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10-09-2019, 11:18 AM - 1 Like   #511
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QuoteOriginally posted by TwoUptons Quote
This is an excellent example.
I know I’ve been very pleased with results from the K1ii.

That said, it would put all of our paranoia to rest if it had an off switch... and maybe the new camera will have that so we can talk about it during next year’s contest raffle

-Eric
Everyone I know with a K-1 and a K-1ii uses the K-1ii. I can only expect I'd do the same. if it costs $5 to put in a switch that's 5 dollars I'm not willing to pay.


Last edited by BigMackCam; 10-09-2019 at 12:27 PM. Reason: Keeping it friendly
10-09-2019, 11:20 AM - 1 Like   #512
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QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
I already answered this by giving some examples.
All of these examples where irrelevant to the "accelerator" unit discussion (see below).

QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
Whoa there. The digital image capture process is largely analogue (one could say the film is digital by the way) - that is, until the A/DC does its job. Only down the stream it is digital.
What you need to understand is that the "sensor" is a unit comprising, among other things, the sensels, read-out circuitry, built-in noise reduction (proper one, not denoising), and (in the case of the Sony sensor we are talking about, column-parallel) A/D conversion circuitry.

In other words, the "sensor" chip is not just some light-sensitive material that converts photons into electrical charge, it is the whole shebang.

Ricoh cannot do anything but read out the digital data from the sensor.

So yes, anything to do with noise happens within the chip which we refer to as "the sensor".

The "downstream" you are referring to starts right after the sensor. There are no discrete A/D converters on the PCB of the camera.

I hope that helps you to adjust your view on what is going on and hence on what a unit like the "accelerator" unit can achieve and what it cannot achieve.


QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
Do you even know what the accelerator does?
Yes, it applies denoising, increases saturation and sharpens the image. All of which can be observed by comparing K-1 images to K-1 II images.

Since we also know how a modern Sony sensor works (anything analogue is hidden within the chip), we know that all the above processing happens on digital data (that some people would prefer to be written to the card as is).

QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
What if it does apply dark frame NR based on - for instance - temperature, or other such factors?
If the "accelerator" unit used dark frame subtraction then
  1. you could do the same yourself; you'd just have to capture the dark frames explicitly. However, we know that it isn't just dark frame subtraction, because
  2. you wouldn't observe smoothing effects in the final images.

QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
It's much more complicated than writing the line above.
How is that an argument at all?
Of course engineering a camera is more complicated than stating that there are manufacturers which can properly engineer a camera. That doesn't mean that the engineering is so complicated that most of them struggle to achieve the same quality as Pentax.

To the best of my knowledge, the sensor even has built in power-supply noise rejection. No vodoo or special magic sauce is required to establish a power source that allows the sensor to operate to its maximum potential. Providing an EMI-free environment surely is harder but, again, these matters are irrelevant for an "accelerator" unit discussion, as you'll hopefully agree, now that you know that it can only operaterate on "downstream" data.

QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
Again this is nowhere as simple as writing the line above. "Stabilising the operating conditions"? What the beep does it means?
It can, for instance, mean to keep the temperature constant.

This is, of course, not practical, but could be done to show that even with constant temperature and other parameter you think are important held constant, a K-1 image would not suddenly look like a K-1 II image.

QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
The patent was an example of noise issues actually encountered in a camera, because you have this wrong idea that a sensor is impervious to external (internal to the camera) factors.
I never said that the sensor is "impervious to external (internal to the camera) factors".

Where did you get that from?

QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
It might be applicable to a Sony sensor, it might be applicable to a Ricoh custom-made sensor.
The patent is definitely not applicable to the sensors used in the cameras that use the "accelerator" unit.

I have surely mentioned this before: Do you think it is a coincidence, that the "accelerator" unit is exactly emulating the DR characteristic you see in cameras that use a sensor with dual-gain technology?

These sensors can actually improve DR at higher ISO settings by using a higher analogue gain before the A/D conversion. They hence exhibit a jump in DR at a certain ISO value. Now isn't it very plausible that Ricoh tried to emulate the same effect in lieu of actually using sensors with dual-gain technology?

Do you think that is really pure coincidence? Or is it more likely that the creative Pentax engineers came up with a way to (somewhat) achieve with post-processing what they couldn't achieve by using the right hardware in the first place?

QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
Breaking news: you prefer processed images, too.
No, I'm not.

Not in the sense that we are discussing.

I find it very unhelpful to confound the necessary conversion of raw data into images, that we can look at, with completely avoidable pre-processing of raw data.


QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
You cannot see unprocessed ones, anyway (not even by investigating the content of a RAW file with a hex editor).
I refuse to believe that you actually believe to be making a valid argument.

You must know the difference between calculating images from raw data and manipulating raw data.

The calculation of images from raw data does not smooth out detail. In other words: The K-1 exists and no so-called "raw purist" complains about it as it refrains from manipulating raw data by applying denoising, saturation adjustments, and sharpening.
10-09-2019, 11:27 AM   #513
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some people just can't restrain themselves

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10-09-2019, 11:33 AM   #514
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QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
No K-1 (i.e. if we had the AU version from the beginning), no such talks and everyone would've been happy.
That is simply not correct.

You can detect the smoothing of the K-1 II without having the K-1 as a reference.

10-09-2019, 11:55 AM - 1 Like   #515
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QuoteOriginally posted by house Quote
Unfortunately I think you are expecting to much from dpreview. Those differences *could* be misfocus, bumped lens etc
QuoteOriginally posted by normhead Quote
That is a lot of work, thanks for doing it, but I'd qualify it by noting, often in comparative lab tests I find not enough attention is paid to ensuring the focus points are the same in both images. When examining two comparison images on IR, there were times the you could argue that one was sharper than the other, the you went to a different part of the image and you could argue the opposite. I would argue that overall image quality at the size the image will be displayed is a better test for most people, than would be pixel peeping.
Both valid points, and I agree that we have to be very careful when using DPR's test photos for analysis, as they can be misleading for a number of varying reasons.

In this case, though, the focus seems accurate and consistent across the frame for both the K-1 and K-1II shots at both ISO 100 and ISO 6400. I've used reference points around the centre, borders and corners of the frames to confirm equally accurate focus for all of the shots. I see no evidence of inaccurate focus, lens aberrations or camera movement affecting the result for the K-1II.

My intention here isn't to criticise the image accelerator's impact. Whilst I'd rather it could be toggled (if that were technically possible), I'd quite happily shoot with either the K-1 or K-1II.
10-09-2019, 12:01 PM - 1 Like   #516
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Thanks BigMackCam, that helps with figuring out how much is camera and how much is dpreview.

QuoteOriginally posted by BigMackCam Quote
My intention here isn't to criticise the image accelerator's impact. Whilst I'd rather it could be toggled (if that were technically possible), I'd quite happily shoot with either the K-1 or K-1II.
It's unfortunate that you have to pledge allegiance after helping us find out about our gear.
10-09-2019, 12:26 PM   #517
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QuoteOriginally posted by Class A Quote
That is simply not correct.

You can detect the smoothing of the K-1 II without having the K-1 as a reference.
I said that there wouldn't be such lengthy talks and people would be happy (like they are with the K-70 and KP), not that you can't possibly detect any smoothing by applying some algorithm on test images.
Note that only noise "smoothing" was detected by Bill Claff, not detail smoothing (as there is no detail on the test images).

10-09-2019, 01:03 PM - 5 Likes   #518
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How often do you tell to the people who are looking at your images to zoom in at 100% to check for details? I'm asking because it seems that for some it's not enough that you already have 36mp to play with, but now you argue about 2% less sharp images at high ISO on K1 II. Come on people...

It's the same with editing... I for example never use: noise reduction (I don't know where is this option on Photoshop, Canon DPP and Lightroom), clarity and saturation when I'm editing. I set my camera to Auto ISO and ISO can't go further than the above limit that I set. This way I don't have to use noise reduction when I edit files. I rarely use sharpen and when I use it it's local sharpen, not general and this is due to the fact that I don't give to my clients full resolution images. I resize them at 4k resolution and by doing that the files looks sharper due to resize.

This accelerator thing seems the last of my problems and I really don't care which camera will give me those 2% better images at high ISO. Again, you have 36mp to play with and some people act like they depend on that 2% difference in image quality. Strange problems these days...
10-09-2019, 01:06 PM   #519
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QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
I said that there wouldn't be such lengthy talks...
Why wouldn't there be talks about that feature?

Surely, if DPReview had picked it up even without having the K-1 as a reference -- note that the author team has a different composition; for the K-1 II review it crucially contains our favourite Ph.D. who openly declared that DPReview is not hitting hard enough on Pentax -- then we'd have the same talks.

Even if they hadn't picked it up but some users, the same discussion would have ensued; admittedly without the component of concern for how damaging the DPReview verdict is.
QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
Note that only noise "smoothing" was detected by Bill Claff, not detail smoothing (as there is no detail on the test images).
There is image denoising.

There is no algorithm that can only denoise noise while leaving all detail intact.
10-09-2019, 01:13 PM   #520
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QuoteOriginally posted by Dan Rentea Quote
How often do you tell to the people who are looking at your images to zoom in at 100% to check for details? I'm asking because it seems that for some it's not enough that you already have 36mp to play with, but now you argue about 2% less sharp images at high ISO on K1 II. Come on people...

It's the same with editing... I for example never use: noise reduction (I don't know where is this option on Photoshop, Canon DPP and Lightroom), clarity and saturation when I'm editing. I set my camera to Auto ISO and ISO can't go further than the above limit that I set. This way I don't have to use noise reduction when I edit files. I rarely use sharpen and when I use it it's local sharpen, not general and this is due to the fact that I don't give to my clients full resolution images. I resize them at 4k resolution and by doing that the files looks sharper due to resize.

This accelerator thing seems the last of my problems and I really don't care which camera will give me those 2% better images at high ISO. Again, you have 36mp to play with and some people act like they depend on that 2% difference in image quality. Strange problems these days...
Well put. I couldn't have said it better myself. I agree 100%.
10-09-2019, 01:15 PM   #521
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QuoteOriginally posted by Dan Rentea Quote
I for example never use: noise reduction
Well, if you use a camera with an "accelerator" unit, you do use noise reduction.

This is meant in the most friendly way possible.

I'm just pointing out if someone really doesn't like the look of denoising then they have no choice when they are using a camera with an "accelerator" unit that cannot be disabled.

QuoteOriginally posted by Dan Rentea Quote
...some people act like they depend on that 2% difference in image quality...
Agreed, it sounds unreasonable.

However, even if it were just 1%, why take the hit when it is not necessary?

Also, under certain conditions (e.g., deep stacking), it may well be a difference that is bigger than 2%.

Finally, and I'm sorry to repeat myself, I believe the hit the K-1 II took by receiving a scathing review by DPReview, missing out on any kind of recommendation (not even a bronze!), is worse than a 2% difference.
10-09-2019, 01:34 PM   #522
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QuoteOriginally posted by Class A Quote
Why wouldn't there be talks about that feature?
Why there weren't, for the K-70 and KP?
Because people only compared the end result, and that was better. But make them believe they'd lose something and...

QuoteOriginally posted by Class A Quote
There is no algorithm that can only denoise noise while leaving all detail intact.
I said that Bill Claff only detected noise "smoothing", and I'm correct. Please do not argue against claims I never made.
There are, however, instances in which correcting noise would leave detail intact or improved. Dark frame substraction algorithms, for example. Or correlated double sampling.
10-09-2019, 01:35 PM   #523
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QuoteOriginally posted by Kunzite Quote
Note that only noise "smoothing" was detected by Bill Claff, not detail smoothing (as there is no detail on the test images).
But there is as far as I know no noise reduction that doesn't remove detail. If there was I'd likely heard about it. Still the accellerator might be good for 99% of users.
10-09-2019, 01:44 PM   #524
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QuoteOriginally posted by house Quote
But there is as far as I know no noise reduction that doesn't remove detail. If there was I'd likely heard about it. Still the accellerator might be good for 99% of users.
The thing is, you just don't know. You don't know how much detail is (supposedly) lost and in which conditions. You don't know what the accelerator does. Saying that there are signs of noise processing on uniform images (zero detail) at ISO 640 is utterly useless.
Except for making you panic that OMG, you must be losing something! It's the end of the world!
10-09-2019, 01:52 PM - 1 Like   #525
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QuoteOriginally posted by Class A Quote
Well, if you use a camera with an "accelerator" unit, you do use noise reduction.
As long as I'm pleased with the quality I get (and I don't think there is a full frame these day that doesn't have enough image quality for my needs) it may reduce noise or add noise because I don't care. As some already know, I buy cameras only after I test them in the conditions I shoot. If the noise reduction will affect my images by 2-5%, then I resize them from 36mp to 30mp or to 24mp and problem solved. And it seems that the accelerator kick in after ISO 800 if I understood correctly, so there is 0% chances that I need a 40" print at ISO 1000.

QuoteOriginally posted by Class A Quote
This is meant in the most friendly way possible.
I know. I try to put smiley faces in order for people to understand that I'm relaxed. It doesn't work always but I'm working on another strategy to let people know I'm not into fighting discussions.

QuoteOriginally posted by Class A Quote
I'm just pointing out if someone really doesn't like the look of denoising then they have no choice when they are using a camera with an "accelerator" unit that cannot be disabled.
True, but again, this is more a theoretical problem rather than a real problem. At least to me it has 0.5% impact when I buy a camera that has this feature.
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