GE E850 Review
Review Date: August 13th 2007
Author: Mark Goldstein
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Image Quality
All of the sample images in this Review were taken using the 8 megapixel
JPEG setting, which gives an average image size of around
3Mb.
Noise
There are 6 ISO settings available
on the GE E850 which you can select at any time if
the camera is in the normal shooting mode. In terms of noise
levels, the GE E850 is the worst performing camera that I
have ever seen, with noise evident even at the slowest speed
of ISO 80. ISO 200 is virtually unusable, whilst ISO's 400,
800 and 1600 should all be avoided. Here are
some 100% crops which show the noise levels for each ISO
setting:
Sharpening
Here are two 100% crops which have
been Saved as Web - Quality 50 in Photoshop. The right-hand
image has had some sharpening applied in Photoshop. The out-of-the
camera images are a little soft at the default sharpening
setting. You can't change the in-camera sharpening level
if you don't like
the
default look.
File Quality
The GE E850 has 3 different JPEG file quality settings available,
with 8M Best being the highest quality option. Here are some
100% crops which show the quality of the various options,
with the file size shown
in brackets.
Chromatic Aberrations
The GE E850
handled chromatic aberrations fairly well during the review,
with small levels of purple fringing mainly present
around the edges of objects in high-contrast situations,
as shown in the example below.
Macro
The GE E850 offers a Macro setting that allows you to focus
on a subject that is 6cms away from the camera. The first
image shows how close you can get to the subject in Macro
mode (in this case a compact flash card). The second image
is a 100% crop.
Flash
The flash settings on the GE E850 are Auto, Red-Eye Reduction, Forced Flash,
No Flash, Slow Synchro, Red-Eye Reduction+Slow Synchro.
These
shots of a white
coloured wall were taken at a distance of 1.5m.
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Auto
Flash - Telephoto (140mm) |
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And here are some portrait shots.
The Auto setting caused a tiny amount of red-eye, which the
Red-eye reduction mode successfully removed.
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Auto
(100% Crop) |
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Auto & Red-eye
reduction (100% Crop) |
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Night Shot
The GE E850's maximum shutter
speed is 30 seconds, which is great news if you're seriously
interested in night photography. Unfortunately the results
are very noisy. The shot below was taken using a shutter
speed of 10 seconds, aperture
of
f/5.6
at
ISO 80. I've included a 100% Crop of the image to show
what the quality is like.
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Night
Shot (100% Crop) |
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Overall Image Quality
The GE E850 produced images of poor quality during the review period.
The GE E850 dealt fairly well with chromatic
aberrations, with some purple fringing effects appearing
in high contrast situations. The built-in flash worked
well indoors, with no red-eye and average overall exposure.
The night photograph was OK, with the maximum shutter speed
of 30 seconds allowing you to capture enough light in most
situations, but the resulting image was very noisy. Macro
performance is average, allowing you to focus as close
as 6 cms
away from the subject. The 8 megapixel images were a little soft straight out
of the camera at the default sharpening setting and ideally
require
some further sharpening in an application like Adobe Photoshop
- you can't change the in-camera setting. The
GE E850 main problem was with noise. The GE E850 is the worst
performing camera that I have ever seen in this area, with
noise evident even at the slowest speed
of ISO 80. Anything above ISO 100 is a complete write-off,
which limits this camera to good lighting conditions only.
 PhotographyBLOG
is a member of the DIWA
organisation. Our test results for the GE E850 have been submitted to DIWA
for comparison with test results for different samples of
the same camera model supplied by other DIWA
member sites.
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