April Meadow

--Lannie

I am just in awe of the detail you get with this camera.  The grass is just amazing.

This picture makes me want to take a picnic basket, spread a blanket and just enjoy the scenery.

Thanks, Diane.  This old beater cost me about $500 on eBay, but a little Nikon glass pulls out every pixel.

--Lannie

I was wondering about this camera.  You had a Kodak a long time ago, no?  I tested one of these early Kodaks when I worked in Santa Barbara.  Believe it or not, Kodak sent three of their digital engineers to learn from us.  Those were the days!  (Honestly, I don't think that's what killed them.)  I found that the Kodak I tested had hellish problems with IR, but I was working with theatre lights which emit hellish IR.

How are you liking your artefact?  best, j

It's a pain, Jamie, but sometimes, when the stars and planets are aligned right, it does give good pictures.

Interesting story.  Kodak seemed to be flailing around with DSLRs before it gave up on them.

Does the sky have too much magenta here?

--Lannie

By the way, Jamie, what I shot from 2004-06 was the 14n.  This one (the PRO SLR/n) is a lot better than the 14n, especially where the excessive noise reduction problem is concerned.  It is still slow and poor in low light--and there is still more chroma  noise than there should be.

--Lannie

I should probably calibrate again.  The sky looks fine, though.

I bet it's a great camera.  What's the crop factor?  1.33x?  That would make it like the Leica M8, which has a Kodak sensor.  best, j

There is no "crop factor," Jamie, unless it is "1."  The camera is full-frame.

--Lannie

when was it made?  j

It was made in 2004, I believe, Jamie--or possibly 2005 as well.  It was a step up from the earlier 14n in performance, even though the megapixels dropped from 13.9 to 13.5 usable megapixels in this newer version (the DCS PRO SLR/n).  It is frankly a lot better than the 14n, although it is still slow and still subject to chroma noise.

The two most noticeable improvements to me are the larger buffer and the absence of "water-coloring" noise reduction effects--or at least I have not noticed that, and I have shot a lot of cedar trees and other high-detail things whose texture the 14n noise reduction program would have obliterated, creating an effect that was sort of like water colors (all detail gone).  That was really obnoxious with the 14n, which I shot from 2004-2006.

This is not a good low light camera, however.  The big Kodaks stayed noisy, especially as the ISO crept up.  Chroma noise was the worst.

--Lannie

I think the ISO goes down to six.  Like six.  You know, six?  What a great thing! You can always keep your lenses wide open.  j

Uh, Jamie, the lowest that I can turn the ISO down to is actually 160 on this camera.  On the 14n, one had the option of turning it down to 50.

Now, perhaps there were applications that did allow the ISO to be turned down much lower, but those kinds of settings were never available to consumers.

Where did you get that number, by the way?  There were a number of similar sensors developed by Kodak and others related to the Kodak forays into DSLRs. I am aware of only two versions in the full-frame Kodaks, the one developed for the 14n, and the one developed for the DCS Pro SLR/n and the DCS Pro SLR/c (using a Canon mount on a body that originated with Sigma).  (At least, I am assuming that the /n and /c versions used the same upgraded sensor--but a different one from the one used on the 14n, which was very noisy.)

--Lannie