Sony Mavica CD1000Sony packs a 156 megabyte CD-R into a 2 megapixel Mavica. (Wow!)<<Viewfinder :(Previous) | (Next): Exposure & Flash>> Page 5:OpticsReview First Posted: 7/17/2000 |
OpticsThe MVC-CD1000 is equipped with a 10x, 6 to 60 mm lens (equivalent to a 39 to 390mm lens on a 35mm camera). The CD1000 also boasts the surprisingly effective Steady Shot anti-vibration system, which increases your chances of being able to hand-hold exposures with the long 10x telephoto. (The rule of thumb in the film-camera world has always been that you should use a shutter speed of one divided by the focal length of your lens in millimeters, to avoid blur from camera shake. Thus, for a 400 mm lens, you should use a shutter speed of at least 1/400.) As we discovered with the FD91 and FD95, the Steady Shot system does an excellent job of steadying the image in the viewfinder when working at the maximum telephoto setting. While we don't have any objective way to measure how effective the Steady Shot system is, our distinct impression was that like that of the FD95, the CD1000's Steady Shot system is significantly improved over that of the earlier FD91: It really does provide an amazing reduction in the amount of camera shake that makes it through to the CCD!
With a maximum aperture of f/2.8, the CD1000's lens is quite "fast," great for sports and other action shots (the larger aperture letting in more light, and permitting a faster shutter speed), as well as providing an option for isolating your subjects with a shallower depth of field. The lens has 52mm filter threads, which allow you to attach specialty filters and auxiliary lenses. The 2x digital telephoto can be turned on and off through the record menu, and effectively extends the camera's zoom range to 20x. However, quality is always an issue with digital telephoto, as the camera is simply enlarging the center portion of the image and thereby decreasing the image quality (which shows up as higher noise levels or softer resolution). Focus ranges from 9.8 inches (25 cm) to infinity in normal mode and from 0.8 to 9.8 inches (2.0 to 25 cm) in macro mode. Macro mode is controlled by the Macro button on the rear panel of the camera. The MVC-CD1000 performs very well in the macro category, capturing a minimum area of just 0.73 x 0.55 inches (18.57 x 13.93 mm). We did notice some barrel distortion in the image at the maximum macro setting, but nothing too extreme. Because the camera's very long lens barrel effectively blocks the flash at such a close range, the onboard flash won't work for extreme macro shots. Regardless, the MVC-CD1000 did a great job in our macro test.
Focus can be manually or automatically controlled, simply by sliding the Focus switch on the same side of the camera (next to the Macro button). Once in manual focus, you control focus by turning the ridged focus ring at the end of the lens. When you do so, the LCD viewfinder immediately switches to a 2x enlarged view, which helps you determine whether you've achieved proper focus or not. When in autofocus mode, the camera continuously sets the focus. The camera lets you know when images are in focus and when the exposure is locked through indicators on the display. When the green circle is solid, the camera is ready to snap the picture.
After we tested the earlier MVC-FD95, we heard from a number of early purchasers of that camera. A complaint many voiced was the cameras tendency to "freeze" the viewfinder display whenever the shutter button is pressed, or when the manual focus bezel is moved. Based on the same optics and camera electronics, the MVC-CD1000 shares this behavior. This is in fact a significant issue when shooting action subjects, as a lot can happen while the display is either frozen or transitioning between modes. Without special handling, this makes the camera of decidedly less value in shooting sports action and other fast-changing subjects. We did find a bit of a workaround to this problem though: It turns out if you just hold the shutter button half-pressed in manual focus mode, the display will revert to normal size, yet you can continue to operate the focus ring manually to follow the action. The on-screen distance display continues to show the distance in real-time, which can help you get the right focus in spite of the smaller screen display. This is still a trifle inconvenient (you have to keep your finger gently pressing the shutter button), but it does seem workable. In a note to the Sony engineers, it'd be nice to have a setup menu option to disable the jump to 2x size when you twiddle the manual focus adjustment. Likewise, why must the display freeze when you push the shutter button? - It sure would be nice if it could stay "live"...
The camera's Aperture Priority mode allows you to manually select the lens aperture from f/2.8 to f/11 in 1/2-stop increments, while the camera selects the appropriate corresponding shutter speed. Two quick focus modes, Landscape and Panfocus, allow you to preset specific focal distances for fast shooting situations. Landscape sets focus at infinity for far away subjects and Panfocus allows you to change focus quickly from close-up to far away subjects. We can see how these modes would be helpful at kids' soccer games and other sporting events, when the fast paced action doesn't give you much time to fool with focus.
In our testing, we found slight to moderate geometric distortion at the wide angle end of the lens range, as we measured about 0.4 percent barrel distortion. However, we found virtually no pincushion distortion at the telephoto end (at least none that we could effectively measure). Chromatic aberration was moderate, showing about two pixels of coloration on each side of the black resolution target corner elements. (This distortion is visible as a very slight colored fringe around the objects at the edges of the field of view on the resolution target). There is also some lens flare in the corners of the image in telephoto mode. Overall, an excellent performance for a lens with such a wide zoom ratio. (Surprisingly, barrel distortion was lower than we measured on the earlier FD95, even though the same lens is used on both cameras, as far as we know.)
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