5D MK2 vs 1D MK4 High ISO & LR3 new noise Process compare.

Just a quickie I though some of you might find interesting. I talked about getting you all some high ISO samples from these cameras on the last podcast, so here they are. After the show, I got together with Nickles and we did a very informal ISO test. Nothing fancy, just some quick, poorly lit handheld images with Cyrus and Harrson. Still, you’ll get the idea. The 5D MK2 was still a solid contender with a great fine grain feel.

The 1D has a trump card because it can go to much higher ISO and while it might be noisy, I would not hesitate to use ISO 50K if I was in an ultra low like situation like a wedding reception. On the show I said it looks as good at 50K as the MK2 does at 12k. Looking here I see that was a an overstatement, but for how high the ISO is I’m still impressed. A little grain does not kill us, in fact the grain on these newer cameras is looking better all the time.

I used basic noise reduction in LR3 (no plugins) but I did use new process version which made a lot of difference in the final quality. To illustrate that I’m posting a side by side on the new and old process as well. Click for larger versions.