is this really so hard to add? They obviously recognise the market of a dslr owner wanting a P&S backup, but seem to think you wouldn't also want 'control'. Panasonic Lumix LX3 is still pretty safe as the P&S backup of choice IMHO.

Wow - my first Sony moan. If I carry on like this I will have to give up my fan-boy membership.

KevinBarrett wrote:The exciting part? The DSC-WX1 features a wide 24-120 mm equivalent zoom starting at a fast f/2.4 aperture.

Sorry, I don't see the exciting part. The lens speed is 1:2.4-5.9---that's not what I'd call 'fast.' Why can't they use a 1:2.4-3.5 lens? Or a 1:2.0-3.2 lens? THAT would be fast and transform the camera into a 'like.no.other' low-light daemon ...

Of course, as usual the product is aimed at clueless fools, not at photographers, so lens speed is worthless from a marketing point of view. Only compactness, wide zoom range, and a nice collection of buzzwords count

David Kilpatrick wrote:The sensor is VERY small (that lens is only 4.25 mm at the short end!) ...

With an aspect ratio of 4:3 and a 35-mm-format equivalent of 24 mm, this translates to a 1/2.1" sensor which by today's standard isn't very small. To the contrary, when 1/1.8" sensors have become rare these days and 1/2.3", 1/2.5", and even 1/2.7" sensors are common with digital P&S cameras then 1/2.1" is not particularly large but above average. Of course, still no competition to D-SLR cameras by any strech of the imagination (until proven otherwise ).

Err, wait a minute ... I just see the specifications say the sensor was 1/2.4", not 1/2.1". That's weird---a 4.25 mm lens on a 1/2.4" sensor is 28 mm-e, not 24 mm-e. So we have contradicting specs ...

-- Olaf

Well, it's a step in the right direction, anyway. Sony P&S zoom lenses have had some of the longest short ends in every comparison. I'm mostly just glad to see Sony get to 24mm wide. I hope these two Exmor R-equipped cameras aren't what the whole "Twilight Football" thing is about.

I've looked at some samples from the WX1, and frankly I don't see anything great going on there. This one looks more like marketing than substance. But then after reading the "worked hard on image processing A230-380" comments from Sony, I don't take them very seriously in this regard

The lens looks a bit pants too, and is unworthy of the G badge IMO

o1af wrote 7 August

With an aspect ratio of 4:3 and a 35-mm-format equivalent of 24 mm, this translates to a 1/2.1" sensor which by today's standard isn't very small. To the contrary, when 1/1.8" sensors have become rare these days and 1/2.3", 1/2.5", and even 1/2.7" sensors are common with digital P&S cameras then 1/2.1" is not particularly large but above average. Of course, still no competition to D-SLR cameras by any strech of the imagination (until proven otherwise ).

Err, wait a minute ... I just see the specifications say the sensor was 1/2.4", not 1/2.1". That's weird---a 4.25 mm lens on a 1/2.4" sensor is 28 mm-e, not 24 mm-e. So we have contradicting specs ...

I support Birma's statement above that

Panasonic Lumix LX3 is still pretty safe as the P&S backup of choice IMHO.

Per my LX3 instruction book this camera fields a 1/1.63" CCD with total 11,300,000 pixels. Working out the size of this sensor is beyond me but I understand it is substantially larger than the Sony and using RAW it produces amazing results at ISO100. I have just sent in 8 LX3 images to Alamy and it will be interesting to see their reaction. LX3 is not on their banned list.

Reference my 26 October insert above I can now confirm that Alamy has passed my eight Panasonic LX3 images so although they prefer DSLR submissions quality, P&S images will pass if they meet the Alamy Quality standards. The LX3 is not on the banned list.
In that connection I had occasion to read the Silkypix help section and saw again their suggestion that CA removal is performed at 400%. I have always ignored this advice until now. I must admit that I get better results - at least in Silkypix - by removing CA at 400%. Anyone else with this experience?