dxomark

Gannon Burgett

DxOMark Reveals Which Lenses Perform Best on Nikon’s D800E

It’s fairly well-known that, when it comes to capturing images, more important than almost any camera body is the glass being put in front of it. However, there are times when your camera body plays a vital role in determining the quality of the image rendered by said glass.

To prove this and also help show off what glass performs best with a particular body, DxOMark has published a series of articles that break down what the best lenses are for the Nikon D800E.

DL Cade

DxOMark: The Sigma 50mm f/1.4 Art Series Lens ‘Comes Seriously Close’ to the Otus

We have our own Sigma 50mm f/1.4 Art lens on the way for full review, but until then it's interesting to see what some of the big names in gear review are saying about this optical beast and how it compares to the Otus it was meant to compete with.

Today, one of the biggest of those reviewers, DxOMark, released the results of its tests -- and news is good if you're planning to pick one of these beauties up.

DL Cade

The Nikon 1 V3 Falls Short of Cheaper MFT Shooters in DxOMark Tests

DxOMark is certainly not the be-all-end-all of camera sensor testing outfits, but what it has going for it is consistency and a whole lot of experience. So while you might not put much stock in their sensor scores, DxO is a great resource for comparing sensor performance between models.

We say all this because there are some Nikon fanboys who will immediately be upset by the news that DxOMark claims the new Nikon 1 V3 might not live up to its price tag.

DL Cade

Nikon D4s Beats Canon’s 1D X in DxOMark Tests, Falls Short of the Df in Low Light

The Nikon D4s is only a marginal improvement on the D4, but that didn't stop Nikon from touting it as significantly better in low light and faster to boot. The question is, do those claims hold up when you put the camera through its paces?

Well, the DxOMark team did just that, and the results may or may not surprise you depending on how much stock you put in press release boasting.

DL Cade

RED Epic Dragon Outstrips the D800E in DxOMark Tests, Breaks 100-Point Barrier

Until today, the Nikon D800E stood at the top of the DxOMark totem pole with an amazing sensor score of 96. But the champion has been unseated, and not by some Canon or Nikon full-frame camera or one of the impressive new APS-C shooters we've seen recently. No, the D800E has been decidedly put out of first place by the RED Epic Dragon video camera.

DL Cade

DxOMark Put the Lumia 1020 to the Test as a Dedicated Camera, See How it Performed

When DxOMark tests out the quality of mobile phone cameras, they usually classify and rank them as such. There's a whole mobile section to the site where one can compare different smartphone cameras using a different scoring system.

The thing is, the Lumia 1020 is no typical smartphone. Nokia has touted it as a camera first, and it seems DxOMark was listening. When they put the Lumia 1020 through its paces, they tested it as a full-fledged camera. And it didn't perform half bad.

DL Cade

The Nikon Df Takes DxOMark’s Low-Light Crown, Outperforms the D4

It seems the Nikon engineers had some tricks up their sleeves when they put the D4 sensor inside the new Nikon Df, because while the sensor earned identical scores to the D4 in almost every category when DxOMark put it through its paces, the Df actually BEAT the D4 in the "low-light ISO" category.

But more than that, it beat EVERYBODY in that category, narrowly edging out the previous champion D3s to claim the number one low-light spot among DxOMark's rankings.

Michael Zhang

Perceptual Megapixel: Lens Sharpness Boiled Down to a Single Number

Modulation Transfer Function (MTF) charts are a very commonly used tool in the photo industry for measuring and describing how sharp a particular lens is. However, it's a system that is largely enigmatic to those outside the realm of optic experts and camera gearheads.

For those of you who don't want to learn how to read MTF charts, camera gear testing service DxOMark has announced a new metric that boils a lens' sharpness down to a single easy-to-understand-and-compare number: the Perceptual Megapixel.

Michael Zhang

Nikon D600 Sensor Found by DxOMark to be “Elite” and 3rd Best Ever

Nikon's new entry level full frame DSLR, the Nikon D600, is supposed to be a lightweight camera with heavyweight image quality. DxOMark confirms it to be true. The camera equipment measurement company has announced its sensor quality results for the D600, and the score is sure to put a big smile on the faces of Nikonians around the world. Rated at an overall score of "94", the camera received the third highest score ever, and falls in third place behind the D800 and D800E -- cameras that cost roughly $1,000 more.

DL Cade

Nikon D800E Steals the DxOMark Crown From Its Fraternal Twin, the Nikon D800

It's been almost three months to the day since the well-respected camera equipment rating service DxOMark crowned the Nikon D800 as its new king, giving the camera's 36.3MP sensor an incredible overall score of 95 -- but now its reign is over. The Nikon D800 has been officially beaten out, and appropriately enough it has happened at the hands of its nearly identical twin brother, the Nikon D800E.

Michael Zhang

Behind the Scenes with Camera and Lens Testing Service DxO Labs

Stephen Shankland over at CNET has written an interesting behind-the-scenes look at how DxO Labs -- one of the world's premier camera testing services -- evaluates equipment. DxO Labs is based near Paris, France and was the result of a 2003 spinoff from a company called Vision IQ, which specialized in swimming pool safety. Since then, the group has published over 185 in-depth camera reviews on its website DxOMark.