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Thanks for a nice review, kids. Due to physical problems I have to give up my beloved Canon 40D and EFS 17-55 f2.8 and EF70-200 f4. The Nikon P7700 will, I believe, allow me to continue shooting with only a minimal loss of quality.
Roundup: Enthusiast Zoom Compact Cameras
Fujifilm XF1
12MP | 25-100mm (4x) Zoom | $450 (US) £320 (UK) €460 (EU)
- Buy Now / Check Price
- www.fuijfilm.com
- Full specifications, plus user reviews and more sample images
- Hands-on preview
The Fujifilm XF1 is the latest in its reputation-building 'X' series - with the company showing off what it's capable of doing. It's impressive in terms of specifications but it also tries to offer something distinctive in terms of design and technology. Conceptually the XF1 sits towards the Canon S-series end of the spectrum - prioritizing small camera dimensions over direct control or a bright lens (it's the X10's job to fulfil those needs).
Key Features
- 12.0MP 2/3" CMOS EXR sensor (offering 6MP output with higher dynamic range or lower noise)
- ISO 100-3200 (up to 12800, at reduced resolution, JPEG only)
- 25-100mm (equivalent), F1.8-4.9 optically stabilized zoom lens
- Rear clickable thumb dial and four-way dial
- 1080p30 video with stereo microphones
- 3.0" LCD screen with 460k dots
- 300 shot battery life (CIPA)
- Built-in ND filter
- In-camera Raw conversion option
Performance and Image Quality
The XF1 has three modes - a full resolution mode or two 6MP modes that combine pixels to improve either dynamic range or noise performance. Confusingly, the camera also has a second mode to capture more highlight information, but doesn't ever make it clear which you're using. And, while the EXR capability means the XF1 can capture 6MP images with unsurpassed highlight detail, for a compact, it imposes some limitations on the full resolution output. Shoot at 12MP or in Raw and you can't quite match the resolution performance of its more conventional peers. More problematically, fine detail - particularly fine green detail - is often rendered in a rather blurred, smudgy way.
However, the Fujifilm's images are pretty good unless you dig around at the pixel level - the camera behaves very well in terms of exposure and its color rendition is on the pleasant side of realistic. The imperfect corners of the lens at its widest setting, plus the camera's rather disappointing demosaicing mean the image quality doesn't live up to the standards set by many of its rivals.
The XF1 is undoubtedly a pretty camera but it's also one that does a good job of balancing the needs of the different potential user - it works well as a stylish point-and-shoot but is still quick and enjoyable to take control over. The XF1's output lives up to the standard of its exterior design - the metering is reliable and the color rendition is attractive. The manual zoom lens, once you've figured it out, gives precise control over your framing in a way that powered zooms don't.
Ironically the one thing the XF1's interface doesn't do well is to give easy access to its EXR capabilities - one of the features that should help the camera stand out. Getting to the EXR features in anything but the EXR Auto mode is unnecessarily difficult, but the XF1 is still a pretty good camera, even if you choose not to use them. Overall, though, the XF1's slightly glitchy image quality takes the sheen off a camera that looks great and is a pleasure to use.
Studio and Real-World Samples (links open in new tab)
Studio Comparison Tool | Fujifilm XF1 Samples (25 images) |
What we like: Classy styling and good build quality. Useful lens range. Well-designed user interface. Flash performance.
What we don't like: Disappointing lens corner performance at wide-angle. Poor detail rendition in full-size images.
Related Links
Click here to go to page 7 of our enthusiast zoom compact camera roundup
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions held by dpreview.com or any affiliated companies.
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There is also another compact camera to consider:
I'd propose the V1 instead (that now is for sale at a very friendly price), with the needle-sharp 18.5/1.8 (equals 50/1.8 on a full frame), and the superb 30-110 VR (equals approx. 80-300), as a superb kit that weigh very little, and with a good viewfinder!
The V2 is better organized (button-wise), but quite a lot more expensive!
Thanks, Tord, I really appreciate your advice. My spine is my primary problem and an eyelevel view finder is not as valuable to me as an articulated screen.
The Nikon P7700 is a good choice. I have the P7100 which has a tilt screen, I'd rather have articulated. I would give up the viewfinder for articulation.
Whats the biggest kept secret of DPR ?
" The Olympus XZ-2 Review"
oh yes ...
Just curious... Wasn't this review posted a few days ago? Were there significant changes with this repost?
Anyone know if the X-F1 has the Advanced Low Light mode of the X10? Not the EXR High ISO mode, but the Advanced Low Light mode that combines multiple images into one final image. That mode is far superior for handheld night time street photography in my experience.
I believe it does. Download the manual and check.
there is EXR Auto (it selects for you according to scene)
exr Resolution Priority (12MP file)
exr High iso & Low Noise (6MP file)
exr D-Range Priority (6MP file)
And under the Advanced menu, you should find
"Pro-Low-Light" where it combines 4 images... but did you say "handheld", for 4 images?
I think this is one thing that DPR might like to include in their reviews: night/low light modes comparison.
Not all cameras' low light modes actually produce acceptable results, while some do a great job. (for example, P7000 was great, XZ1 was horrible)
Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX7
10MP | 24-90mm (3.75x) Zoom | $300 (US) £355 (UK) €460 (EU)
WOW -- someone needs a currency calculator!
You're absolutely right! And about that, camera companies prices have got to become more standardized. I know they're going to charge whatever the traffic will bear, but really, other than that, what's their rationale for charging literally twice as much for the same camera in Great Britain and in European Union countries than they'll sell them for in the United States?
I think Panny was running a special on the LX7 in the US for $299. But it wasn't clear how long the special would last until it expired the other day. I saw B&H advertising it at $299 while Amazon has it at regular $449, so I went to B&H and bought it immediately. The price went back to $449 on B&H's site literally that evening. Maybe they still have it at $299 at the store, call them up!
While I was at B&H, I did spend the time to check out most of the cameras above, plus Nikon V1, which is not much bigger w/ the 10mm lens. Nikon is giving it away at $299 w/ 1 lens, $399 w/2, plus $149 for an additional lens with purchase. The Panny GX1 is $449! I bought the LX7 because of the deal and I don't want to deal with changing lens. It's meant for quick snapshots. I like to have additional control over it, but not too much. It's NOT meant to 'replace' my DSLR. I like the RX100, but extra $ can be used for a decent prime. In a year, there will be another test like this one! :)
Declaring a best all rounder without taking acquisition price into account is delivering only a partial review.
These are consumer products. Toys like this are a major expense for people, and going out on a limb to buy toys they can't afford are a major problem for people.
Let's have a new attribute to include in reviews. Let's call it the price/performance ratio. Take you quality metrics, your imaging ability metrics, and whatever other subjective ingredient to throw into the stew, and divide it by today's actual acquisition price.
And then let us determine the best all-arounder. Is an LX-7 with a ppr (price/performance ratio) of 8.3 better than the Sony with a ppr of 4.8? Or whatever.
Because without real world, practical business attributes shared, this is just soft core spec porn.
What price? In what country? We would need many ratios, it would become cumbersome:) by the way, if you happen to think the US prices are representative at least relating one camera to the next, think again. Canon for example charges 85% more for the G15 in the UK than it does in the Us, Sony only charges 11% more for its RX100. RX100 is cheaper to buy in the UK than the G15.
> Declaring a best all rounder without taking acquisition price into account is delivering only a partial review.
This is markedly "enthusiast" round-up.
Price is very important for "consumer" level selection - not so much for the "enthusiast" level.
> [...] this is just soft core spec porn.
That's intentional. Lion share of enthusiast level gear is designed specifically to appeal to that. :)
> Let's call it the price/performance ratio.
As you yourself highlight, there is no singular "performance" metric. Thus the "PPR" benchmark would end up being as skewed as the conclusion on the last page.
Some German car reviews use fancy scheme where car is rated on number of metrics, then the weigh quotients are applied to the ratings and they are summed up to produce a singular number. User can also adjust the quotients to give different weigh to particular rating, if they place special important on it. Probably that can work here too.
That is a rather easy exercise for your to do: can't afford the RX100, get the LX7.
The P7700 is the only camera I have really got excited about since I swapped my Canon G3 for a 30D. Fast (relative to other longer zoom compacts) lens, longer zoom range, flip out screen and lots of external control. Shame about the processor it seems. Come on Nikon, give us a faster processor and I'm in! But if Canon bring back the flip out display next time round it would be a tough call.
I'd love a bigger sensor like the G15 but I frequently use the 140-170mm range of my 24-105 +30D combination, physics can be really inconvenient sometimes! So I'll save my pennies and wait for the G16 vs P7800.
It's fine shooting J-pegs which is what I shoot all the time. Just bought the P7100 and quite happy with it so far.
Looking forward to the day, when this category, will have a roundup of compact cameras that all have larger sensors, like today's RX100. When more cameras have larger sensors, the test and comparison results will be much more interesting.
Reading all the comments, I feel that we are having to choose between the sensor we want, versus the lens characteristics we want, all debating which is better. With the competition catching up, we won't be stuck between a rock and a hard place.
I agree. The choice between lens and sensor is very frustrating. I want a flexible travel camera that also lends itself to some low light creativity. Understandably I guess that's too much to ask. But it would look like an LX7 with double the zoom and an articulating lcd screen.
To me, the choice is other CX-senored cameras, like the Nikon 1 series cameras. I like the V1, others like other variants!
I'm referring to, of course, the graph that I made and published here when the RX100 came out.
nobody mentions LX7 raw NR above 800 ISO, and it's sensor inferiority (just compare it to XZ2)
Excellent - really enjoyed reading this. I'm choosing between the RX100 and the LX7. I primarily want the camera for underwater use (yes, with a housing...), but I also want a pocketable camera for when I don't want to bring my Canon 7D. With housings (Ikelite), they both end up at a similar price (the LX7 housing is more expensive due to the ergonomics).
Advantages of the RX100:
- Awesome light gathering at the wide angle (it's the wide angle i need underwater)
- Great DR and noise control
- Good AF, I think...
- Truly pocketable for non underwater use
- I've fallen in love with the spec sheet - sorry!
Advantages of LX7:
- Wider wide angle
- Superfast shooting (is this RAW?)
- Camera will be the cheaper part of the underwater setup (useful in case i fail to seal the housing properly.
They both look like great cameras. I'm probably leaning towards the RX100 (could you tell?) but was wondering if anyone had any useful info or opinions to share.
If you see the underwater videos and photos taken by the RX100 on the web, you will be in no doubt:) They are SPECTACULAR.
Lab tests are one thing, but what are the challenges that you run into in real life? Yesterday I was filming my little daughter's Christmas show, and a camera I was using was constantly hunting to focus and the pictures came out pretty bad (noisy). When the going gets tough, which of these cameras will deliver? I suspect that sensor size will trump all, as they all have relatively fast lenses in this roundup.
There's also another option you can consider: just spending the extra money on an underwater camera. That's what I did, for a Pana TS3 (although, when not shooting underwater, I'm not impressed with DPR's award winning underwater camera).
Thanks for the Ikelite rec - am taking my RX100 to the Galapagos in April, and now it looks like I'll get to take it underwater, too.
I adore the RX100. I was an avid Canon fan for many years and really didn't want to like the Sony, but it's just about everything I'd want it to be: small but substantial, fast, versatile, and really quite a lot of fun, at least for someone with small hands. I'd strongly recommend getting Alexander White's guide to the RX100 unless you enjoy camera manuals: it helped me familiarize myself with the camera tremendously.
Also, if you're not crazy about the no-grip style, Richard Franiec made a gorgeous, light, metal alloy grip for this camera that costs $34.95 plus shipping. I should be getting it soon, and I think it will make a big difference in my confidence handling the camera.
Is RX100 actually the best camera? I cannot see it with my eyes.
Try to use the studio shot comparison tool and compare RX100 with any other compact camera (I tried P7700) and with a top Reflex for reference (any brand, it does not matter). Now look at the top left quarter of the clock quadrant. RX100 is not able to separate the white dashes of 10, 11 and 12 (at any ISO). It seems incredible, even a 50$ camera can, but it is true. I have no explanations. I found other problems, but not so evident.
The LX7 has also another interesting function worth mentioning: Time lapse.
Yes, a welcome addition ... BUT ... need more. User should be able to dial in how many shots maybe up to 256, and need more intervals, e.g., 1sec, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 20, 30 in addition to those in the menu.
Sony and Canon are built like a piece of soap - no good to hold. Most of the lenses are very slow at the tele-position. The only winner for me, with the best viewfinder from all small and mirrorless cameras: Panasonic LX7 - easy choise.
Well... I can only say that I have had the RX100 since September and apart from no optical veiwfinder I really cannot fault this amazing machine. Getting used to managing without veiwfinder and it really doesn't bother me at all now. Size and build quality are superb, perfect even ! The image quality is fantastic, even low light high ISO shots come out brilliantly. A friend of mine has the Nikon and he is considering changing. This is my first Sony camera ( Nikon DSLR ) and it is an ongoing great experience, still learning from it and I love it !! For me it is the perfect combo, pocket size and DSLR image quality, and with a zeiss lens and great build.... well ! I did a lot of research before parting with my cash.... and I am not dissapointed at all, money v well spent ! Get one !
If you check out the Canon G12 on Amazon you wll see that its price is soaring as the G15 goes in the opposite direction. The G12 is now $10 more than the newer model which may suggest the loss of the articulated screen, loss of direct access to ISO and questionable IQ (on some reviews) make the older model more attractive. Had the G15 given us a Contax G2 viewfinder and retained the articulated screen with 24mm at the wide angle I would have bought in an instant. None of the current crop offer what I am looking for--the LX-7 is close with the 24mm but the tele end is well below par and the CMOS is too tiny. Overall, the Nikon P7700 is looking good because it has the reach and is the ideal travel camera for the growing number of us who are gettng tired of carring a DSLR and lenses on vacation.
I recently bought the Nikon 7700, and have been very pleased with how it generally performs, except in low light. But, I did not buy it for that; I bought it for an upcoming trip to Brasil and I am not keen to take my big DSLR and some lenses lest they get stolen! The range on this little camera is remarkable, and it takes brilliant photos in good light. I could not be more pleased. There is a lot of buzz about the Sony RX-100, but I found it to be too small, that it's optical zoom is limited, and that it is slippery in the hand and too expensive for what I wanted. I managed to find my little Nikon for $C450 with tax.
have you tried it yet on it's night mode setting? my P7000 was remarkable, compared to others with the same sensor size.
Totally agree on you.
The P7700 is Nikon's first good looking enthusiast compact camera.
I was mostly happy with my G12, but yearned for a little more zoom and most of all the ability to easily fit filters (polarising in particular). I saw the P7700 and it had a FLIP 'N TWIST SCREEN!!! Absolutely essential IMHO, my last 4 cameras had them, can't imagine working without it. The G12 had a viewfinder but I had only used it twice in 2 years, so going without it for filters and more zoom was a no-brainer!
I've had some problems learning Nikon's UI's quaint ways, inevitable with a brand change, but nothing unsurmountable. I love this camera.
The travel zooms are nice cameras for, well, travel.
I have a Canon SX30HS, and while the Nikon 7700 will surely beat it pixel peeping at equivalent focal lengths, the 480mm equivalent gets a lot of shots that I would not get even with 200mm equivalent, such as flowers on balconies, details of ornaments on buildings, etc. Also, at 8x10, I bet there is no difference in the prints between the two cameras. There probably is at 13x19, but I rarely print that size.
I thought the travel zooms were crap, but there is a place for them. The Canons, Panasonics, etc. fit in my pocket without a problem. Just a thought.
I love the fact that I can put a screw-on filter on the P7700 right out of the box. I've hardly used the lens cap since I got the camera; it's always ready to shoot.
You'd think every manufacturer would want to do this -- it isn't magic.
I have Oly C5060 (I like it) and Canon G11 (I do not like it, but the low light performance, of coarse, and lens cap is better than Oly).
My priority is a fully tiltable LCD.
I am planning to buy a Nikon P7700.
I do not understand how a camera can be sold without this.
Do you like crawling in the mud?
And a camera without filter screw?
Compare the sample G15 wide angle shot here with the RX100's. It's not even funny how much better the RX100 is. Far more detail, less noise, better DR, better microcontast, you name it.
Yes, but the RX100 doesn't have a hot shoe, optical viewfinder, or manual flash like the G15 and my old G10. However, I just replaced my G10 with the RX100 (rather than a G15) because the extra features already exist (in better ways) on my DSLR. The RX100 is a fantastic genuinely small camera with great IQ. If you already have a DSLR, the Sony wins hands down.
Judging all the cameras ONLY on the wide angle shot, the P7700 to me looks like it is delivering the best optical performance, nudging out the RX100 by a hair or nose or some other body part.
Haven't looked at other image comparisons yet.
RAW images processed by ACR are far too yellow for both P7700 and G15. If you are trying to convince me to shoot JPEG, you are succeeding.
ACR raw conversion are too yellow for a LR of cameras when you are using the Adobe standard option. For those cameras that have other picture styles available from the manufacturer, like the Canon DSLRs the results are better. But I find it prblematic for the other cameras, like all the mcro four thirds cameras.
The LX7 is now a $270 camera from Panasonic Direct. It wins hands down.
@Kodachrome200 I didn't check, but maybe you have to like them on Facebook to get the deal? That's how it used to be, anyway.
Guys, again, I didn't check, because I'm not buying the LX-7, but to get the special prices from Panasonic in the past, you had to like Panasonic on Facebook, then go to the Panasonic Facebook page and click "Fans-only deals" or "Friends-only deals" (something like that), at which point you saw the special deals. I'm not saying it still works that way, but it did when I was shopping for a GH2 and FX150 . Maybe OP is full of it with this price, I don't know.
You guys just missed a bunch of deals on the LX7 at that $300 price point. B&H had it for around that as did J&R. J&R was at $290 actually. Picked it up and ditched the XZ1 for it.
No FB silliness. Just a coupon code, which put it at $275 shipped. incredible! If I didn't already have the LX-5, that would have been a no brainer.
For me with a fixed lens .... I would want 24mm wide angle ... so that alone shortens the list ....
Then with no viewfinder I would want some form of articulated screen
Only Samsung left ....
Exactly, only 3 cameras here have 24mm which is an absolute must for me, they are all great. I agree the handling and fold out screen of the samsung just shade it out of those 3.
I download all the wide angle pic and conclude that the best are from
RX100 and P7700
A high cost and low cost pic
So long as wide-angle image quality is your sole criterion. I'd argue there's more to a camera that that, which is why it took 12 pages to reach a more nuanced conclusion.
Hi, reviewer
I wish dpreview will answer the age old question of whether one should buy an Enthusiast Compact or mirrorless with kit lens (NEX-F3,E-PL5...etc)
They are about the same price and what will give you better IQ?
The larger sensor will. Consider the RX100 as a fixed zoom lens & pocketable version of the Nikon-1 system. In some reviews (ex: RX100) DPR gives a table of relative apertures to guesstimate control over depth of field. The sensor isn't as large as 4/3, but it is multiples larger than the tiny sensors in the rest of this category.
Low light: might I add, I owned a Nikon P7000 (1/1.7"), a Olympus XZ1 (1/1.7"), and now have a Fuji XS1 (2/3"), all of which have a relatively small sensor. But there was a world of difference between the night mode on the Nikon (amazing) and the Olympus (crappy), yet both use a 1/1.7" sensor.
In the fixed lens category the Sony is a safe choice, as it can outperform some f3.5 kit lenses.
If you go a bit larger, a Samsung NX1000, 20MP, APS-C, with 30mm f2 is a great choice (a poor man's version of a Sony RX1).
It all depends on your personal preference... if you don't mind carrying a camera bag & think you'll get serious, or really want it in your pocket.
I think it depends on what you want to do with the camera.
My favorite compact ever was the Olympus C7070. I shot with it for 5 years. It had a magnesium body (tough!), lots of exterior controls, and it took a lot of accessories. I OFTEN used it with wide-angle adapter, exterior flash, underwater case, etc. It also had a fold-out screen that could be used at almost any angle.
If you are looking for something to put in your pocket and shoot landscapes with, that's it, then I think the Sony wins. But if you ever use external flash, etc., then maybe you should look at a camera that can take more accessories and do more things. I am looking more at the Canon and Nikon offerings this time around, as well as the XZ2.
In my opinion, these cameras have gotten TOO small. My C7070 had four little plastic feet. I could sit it on a table as a tripod. Let's see the RX100 do that. I am not a teenage girl that has to fit a camera in her tight jeans. A LITTLE bulk in a camera is useful.
Nowadays, my choice would (indeed is) a mirrorless camera. They have become so tiny that they are as convenient as a compact. If I had to pick one, it would be the Olympus XZ2, but an E-Pm2 isn't that much bigger when used with a pancake lens.. You can even put a 28-84mm power zoom pancake on it ! Or the 15mm body lens cap.
There is no clear winner regarding IQ between compact and mirrorless.
I currently compare a Nikon V1 and an XZ-1 and the former really struggles... Indoors - where you need lots of DOF - bright compacts can be excellent.
But then there are those superb mFT lenses...
One of my priorities is size and weight and an XZ-1/2 offers excellent versatility in a small and light package.
I was deciding between a compact and a mirrorless, and I chose the Sony RX100, mainly because for me, nothing beats the ease of not having to change lenses, and the RX100 seemed to have similar quality with a fixed lens. I'm extremely happy with my choice so far.
Ignoring the RX100, it looks as if this review might say the same thing about all-around-best cameras that the last DPR comparison piece on enthusiast cameras did -- Olympus first (if you do mainly stills) and Panasonic first (if video matters to you).
The full review on the LX7 brought out a couple of issues that I am wondering whether a firmware fix will address -- red eye worse than its peers, and quite visible vertical striping in sweep panoramic shots. Any idea whether a firmware fix will address these issues, or are we waiting for an LX8 (hopefully not 2 years this time)?
Benn using the RX-100 for 2 months, I.Q. is really impressive, the video performance is the best I've seen, but the pictures' colors are so cold and dark on auto mode. I could see a huge difference in this test with the real world samples against the other competitors, the Sony is the only one with a wierd color.
On P mode and after a extensive research I manage to make it a little better, but still misses warmth and live. I hate post processing, so JPEG are essential to me. But my wife thinks is really boring to wait for me to find the perfect setup for each photo...
I had a S100 but exchange due lens error and the 24fps video (terrible without tripod), but the pictures colors were nicer than RX-100.
Size is also essential to me so the Fuji XF1 maybe could be the last option for me, but the powering system is too anyoyng...
Maybe next year the perfect camera for me might show up :)
My Samsungs tended to be cold too, so I bought Skylight 1a filters for all my lenses. (filters half the UV (better than nothing) and adds warmth to skintones etc.). You might like to check if you can get that for a RX100.
@bzanchet have you tried setting the RX100 to always bias the white balance a tiny bit towards the Amber end of the scale?
It's not the perfect solution but worth a try.
Mr. Butler I`m flattered to receive a reply from you thank you very much!! I'll try it tomorrow and post the results. I'm also using the contrast -1 or -2, it really improved the dark images... still I could not find the ideal setup for the creative style, on standard the colors seems dull, portrait is amazing for self pics and landscape is also very good for distance pics, but it's a bit anoyng to change this setting every time ;)
I have had a lot of camers in the past years since I can sell them in Brazil for twice the price, and I know it may sound stupid, but the best camera I have ever had till know is an old Sony DSC-N1 (excpt of course the limitations like 35mm wide, slow lens and and bad video), it is the best 100% crop I have ever seen, the sensor is a CCD 1/1.7... just a thought I'd like to share!
I've been considering the panasonic fz200 and I'm wondering if the sensor size in it would be smaller due to its larger zoom range then some of these cameras ? And how does the quality of the images compare? I can't seem to compare the images of the Panasonic fz200 to the Sony rx100 or olympus x2 in the full review on the Panasonic.
Try clearing your cache - that should force your browser to update the list of available cameras.
The FZ200 has a 1/2.3" type sensor, which is around 6.17 x 4.55 mm - around 1/3rd smaller than the 1/1.7" type used by most of these models.
Same zoom range but with a much larger sensor, 2/3", is the Fuji X-S1.
Looking at the images on the web the FZ200 consistently outperforms the XSi due to having a better (brighter and sharper) lens nullifying the sensor size difference.
@Doughbm2: where did you get that information? both have a f2.8 on the wide end. contrary to popular belief, the pana is not f2.8 throughout - leaving out the tele number is just misleading advertising. it's maximum opening is f2.8... and as you go tele, that becomes a smaller proportion of total length, hence the number increases and aperture regresses - it's a mathematical equation - you can't circumvent that.
@Timmbits: "...where its predecessor had a variable aperture of f2.8-5.2, the new model boasts nothing less than a constant aperture of f2.8 throughout the entire focal range. Yep, that's right, the FZ200 offers f2.8 all the way to its maximum equivalent focal length of 600mm." from Cameralabs review. ps: no h in my nickname
I am sure all of these cameras can and will take great quality images but 1 thing I must have is a viewfinder. That leaves only the Canon and the Fuji x10
If no viewfinder then an articulated LCD would be nice Nikon and Samsung
ever tried using one of these LCD screen only cameras out in the sun?
your better off with your cell phone
You can buy an EVF for the LX7 and the XZ-2 although that means you get an additional cost for the setup.
This is a very useful review, but I would like to see a section on viewfinders. In Australia or anywhere there is harsh light, a viewfinder is an important consideration. They can also be useful at performances where a bright screen might be distracting.
My VF2 viewfinder was originally purchased for $200 to fit an m43 camera, but I can also use it on my XZ-1, and presumably on the XZ-2 as well, so the cost is amortised over a longer period. Something to consider.
Even with a G12 viewfinder available, I found it OK to just cup my free hand over the articulated screen in bright light. Only once in 2 years did I find it too bright and that was a Central Otago (NZ) blue-dome high noon that was making my skin prickle.
The other use of a view-finder was when I was trying to get pix of my grandson. The only way was to put the camera on 'motor drive' and follow him in the viewfinder. No camera's digital screen can keep up with a 4-year-old.
Agreed. One of the reasons I replaced my G11 with an X100.
Hope the X-101 or X200 has a small fixed zoom (28-90 would do).
I'm really skeptical at their "conclusions". They seem to have simply "forgotten" that the Samsung has a f1.4 lens, like the LX7. Both of these should have rated better than the S110, and the Samsung been a better alternative to wifi which the canon has.
Also, I find that DPR is confusing EXR mode with Night mode. EXR isn't just "night". A subtle "mistake" to slam the manufacturer and favor another? Either this is going on, or the reviewers aren't paying attention. Pick one. Neither bodes well for an eroding reputation.
With regards the Fujifilms, please let me know where you think we've mistaken EXR for night mode. I wrote the EXR sections on the XF1 and X10 and I discussed both the SN and DR modes so I'd be interested to know where you think we've gone wrong - I'll clarify the text if needed.
However, when it comes to the EX2F, we're not going to agree.
You're welcome to be as skeptical as you like, but us not agreeing with you is not evidence of bias.
The problem is that it's not as good as its specifications suggest. Simply having a F1.4-2.7 lens doesn't automatically make you the winner, or we could have saved all the time we spent waiting for the cameras, testing and shooting with them, and just declared a winner based on numbers.
The S110 is, without a doubt, a better camera than the EX2F, if you want something small (the area we highlighted it in). The EX2F is considerably bigger, meaning it has to compete with the LX7 and XZ-2, both of which are also better cameras.
Because you wrote that it is only 6MP. that is pretty much night scene. EXR isn't just all about night scene.
I confess that I haven't tried the EX2F. I think my point was more to give attention to good lenses and sensor size.
I do think though, that not pitting the S110 against the others because it's a bit smaller, is really splitting hairs on camera size.
Plus, I think that you may be going about things the wrong way. In the vast "compact" category, it may be more pertinent to split the categories along sensor size, instead of body size. This has two advantages: it educates the general public, beginners, about the importance of a good sensor, and placing it more in the forefront tells manufacturers to up their game instead of complacency and withholding progress. If a compact camera has a bigger sensor, brighter lens, and gives you all the manual controls of a larger camera, why would the unnecessarily large one be sheltered from comparison with it?
EXR is only 6MP - the cameras can do a DR enhancing mode in 12MP images, but it's not EXR, it's a different system more like Highlight Tone Priority on a Canon DSLR (it halves the shutter speed and uses a different tone curve to pull the exposure back to the correct brightness).
With regards lenses and sensors, we tried to make clear that the S110 is limited in comparison to the opposition, in that it has a slower lens than any of the others. However, it is nice to use and is /significantly/ smaller than the opposition. Hence we recommended the RX100 or, for a cheaper option, the S110 /if/ your priority is having a really small camera.
If you're willing to accept a larger camera, then the others come into play and significantly out-muscle the S110. We've tried to make that clear.
People don't come here to be told that a camera is better because of the size - that is the one parameter even a blind person can figure out for themselves. We come here to have the rest, more technical stuff, presented. That being said, good thing you're there to clarify some stuff.
In the DPR's specs sheet section on the XF1, I don't see it mentioned that EXR mode halves resolution. For the life of me, I can't find it anywhere - not on their website, specs, features, not even in the user manual. You'd think this is an important detail that people would want to know.
Thanks for your good nature and for the clarifications.
Might you be able to share with us, where Fuji mentions this very important detail?
I've been using the X10 for several months and I like both its feel and its photos. In EXR mode there are three possibilities plus Auto. In two- and ONLY two - of the three ("high ISO and low noise" and "D-range priority") the resolution is reduced to 6 mp. To learn all about the X10, see "Photographer's Guide to the Fujifilm X10" by Alexander S. White.
They actually talk about it on this very website. 2 of the EXR modes are 6mp, one of the EXR modes is 12MP. But the way it was written in the conclusion of this roundup, suggests (to those who didn't weed through the original X10 review - which is most of us), that EXR does _only_ 6MP. Just seems a little biased.
I did not understand you complaint till your last comment. When you talk about EXR, you refer to the sensor name, while in this review it appeared quite clearly to me DPR was talking about EXR modes. Beside it's in the spec sheet that the sensor can deliver 12mp images.
It makes far more sense to split categories by body size over sensor size.
1st of all, sensor size, actually says nothing about image quality. How many pixels have they fitted, how tightly have they fitted them, what is the individual sixe of each pixel, and the sensor actually nay good at all. And then we have the optics, that could easily ruin a great big sensor.
2ndly, this is a review of "pro"-compacts, those are often used as complements to better cameras, and then size is often a prioroty, otherwise people would just bring the better camera they have.
or people are checking this out, cause they've understood that their mobiles dont give them much of low light performance, and thus are willing to invest in a pro compact to complement the mobile, and therefore want something they can pocket.
Sure, one can find size out for themselves, but there are thousands of cameras in DPs database, and really no way to filter out the best current pocketable ones for "pro" use.
@JH... exactly the opposite has been argued time and time again: megapixels don't determine image quality, but sensor size does. they don't make tiny sensors with photosites as large as the ones in a sensor multiple times larger. do the math.
2ndly, if it were only "pro" compacts (btw are you kidding me, "pro"?), we wouldn't see a S110... nor any other tiny sensor compact in this roundup.
In fact, like DPR already outlined for us, everything has to be taken in context... although not pro quality, this is a category, and within which we can find winners as well as obsolescence.
Well, at least you are starting to appreciate how a camera can give you better IQ than your cameraphone.
Comparing the studio scene shots, looking at the watch's 'Thursday', the Oly image simply stunning. But the Samsung image looks very soft, not sharply focused I guess, it surely can't be *that* bad a camera...?
I'm seriously thinking about buying a good, small camera. I'm looking for the best possible image quality in the smallest possible package. When money is no object, I feel that the answer to the previous equation can only be the RX100. When the price matters, I think the LX7 has the edge. The smallest m4/3 with the smallest possible lens is not enough pocketable for me.
What about the pentax q? Its really rather cheap right now and is decent for a p&s sized 12mp sensor. I wouldn't make poster prints from it, but for a lot of people its more than enough. You can change lenses too....
I must add, the q is the size of a credit card roughly. Tiny. A three lens kit could easily fit in a pocket. You can clean the sensor too...I've had a few bridge cams get dust on the sensor....
I don't think it's a matter of what camera is 'best' as I'm sure a lot of people choose a camera based on features. While the RX100 may have the best IQ, for my second camera I would like the 200 mm range, an articulated LCD and macro of at least 2cm. I carry two cameras so they compliment each other. This would let me shoot fast and without lens change from 15 -200mm. I now have a Canon G12 and have never used the optical viewfinder, so that's a non issue for me. Others find it essential.
For the best possible IQ in the smallest possible package, RX100 is what you should choose if money is no object. However, the S100, (which still costs as much as $482 at some stores) is currently available for a mere $249 on Amazon and at Adorama. At that price, it's a steal. It's quite a bit smaller than even the RX100 and is totally shirt-pocketable. If I were you, I'd get both as both have great IQ to size ratio. LX7 is very good too - it's just that it's not that small - definitely not shirt or pant-pocketable and needs a much bigger case. I snared the S100 for $229 (one-day only lightning deal) and the LX7 for $299 from Amazon recently.
Thanks guys for your responses. The thing is I want a small and capable camera as a second, carry-everywhere, leave-it-mostly-at-Auto care-free point-and-shooter. I have a DSLR for when I try to be an enthusiast amateur. Right now my second small camera is a Panasonic TZ-5 which I REALLY like but carrying it with me for some years in my sports etc, it has gathered many dings and a partially black LCD, but otherwise it works brilliantly. So I'm thinking about giving the poor thing some rest as I don't want it to die. I feel the Q with its interchangeable lenses might not be quite robust for where I want to take it. So, for now I'm between the RX100 and the LX7. It's not urgent though, come spring I'll decide and choose.
The Q has a tiny sensor! Don't expect too much from it. More like a toy interchangeable lens camera. If you're on a photography site like this, it is because you are a little more discriminating than what is offered in the cheap 1/2.3" sensor sizes.
From around the internet I've got the impression that the Q's tiny sensor is a cut above than other tiny sensors in point-and-shoot cameras, so maybe it too could pass as an alternative choice of the small and the good. It's unfortunate DPreview hasn't reviewed it yet and give us their opinion. It's the interchangable lens that rule it out for me, not its size sensor. And by the way, if I'm on a site like this it's because I've seen many times in the challenges that great photographs can be taken even with cheap point-and-shoot cameras.
the rx100 is great, but you have to pay for it's greatness as well. I can't believe street prices for the canon's in pounds. They must really not want to sell these camera's in Brittain. In Holland an S110 is €369 300 pounds and a G15 €479 390 pounds.
I stopped several magazine subscriptions because their reviews became not much more than a re-print of the spec sheets from the manufacturers.
Where are the full reviews of these enthusiast cameras, reviews that they deserve.
We can make our own decisions once we get proper review.
Case in point: how could a reviewer include only one sentence when a particular enthusiast camera provides multiple off camera TTL flash?
It is obvious the reviewers have no personal expierence with the merits and value of off camera flash.
Have you ever stopped to think that this particular roundup format might have a space limitation? It's impossible to cover every aspect of a camera in detail on one page. You may also wish to consider the thought that not every user will consider multiple off-camera TTL flash as important as you do, especially on a compact camera.
Precisely, if you provided full reviews of these cameras as DPReview did in the past, your excuse about space limitation in today's world of web pages is a rather weak response.
I may consider mutiple off camera flash is more important than others but that does not give a reviewr an excuse to not cover it.
As a reviewer give the facts, all the facts, we can then decide.
Your defensive posture to my sincerely given remarks to this article is a bit of a shock to me in what it reveals.
Stick to full proper reviews.
This roundup article is an entirely different thing to 'full proper reviews', and complements rather than replaces them. It's a way of quickly summing-up and comparing the different models' strengths and weaknesses against the competition. Several of the cameras covered in this article have already been reviewed in full, a fact you appear not to have noticed; the others are in the queue.
The space limitation here is about readability - we're producing a short one-page summary of each camera. Any more detail and we'd turn readers off (we've produced enough group tests to know what gets read and what doesn't).
Finally, this idea that a reviewer needs an 'excuse' not to cover a feature that, however important to you, is unequivocally niche on a compact, is very strange indeed. How many P7700 buyers do you really believe will go out and add multiple Speedlights, let alone carry them around? Compacts are substantially about portability, after all.
Solution: Clearly indicate in your 'round-ups' which cameras have and have not undergone a full review.
This way readers will not be mis-led by the incompleteness inherent in a 'round-up' of a partiular class of cameras.
And if I may, as a photojournalist, leave you a tip:
-'Make sure it is not the level of quality of your content that leads to your readers to having a short attention span ( as you have stated and so measured).
Respectfully, Nikonworks
Am I missing something, or is there no way of navigating to the review you wish to read from within this otherwise very useful article?
It's a bit frustrating having to guess which page of the article refers to the G15 or P7700, etc. Could you change the navigation to include shortcuts to the individual pages which include the camera's names please?
If you hover over the 1, 2, 3, etc. buttons it has the name of the camera as a tooltip, which helps...
We're aware the navigation system needs improving and it's on the (rather long) list of improvements.
In the meantime, we've put a list of cameras on the first page that links through to the relevant page. It's not ideal, but it should make life a bit easier.
One question:
Most of those cameras are little bit "big" for a compact camera.
For a only slightly bigger package, you can get Panasonic GX1+14-42X pancake zoom or Sony NEX6 + 16-50PZ pancake zoom.
This give much larger sensors, but you loose wide apertune.... so, what is the best?
Do those "large sensor with extreme compacted zoom lenses" really bring better image quality than the compacts cameas of this review or not?
Yes, my pocket camera is a Pana GF3 with the 14-42x. It's on the big side but it has the flexibility to use another lens if I want, and even with the x lens the quality is pretty good. I'd be interested in an answer to your question, though, as I haven't done the comparison.
Yes, I completely agree.
My pocket camera is an Olympus EPL2 with 14-42mm lens and the 14mm Lumix pancake for real "pocketability."
For those who want maximum image quality you can do better than a Sony RX100.... for a lower price... by selecting a M4/3 camera with a smallish lens. Plus you now have multiple lens options.
It also might be interesting to see how the Nikon 1 or Pentax Q compares to these compact enthusiast cameras.
1. @Marty: are you kidding us? pentaxQ has a TINY sensor, how could you even consider it in this comparison? especially with a RX100!!!
2. the RX100 has the same size sensor as the Nikon-1.
3. if you're going to go as large as 4/3, why not get something way better, an APS-C, for about the same size (for example, an NX210, NX1000).
MFT won't compete with APS-C in the long run with lens and housing systems getting more compact, but it does have a future competing favorably with the new 1" generation.
I've been searching for small interchangle lens solutions, but discovered that it doesnt really exist.
Or not on any kind of budget, at least.
Those pancake lenses you talk about they really dont retract that much, so its only when you compare the body against a compact that you feel it could be an alternative, but as soon as you start to look at lenses you discover, that with excaption for som fixed zoom lenses they are all too thick to be pocketeble in any way.
And then you look at the specs of those zoom lenses, and quickly discover that if you want decent aperature size, well they you have to pile up a lot of chash.
The retraction of the lens, goes a long way if you want to be able to pocket a camera.
But sure, some of these really are on the big side, but some users look at the "pro" compact category, because of the flexible zoom lenses, and as a way to not have to bring their more professional gear with them all the time, du to value or the size (including lens kit)
Extra Mp (due to larger sensor area size) does offer more flexible creative crop options, it's more about the relevance of how well particular pixel sizes perform 'like-size-for-like-size'.
There is nothing about the Sony RX-100 that is a 'engineering marvel' at all, when all they do is resort to using slightly larger yr2012-pixels than all the rest, albeit plastered on a large enuf sensor size to ensure more Mp overall
Based strictly on predicting IQ on pixel density (pixels/mm of sensor), larger pixels should perform better than smaller (sensor size and Mp count notwithstanding):
Best to Worst, similar pixel densities, if same*, are truly pitted 'one-on-one'*:
1) RX100 @ 415 pixels/mm
2) FujiFilm X10/XF1 @ 455 pixels/mm
3) Pany LX7 @ 490 pixels/mm
4) Oly XZ-2 @ 533* pixels/mm
4) Nikon P7700 @ 533* pixels/mm
6) Canon G15/S110 @ 538 pixels/mm
If a sensor with SMALLER pixels happen to demonstrate superior IQ to others that are LARGER, then, it's the better pixel (superior tech).
The question of pixel density is not exactly relevant.
Sure, lessening gap between pixels and between micro-lenses ensures more of the sensor surface is actually exposed to light, so as tech advances semi-conductors become more efficient.
But here the thing with the sony mainly is that the bigger imager (sensor) is less demanding in terms of optical glass resolving power and thus the combination produces more detailed images...
Also when we invest in a camera, it is first and foremost a system, and cannot be judged on a component alone, especially when we cannot change the lens on it...
How much does it cost?
What does it provide?
- Performances
- IQ : Sharpness, noise, DR, colour rendition
- And whatever feature is important to you
Otherwise, Nikon D800E and D3200 have to be the best there is given both these sensors provide high SNR with staggering MP count... Irrelevant to me...
In terms of practicality, it's just: what do we get for what we pay?
Although I agree Sony's RX100 is no miracle.
But what's nice is that for a change they did produce something a bit out of the box.
A bit like Canon's G1X but more "pocketable".
While every other manufacturer sticks to the 1/2.3 1/1.7 format.
So no miracle, but well, it works.
the RX100 is remarkable, in that it sets new records for lens system size: consider the dimensions of the lens system, comparable to the sensor size that it services. consider distance from back of the lens to the sensor, the total volume of .the lens system, and it's just as compact as something servicing a sensor a third. the size.
Oh, and your calculations are wrong. You quote linear units, while we are dealing with surface (square area) units. Let me help:
We have sensor size, square area, divided by total pixels (and not image pixels because many do a crop of the total), giving us a total in micrometers, I assume. As you can see, the RX100's pixels, at 5.8 u2 are almost twice the size as the smaller ones in this roundup, the Nikon at 3.2 u2. Sensor sizes have even larger differences: Sony's sensor at 116.6 is almost triple the size of 1/1.7" sensors.
5472 x 3648
13.2 x 8.8 = 116.6 mm2
div/20 = 5.8 u2
4000 x 3000
8.8 x 6.6 = 58.8 mm2
div/12 = 4.8 u2
3948 x 2976 = 11.7MP / 12.8 total Mpixels
7.44 x 5.58 = 41.5152 mm2
div/11.7 = 3.5 u2
4000 x 3000
7.44 x 5.58 = 41.5152 mm2
div./12.1 = 3.4 u2
3468 x 2236 = 10.1MP / 12.7 total Mpixels
7.44 x 5.58 = 41.5152 mm2
div/12.7 = 3.3 u2
Nikon P7700
4000 x 3000 = 12MP / 12.8 total Mpixels
7.44 x 5.58 = 41.5152 mm2
div./12.8 = 3.2 u2
In summary, the Sony, despite more pixels, still has pixels twice the size, and a sensor triple the size as the 1/1.7" sensors.
The Fuji is somewhere in the middle, with larger pixels than most, but not as large as the Sony. The Fujifilm XF1 has pixels 17% smaller than Sony's, and 41% larger than the 1/1.7" lot. It's sensor is almost exactly half the size as Sony's, while 41% larger on average than the smaller sensors.
Assuming you put the best quality optics possible in front of all these sensors, there is no arguing that the larger sensors and larger pixels will arguably produce better tones, nuances, and less dead spots (noise) than the smaller ones.
This gives us 3 sub-categories in this roundup:
Sony, larger sensor, larger pixels
Others, smallest sensors, smallest pixels
the rest, is splitting hairs... as other factors will take over - like lenses, firmware, etc.
Correction for the XZ2 (not that it changes anything)
3948 x 2976 = 11.7MP / 12.8 total Mpixels
7.44 x 5.58 = 41.5152 mm2
div/12.8 = 3.24 u2
Nikon P7700 seems to deliver the best per-pixel sharpness in this test.
The operational speed and AF speed is an issue for street/sports/kids shooters etc. RX100 is blisteringly fast in comparison. S110, if it's anything like the S100, hopefully won't be burned by lens issues. The AF is also slower than the RX100's.
Can't say anything about the rest though, haven't tried them.
I was very happy to discover this review as I'm a DSLR user wanting a compact camera for travelling light.
I was about to go for a Canon G15 or S110, I didn't exactly know if I needed more the first's commands or the second's small size, but reading this made me appear that the Nikon P7700 is not bad choice at all. Add to that that I'm already a Nikon user, I can use my flashgun in case of need or more useful the ML-L3 remote (so told me the guy at the shop), and the possibility of adding a microphone is a plus.
I just hoped that more among this cameras were able to make in-camera crop like 3:2 or 1:1 and not only 4:3…
My only one complaint to panasonic is that...
Please please do the next lx serie with the same 24 mm. Wide and put bigger sensor on them. Imagine if lx7 has larger sensor that can perfome better on high iso ... I think sony rx100 will hardly makes such phenomenon in this year.
And I think it dose not matter if pricing will go up high just like sony's.
There's a tradeoff involved with sensor size. Bigger sensor = bigger lens = bigger camera, OR same-size lens with smaller max aperture. Look at the LX7 vs GX1. The GX1 has a bigger sensor and consequently higher usable ISO, but the kit zoom lens starts at f3.5 vs. f1.4 for the LX7. Where you can shoot the LX7 at f1.4 and ISO 100, the GX1 will be at f3.5 and ISO 640. That's why I have both. LX 7 for pocketable every-day carry, and GX1 for planned shooting in good light for large (16"x24") prints.
lx7 win me all my 300$ out of my pocket.
Not because panasonic gives me money to tell this.
It Because of
- 24 mm. Lens that offer great coverage over landscape shooting that put other cameras fall down here.
- very appealing video control and performance.
- brigthest lens on the market.
- shorter zoom range never bother me as long as the quality of images from that shorter zoom will result in excellent camera optic performance.
Not to mention the very attractive pricing that I do not concern much here.
PS. I plan to buy the lx7 on february. :)
Now that Sony and Olympus have partnered I see great things in the future for Olympus cameras.
Completely agreed with the conclusions.
XZ-2 is an amazing camera with excellent images. I have the XZ-1, now if only olympus would tweak their JPEG engine a bit for the XZ-1, not sure if this can be done by a firmware update.
The lens same for XZ-1 and XZ-2 is amazing all the way from the center to the corners. None of the others can match this.
When in doubt pull up the image comparison tool and see for yourself.
I agree, I have the ZX-1 also and love the camera. Now if they could take the sensor from the RX100 and put that in the XZ-3 we might have the perfect compact.
Agree 100%, if they also manage to keep the marvellous iZuiko Olympus little lens on the XZ-3 ;-)
All in all my current decision lies with XZ-2, as the reviewer also concluded.
At the end what matters is what a camera can deliver in variable conditions and how enjoyable it is to use, also how expandable, adding to the review that buying the CLA-12 adapter tube you can attach 55mm tele converters, fisheye lenses, filters.
You also have a pair of flexible macro LED lights that are very handy.
If want to see what the Olympus XZ-2 can really do in several conditions check out this 3 part great review by Robin Wong,
it has links to the two previous parts at the begining :
I'm mainly a creative amateur, not a pro in the photography field and not very experienced with different camera's. I shoot all my stuff in JPEG unless It's a planned shooting for photomontage/heavy editing in Photoshop. My last compact was the Panasonic LX3. I had a blast with it, the wide angle, the in-camera creative settings. It gave a real kick to carry it around walking and make creative shots. The controls felt logical to me. The wide angle has the ability to make every shot look edgy. It just felt great.
Now obviously I have an eye on the LX7 but I'm kind of disappointed it didn't make it into the conclusions. Now I followed your link here. Some of the shots in that review are impressive, I like the unsharp backgrounds and the detail in faces. Also the coloring is really nice. Do you think the Olympus has the creative capabilities to get me just as enthusiastic as the LX3 got me in 2009?
Also, which do you think will perform better in lowlight, small venue concertphotography?
i had G15 and Rx100 for about a month to decide which one to go for,,,in terms of IQ- even at base iso-, shutter lag, sharpness,clarity,,RX100 was way superior to G15,,, with RX100, you can still get tempting photos at iso3200, however other compacts fall short even at iso400, clarity, details are gone at iso400...i still don't get it how you can compare RX100 to the others....RX100 is playin at another league...
There's more to a camera than just the sensor. I value the lens and the ergonomics more than the sensor.
Tues, Dec 18, 2012
I agree with topstuff, The Sony RX100 is truly in a different class.
In spite of the fact all of these cameras and The RX100 are put together in this same article, dpReview also agrees with the premise topstuff puts forth, dpReview will not allow the RX100 to be compared with any of the other eight cameras on the RX100 conclusion page.
The Sony RX100 is an engineering marvel.
Sony has performed the unimaginable astonishingly well, but apparently blundered in doing the easy things badly, such as:
Vague clickless control dial
Unpredictable flash metering
Lack of ND filter
No lens filter option
Confusingly playback stills, MP4 and AVCHD
Irksome lag zoom in playback.
No hard copy manual.
These apparent quirks, on paper at least, seem to keep the RX100 from being the GEM it should be.
I hope that the RX200 overcomes all of these relatively simple shortcomings; then perhaps I would not mind spending $649.
The $299 Lumix LX7 is the better purchase and a great camera.
I completely agree. Sony does have a habit of making something that should be perfect, "almost" perfect.
Has anyone had a good look at some of the parts of the comparison test?
The Queens face is a shocker, the Kodak logo is soft as, but there are some other gems that are very superior IQ?
So going by this I am not so sure about overall IQ.
Saying that, I would love to give one a go :-)
The Queen is out of focus!
So many people are drawing the wrong conclusions based on those tests shots, I'm surprised DPR doesn't take some action...
The RX100 RAW files look soft. Yes, the test images appear to be somewhat front-focused relative to some other cameras, but even objects near the front, like the watch, look soft and show less resolution than the GX1. In terms of practical resolution of fine detail, it doesn't appear to be any better at low ISO than even the 10MP LX7. I think the hype around the RX100's 20MP is overblown. If I really need to make high-resolution prints larger than 12"x18", I'd rather have a GX1. For prints up to 12"x18", I'd rather have the LX7 with its faster & sharper lens (especially at the tele end) and superb interface.
The RX100 doesn't perform at its best at the close-focus distances we use for our test scene (which is exactly why we're developing a new test scene).
We shot it many, many times at different distances, focal lengths and focus positions to try to get the best results. Sadly even those best results are not ideal. I'll add a note to make this clear as we did in the original review.
The G1X and DSLR kit lenses have even less close-focus abilities, that's likely directly related to the larger sensors (longer extension needed to get up close).
> I think the hype around the RX100's 20MP is overblown.
I think RX100 needs 20MP for better software correction of lens distortion.
I have the impression from the test scenes that last-generation Fujifilm sensors RAW output present weird artifacts, something between moire-gone-wrong and AA artifacts. I tend to assume that the industry RAW conversion software has not yet properly grasped the Fujifilm sensors structure in order to produce artifact-free images.
I would love to have that RX100 for a week, just to see if I could get used to no viewfinder. That is really my only complaint with that unit.
The lack of a viewfinder is partially offset by its "white magic" lcd display which users on the dpr forum feel make it quite visible even in bright sunlight.
Check out this handy little 3rd -Party accessory for the RX-100 called the Clearviewer (http://www.clearviewer.com/Products.html).
I have the RX-100 fitted with the Clearviewer and I find that I prefer it to an EVF. I do not have any financial or personal involvement with the person that makes this product.
Great and informative review. No question they are all very good cameras but what became apparent to me is the LX-7 is the steal of the bunch if you can find it at $300 (which you can).


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Editor's note: Exactly 20 years ago, on June 23, 1988, James Hansen of the NASAGoddard Institute for Space Studies testified before a Senate committeethat he could state with "99 percent confidence" that a recent,persistent rise in global temperature was occurring, and had long beenexpected. That landmark statement, and the dawn of the global warmingdiscussion, was covered by Andy Revkin, then a DISCOVER senior editorand now an environmental reporter for The New York Times.
Here we republish Revkin's groundbreaking 1988 article that helped begin to raise awareness of the issue. DISCOVER's science and politics blog, Reality Base, also has an interview with Revkin about what's happened with regard to global warming over the past 20 years.
On June 23 the United States sizzled as thermometers topped100 degrees in 45 cities from coast to coast: 102 in Sacramento; 103 inLincoln, Nebraska; 101 in Richmond, Virginia. In the nation's heartland thesearing heat was accompanied by a ruinous drought that ravaged crops andprompted talk of a dust bowl to rival that of the 1930s. Heat waves anddroughts are nothing new, of course. But on that stifling June day a topatmospheric scientist testifying on Capitol Hill had a disturbing message forhis senatorial audience: Get used to it.
This wasn't just a bad year, James Hansen of the NASAGoddard Institute for Space Studies told the Senate committee, or even thestart of a bad decade. Rather, he could state with "99 percentconfidence" that a recent, persistent rise in global temperature was aclimatic signal he and his colleagues had long been expecting. Others werestill hedging their bets, arguing there was room for doubt. But Hansen waswilling to say what no one had dared say before. "The greenhouseeffect," he claimed, "has been detected and is changing our climatenow."
Until this year, despite dire warnings from climatologists,the greenhouse effect has seemed somehow academic and far off. The idea behindit is simple: gases accumulating in the atmosphere as by-products of humanindustry and agriculture—carbon dioxide, mostly, but also methane, nitrousoxide, ozone, and chlorofluorocarbons—let in the sun's warming rays but don'tlet excess heat escape. As a result, mean global temperature has probably beenrising for decades. But the rise has been so gradual that it has been masked bythe much greater, and ordinary, year-to-year swings in world temperature.
Not anymore, said Hansen. The 1980s have already seen thefour hottest years on record, and 1988 is almost certain to be hotter still.Moreover, the seasonal, regional, and atmospheric patterns of rising temperatures—greaterwarming in winters than summers, greater warming at high latitudes than nearthe equator, and a cooling in the stratosphere while the lower atmosphere iswarmer—jibe with what computer models predict should happen with greenhouseheating. And the warming comes at a time when, by rights, Earth should actuallybe cooler than normal. The sun's radiance has dropped slightly since the1970s, and dust thrown up by recent volcanic eruptions, especially that of Mexico's ElChichon in 1982, should be keeping some sunlight from reaching the planet.
Even though most climatologists think Hansen's claims arepremature, they agree that warming is on the way. Carbon dioxide levels are 25percent higher now than they were in 1860, and the atmosphere's burden ofgreenhouse gases is expected to keep growing. By the middle of the next centurythe resulting warming could boost global mean temperatures from three to ninedegrees Fahrenheit. That doesn't sound like much, but it equals the temperaturerise since the end of the last ice age, and the consequences could be devastating.Weather patterns could shift, bringing drought to once fertile areas and heavyrains to fragile deserts that cannot handle them. As runoff from meltingglaciers increases and warming seawater expands, sea level could rise as muchas six feet, inundating low-lying coastal areas and islands. There would bedramatic disruptions of agriculture, water resources, fisheries, coastal activity,and energy use.
"Average climate will certainly get warmer," saysRoger Revelle, an oceanographer and climatologist at the Universityof California at San Diego. "But what's more serious ishow many more hurricanes we'll have, how many more droughts we'll have, howmany days above one hundred degrees." By Hansen's reckoning, where Washington now averagesone day a year over 100 degrees, it will average 12 such scorchers annually bythe middle of the next century.
Comparable climate shifts have happened before, but overtens of centuries, not tens of years. The unprecedented rapid change couldaccelerate the already high rate of species extinction as plants and animalsfail to adapt quickly enough. For the first time in history humans areaffecting the ecological balance of not just a region but the entire world,all at once. "We're altering the environment far faster than we canpossibly predict the consequences," says Stephen Schneider, a climatemodeler at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado."This is bound to lead to some surprises."
Schneider has been trying to generate interest in thegreenhouse effect since the early 1970s, although largely unsuccessfully.Frightening as the greenhouse effect is, the task of curbing it is so dauntingthat no one has been willing to take the necessary steps as long as there waseven a tiny chance that the effect might not be real. Since greenhouse gasesare chiefly the result of human industry and agriculture, it is not anexaggeration to say that civilization itself is the ultimate cause of globalwarming. That doesn't mean nothing can be done; only that delaying the effectsof global warming by cutting down on greenhouse-gas emissions will be tremendouslydifficult, both technically and politically. Part of the problem is thatpredicting exactly what will happen to the local climate, region by region, isa task that's still beyond the power of even the most sophisticated computermodel.
Some parts of the world could actually benefit from climatechange, while others could suffer tremendously. But for the foreseeable futurethe effects will he uncertain. No nation can plan on benefiting, and so, says Schneider,we must all "hedge our global bets," by reducing emissions of greenhousegases. "The longer we wait to take action," he says, "and theweaker the action, the larger the effect and the more likely that it will benegative." Says meteorologist Howard Ferguson, assistant deputy ministerof the Canadian Atmospheric Environment Service, "All the greenhousescenarios are consistent. These numbers are real. We have to start behaving asif this is going to happen. Those who advocate a program consisting only ofadditional research are missing the boat."
While the greenhouse effect threatens to make life on Earthmiserable, it is also part of the reason life is livable in the first place.For at least the last 100,000 years atmospheric carbon dioxide, naturallygenerated and consumed by animals and plants, was in rough equilibrium, at acouple of hundred parts per million. Without this minute but critical trace tohold in heat, the globe's mean temperature would be in the forties instead of acomfortable 59 degrees. The amount of carbon dioxide has risen and fallen abit, coinciding with the spread and retreat of glaciers as ice ages have comeand gone. But until the Industrial Revolution, atmospheric carbon dioxidelevels never rose above a manageable 280 parts per million.
Then, beginning early in the nineteenth century, the burningof fossil fuels, especially coal, took off. By 1900, carbon dioxide levels inthe atmosphere had begun to rise steadily, reaching 340 parts per million lastyear.
Levels of the other greenhouse gases have also risen. Methane,for example, is generated primarily by bacterial decomposition of organicmatter—particularly in such places as landfills, flooded rice paddies, and theguts of cattle and termites— and by the burning of wood. Methane concentrationin the atmosphere has grown steadily as Earth's human population has grown,rising one percent a year over the last decade. Levels of chlorofluorocarbons,which are used as refrigerants, as cleaning solvents, and as raw materials formaking plastic foam, have climbed 5 percent annually.
The amount of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere has quicklyincreased as well, with about a third of the total added by human activity—much of that emitted by nitrogen-based fertilizers, and half of that from justthree nations: China, theSoviet Union, and the United States. This gas is also released by theburning of coal and other fossil fuels, including gasoline. And ozone, whichforms a beneficial shield against ultraviolet radiation when high in thestratosphere, is an efficient greenhouse gas when it appears at airlineraltitudes— as it increasingly does, since it too is a by-product of fossil fuelburning.
All these gases are far more efficient at absorbing infraredenergy (the invisible radiation that ordinarily carries Earth's excess heatinto space) than is carbon dioxide. Indeed, atmospheric chemists have estimatedthat the combined warming effect of these trace gases will soon equal or exceedthe effect from carbon dioxide. And even as growth has slowed in the industrializednations, the Third World is rushing full tiltinto development. All told, billions of tons of greenhouse gases enter theatmosphere each year.
The big question is, given the inexorable buildup of thesegases—a growth that even the most spirited optimists concede can only beslowed, not stopped— what will the specific effects be? It's hard to say,because the relationship between worldwide climate and local weather is such acomplex phenomenon to begin with. The chaotic patterns of jet streams and vorticesand ocean currents swirling it around the globe and governing the weatherstill confound meteorologists; in fact, weather more than two weeks in thefuture is thought by some to he inherently unpredictable.
So far, the best answers have come from computer models thatsimulate the workings of the atmosphere. Most divide the atmosphere intohundreds of boxes, each of which is represented by mathematical equations forwind, temperature, moisture, incoming radiation, outgoing radiation, and thelike. Each mathematical box is linked to its neighbors, so it can respond tochanging conditions with appropriate changes of its own. Thus, the modelbehaves the way the world does—albeit at a very rough scale. A typical modeldivides the atmosphere vertically into nine layers and horizontally into boxesthat are several hundred miles on a side.
Climate modelers can play with "what if" scenariosto see how the world would respond to an arbitrary set of conditions. Severalyears ago, for example, computer models were used to holster the theory ofnuclear winter, which concluded that smoke and dust lofted into the atmospherein a nuclear war would block sunlight and dangerously chili the planet. Tostudy the greenhouse effect, climatologists first used models to simulatecurrent conditions, then instantly doubled the amount of carbon dioxide in theatmosphere. The computer was allowed to run until conditions stabilized at anew equilibrium, and a map could be drawn showing changes in temperature, precipitation,and other factors.
But Hansen's latest simulations—the ones he used in hisstartling congressional testimony—are more sophisticated. In them he addedcarbon dioxide to the atmosphere stepwise, just as is happening in the realworld. The simulations, begun in 1983, took so much computer time that theywere not completed and published until this summer.
Even the best climate model, however, has to oversimplifythe enormous complexity of the real atmosphere. One problem is the size ofthe boxes. The model used at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, forexample, typically uses boxes 4.5 degrees of latitude by 7 degrees oflongitude— about the size of the center's home state of Colorado— and treatsthem as uniform masses of air. While that's inherently inaccurate—the real Colorado contains such fundamentally different featuresas the Rocky Mountains and the Great Plains—using smaller boxes would take too much computing power.
Another problem is that modelers must estimate the influenceof vegetation, ice and snow, soil moisture, terrain, and especially clouds,which reflect lots of sunlight back into space and also hold in surface heat."Clouds are an important factor about which little is known," saysSchneider. "When I first started looking at this in 1972, we didn't knowmuch about the feedback from clouds. We don't know any more now than we didthen."
So it is not surprising that while the inure than a dozenmajor global climate models in use around the world tend to agree on thebroadest phenomena, they differ wildly when it comes to regional effects. And,says Robert Cess, a climate modeler at the State University of New York atStony Brook, "The smaller the scale, the bigger the disagreement."
That makes it extremely hard to get national and localgovernments to take action. Says Stephen Leatherman, director of the Laboratoryfor Coastal Research at the University of Maryland, "Unlessyou can put something down on paper and show the effects on actual locations—even actual buildings—then it's just pie in the sky."
There are, however, some consequences of a warming Earththat will be universal. Perhaps the most obvious is a rise in sea level."If we went all out to slow the warming trend, we might stall sea levelrise at three to six feet," says Robert Buddemeier of Lawrence LivermoreNational Laboratory, who is studying the impact of sea- level rise on coralreefs, "But that's the very best you could hope for." And a six- footrise, Buddemeier predicts, would be devastating.
It would, for one thing, render almost all low coralislands uninhabitable. "Eventually," Buddemeier says, "a lot ofthis real estate is going to go underwater," For places like the MarshallIslands in the Pacific, the Maldives off the west coast of India, and someCaribbean nations, this could mean nothing less than national extinction."You're really looking at a potential refugee problem of unprecedenteddimensions," says Buddemeier. "In the past, people have run away fromfamine or oppression. But they've never been physically displaced from a countrybecause a large part of it has disappeared."
Coastal regions of continents or larger islands will alsobe in harm's way, particularly towns or cities built on barrier islands andthe fertile flat plains that typically surround river deltas. Bangladesh,dominated by the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna Delta, is the classic case, saysBuddemeier. "It's massively populated, achingly poor, and something likea sixth of the country is going to go away."
Egypt will be in similar trouble, according to a study byeconomist James Broadus and several colleagues at Woods Hole OceanographicInstitution. Like the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna, the soft sediments of theNile Delta are subsiding. Given even an intermediate scenario for sea-levelrise by the year 2050, Egyptcould lose 15 percent of its arable land, land that currently houses 14 percentof its population and produces 14 percent of its gross domestic product.
One mitigating factor for some coastal nations that arestill developing, such as Belize and Indonesia, is that they generally havecommitted fewer resources to the coastline than their developedcounterparts—Australia, for example, or the United States, with such vulnerablecities as Galveston and Miami. "Developed countries have billions investedin a very precarious, no-win situation," Buddemeier says. "The lessdeveloped countries will have an easier time adapting."
Indeed, the impact on coastal cities in developed countriesmay be enormous. The Urban Institute, a nonpartisan think tank, is completinga study for the Environmental Protection Agency on what a three-foot sea levelrise would do to Miami.Miami isparticularly vulnerable. Not only is it a coastal city, but it is nearlysurrounded by water, with the Atlantic to the east, the Everglades to the west,and porous limestone beneath— "one of the most permeable aquifers in theworld," says William Hyman, a senior re search associate at the institute."The aquifer in Miamiis so porous that you'd actually have to build a dike down one hundred fiftyfeet beneath the surface to keep water from welling up." In an unusuallysevere storm nearby Miami Beachwould be swept by a wall of water up to 16 feet above the current sea level.
Storms are an even greater danger to Galveston, whichLeatherman has studied extensively. Given just a couple of feet in sea-levelrise, a moderately bad hurricane, of the type that occurs about once every tenyears, would have the destructive impact of the type of storm that occurs oncea century. And Galveston is typical of a whole range of resort areas on theeastern and Gulf coasts, such as Atlantic City, New Jersey ("almost thewhole New Jersey coast, really," says Leatherman); Ocean City, Maryland;and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. "The point is, all these cities havebeen built on low-lying sandy barrier islands, mostly with elevations nohigher than ten feet above sea level," Leatherman says. "Just asmall rise in sea level will result in a lot of complications."
Even as cities become more vulnerable to moderate storms,the intensity of hurricanes may increase dramatically, says Kerry Emanuel, ameteorologist at MIT. Hurricane intensity is linked to the temperature of thesea surface, Emanuel explains. According to his models, if the sea warms topredicted levels, the most intense hurricanes will be 40 to 50 percent moresevere than the most intense hurricanes of the past 50 years.
James Titus, director of the Environmental ProtectionAgency's Sea Level Rise Project, says communities will have two choices: buildwalls or get out of the way. For cities such as New Yorkor Boston theanswer may well he to build walls. But for most other coastal regions, pickingup and moving may work out better. One of the first examples of a regionalgovernment making a regulation based on the greenhouse effect took place in Maine last year. Thestate approved regulations allowing coastal development with the understandingthat if sea level rises enough to inundate a property, the property will revertto nature, with the owner footing the bill for dismantling or movingstructures.
Another worldwide consequence of global warming isincreased precipitation: warmer air will mean more evaporation of ocean water,more clouds, and an overall rise in rain and snow of between 5 and 7 percent.But it won't be evenly distributed. One climate model at PrincetonUniversity's Geo physical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory predicts that centralIndia will have doubled precipitation, while the centers of continents atmiddle latitudes--the midwestern United States, for example— will actually havemuch drier summers than they have now (this summer's drought could, in other words,be a foretaste). Some and areas, including southern Californiaand Morocco,will have drier winters; and winters are when such areas get most of theirprecipitation. Moreover, the effect may be self-perpetuating: drier soil, saysSyukuro Manabe, the climatologist who developed the model, leads to even hotterair.
The changes could be political dynamite for nations thatalready argue over water resources. A prime example is Egypt and Sudan,both of which draw their lifeblood from the north- flowing Nile.Sudan has been trying to divert a bigger share of the river's water; butdownstream, Egypt is experiencing one of Africa's fastest population explosionsand will need every drop of water it can get. A string of droughts in the Sudan couldmake the conflict far worse. The same situation occurs in many other parts ofthe world.
Not all the tensions will be international. Within nations,local effects of global warming will cause internecine fights for increasinglyscarce water. In the United States,for example, western states have long argued over who owns what fraction of thewater in such rivers as the Colorado.In California 42 percent of the water comesfrom the Sacramento and San Joaquin river basins,which are fed by runoff from the Sierra Nevadaand other mountain ranges. Most of the water falls as snow in the winter, whichmelts in the spring to feed the rivers, reservoirs, and subterranean aquifers.The state's normal strategy for water management calls for keeping thereservoirs low in winter, to provide protection against floods, and keepingthem as high as possible in summer, to ensure an adequate supply for the giantfarming operations in the Central Valley (one of the most productiveagricultural regions in the world) and for arid southern California.
Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute for Studies in Development,Environment and Security, in Berkeley, California, has devised a widelypraised model that predicts a dramatic disruption of the state's water supplyin the event of global warming, even if total precipitation remains unchanged.It focuses on the Sacramento River basin, which alone provides 30 percent of thestate's water and almost all the water for agriculture in the Central Valley.
According to the model, higher temperatures will mean thatwhat falls in winter will increasingly be rain, not snow, and that more of itwill run off right away. Californiamay get the same amount of total annual runoff, but the water-distributionsystem won't be able to deal with it. "California will get the worst of all possibleworlds—more flooding in the winter, less available water in the summer,"Gleick says. "This will reverberate throughout the state." San Francisco Bay will feel a secondary effect. Asfreshwater supplies shrink in the summer, seawater, which has alreadyinfiltrated freshwater aquifers beneath the low-lying Sacramento Delta, willcontinue its push inland. Rising sea level will just compound the effect.
Food is another crucial resource that will be affected bythe global greenhouse. Taken by itself, a rise in atmospheric carbon dioxidemight not be so bad. For many crops more carbon dioxide means a rise in therate of photosynthesis and, therefore, in growth; and with increased carbondioxide some plants' use of water is more efficient, according to studies donein conventional glass greenhouses. Also, as the planet gets warmer, crops mightbe cultivated farther north. But as usual, things are not so simple. Atemperature rise of only 3.5 degrees in the tropics could reduce riceproduction by more than 10 percent.
In temperate regions also, the picture is mixed. CynthiaRosenzweig, a researcher based at Goddard, has been using crop-growth computermodels to predict effects of carbon dioxide buildup and climate change onwheat, the most widely cultivated crop in the world. Plugging in temperaturechanges derived from the Goddard climate model, Rosenzweig tested a worldwith doubled carbon dioxide levels. Because the Goddard model is had atpredicting precipitation, she did separate runs for normal and dry conditions.She found that in normal years the wheat grew better, thanks to the extracarbon dioxide. But in dry years there was a marked increase in crop failures,because of excessive heat. Given the likelihood that heat waves and droughtsare increasing, she says, no one should count on better yields in years tocome.
The nations most likely to reap the benefits of warmerclimate are Canada and the Soviet Union, much of whose vast land area is too coldfor large-scale crop cultivation. There has even been speculation that thesecountries might go slowly on controlling the greenhouse effect, or even opposesuch control; anyone who has spent the winter in Moscowor Saskatoonwould be sorely tempted by the prospect of better weather.
But again, atmospheric scientists stress that no nation cancount on benefits. "The models suggest that ecological zones will shiftnorthward," says planetary scientist Michael McElroy of Harvard. "Thesouthwestern desert to the Grain Belt; the Grain Belt to Canada. There might he winners andlosers if this shift occurs slowly. But suppose it shifts so fast thatecosystems are unable to keep up?" For example, he says, there is a limitto the distance that a forest can propagate in a year. "If it is unable topropagate fast enough, then either we have to come in and plant trees, or elsewe'll see total devastation and the collapse of the ecosystem."
According to Irving Mintzer, a senior associate with theEnergy and Climate Project of the World Resources Institute in Washington,there is another reason to be leery of projections for regional agriculturalbenefits. Just because climatic conditions conducive to grain cultivation movenorth, that doesn't mean that other conditions necessary for agriculturalsuperpowerdom will be present. Much of Canada, for example, does not havethe optimum type of soil for growing wheat and corn.
Wildlife will suffer, too. In much of the world, wildernessareas are increasingly hemmed in by development, and when climate shifts,these fragile ecosystems won't be able to shift with it. Plants will suddenly beunable to propagate their seeds, and animals will have no place to go. Speciesin the Arctic, such as caribou, may lose vitalmigratory routes as ice bridges between islands melt.
In the United States the greatest impact will likely be oncoastal wetlands: the salt marshes, swamps, and bayous that are among theworld's most diverse and productive natural habitats. James Titus of theEnvironmental Protection Agency estimates that a five-foot rise in sealevel—not even the worst-case scenario—would destroy between 50 and 90 percentof America'swet- lands. Under natural conditions marshes would slowly shift inland. Butwith levees, condominiums, and other man-made structures in the way, theycan't. The situation is worst in Louisiana,says Titus, which has 40 percent of U.S.wetlands (excluding those in Alaska); much ofthe verdant Mississippi River delta may wellvanish.
In many parts of the tropics, low forests of mangrove treesthrive in the shallow waters along coastlines. Their dense networks of rootsand runners are natural island-building systems, trapping sediment and cushioningthe damaging effects of tropical storms. But rising sea levels will flood themangroves; the natural response would be for them to shift with the tide,spreading their roots farther inland. But in places where development hasencroached on the shore, the mangrove forests will feel the same squeeze thatwill threaten marshes.
The only way to eliminate the greenhouse problem completelywould be to return the world to its preindustrial state. No one proposesthat. But researchers agree that there is plenty that can be done to at leastslow down the warming. Energy conservation comes first: using less coal,finding more efficient ways to use cleaner- burning fossil fuels, and taking anew look at nonfossil alternatives, everything from solar and geothermal energyto—yes, even some environmentalists are admitting it— nuclear power.
Getting the world's fractious nations to agree to a programof remedial measures sounds extremely difficult, but Stephen Schneider seessigns that it may not be impossible. Schneider was one of more than 300 delegatesfrom 48 countries who attended the International Conference on the ChangingAtmosphere, which took place in Toronto,coincidentally, just a week after Hansen's congressional testimony. It was,says Schneider, the "Woodstock of CO2" (an obvious reference to the"Woodstock of Physics" meeting held last year, during which news ofthe high-temperature superconductors exploded into the public consciousness).
The meeting was the first large-scale attempt to bridge thegap between scientists and policymakers on a wide range of atmospheric problems,including not just the greenhouse effect but also acid rain and the depletionof the protective layer of ozone in the stratosphere. Four days of floordebates, panel discussions, and closed-door sessions produced an ambitiousmanifesto calling for, among other things, the following:
• A 20percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by industrialized nations by theyear 2005, using a combination of conservation efforts and reduced consumptionof fossil fuels. A 50 percent cut would eventually be needed to stabilize atmosphericcarbon dioxide.• A switchfrom coal or oil to other fuels. Burning natural gas, for example, produceshalf as much carbon dioxide per unit of energy as burning coal.• Much morefunding for development of solar power, wind power, geothermal power, and thelike, and efforts to develop safe nuclear power.• Drasticreductions in deforestation, and encouragement of forest replanting and restoration.<• Thelabeling of products whose manufacture does not harm the environment.• Nearlycomplete elimination of the use of chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, by the year2000.
Of all the anti-greenhouse measures, the last should proveeasiest to achieve. Although CFCs are extremely persistent, remaining in theupper atmosphere for decades, and although they are 10,000 times moreefficient than carbon dioxide at trapping heat, the process of controlling themhas been under way for years, for reasons having nothing to do with thegreenhouse effect. Since the early 1970s atmospheric scientists have knownthat CFCs could have destructive effects on ozone. CFCs were banned from spraycans in the United Statesand Canada in the late1970s, and the appearance of a "hole" in the ozone layer over Antarctica in the early 1980s created an internationalconsensus that CFCs must go. Last year 53 nations crafted an agreement thatwill cut CFC production by 50 percent over the next decade; the chemicals maywell be banned altogether by the turn of the century.
CFCs are a special case, however. Since they are entirelyman-made, and since substitutes are available or under development, control isstraightforward. "There are only thirty-eight companies worldwide thatproduce CFCs," says Pieter Winsemius, former minister of the environmentof the Netherlands."You can put them all in one room; you can talk to them. But you can't dothat with the producers of carbon dioxide— all the world's utilities andindustries."
Also, there is a lack of basic information on the flow ofcarbon dioxide and the other greenhouse gases into and out of the atmosphereand biosphere. Just as one example, there is no good estimate of how muchcarbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide are produced by fires, both man-madeand naturally occurring. "We need to better assess global biomass burningas a source of greenhouse gases," says Joel Levine of the NASA LangleyResearch Centerin Hampton, Virginia. "We have to understand whatwe're actually doing when we burn tropical forests and when we burnagricultural stubble after harvest. We don't know on a global basis what thecontribution is."
Remarkably, the conference spurred some specific promisesfrom political leaders rather than just vague platitudes. Standing before a40-foot-wide photorealist painting of a cloud-studded skyscape, prime ministersBrian Mulroney of Canada andGro Harlem Brundtland of Norway pledged that their countries will slow fossilfuel use and forgive some Third World debt,allowing developing countries to grow in a sustainable way. Says Schneider,"In the fifteen years that I've been trying to convince people of theseriousness of the greenhouse effect, this is the first time I've seen a broadconsensus: First, there is a consensus that action is not premature. Second, that solutions have to occur on a globalas well as a national scale."
In the end, the greatest obstacle facing those who aretrying to slow the output of greenhouse gases is the fundamental and pervasivenature of the human activities that are causing the problem: deforestation,industrialization, energy production. As populations boom, productivity mustkeep up. And even as the developed nations of the world cut back on fossilfuel use, there will be no justifiable way to prevent the Third World from expanding its use of coal and oil. How can thedeveloped countries expect that China, for example, which has plansto double its coal production in the next 15 years in order to spur development,will be willing or even able to change course?
And then there is poverty, which contributes to the greenhouseeffect by encouraging destruction of forests. "Approximately seventy-fivepercent of the deforestation occurring in the world today is accounted for bylandless people in a desperate search for food," says Jose Lutzenberger,director of the Gala Foundation, an influential Brazilian environmental group.Commercial logging accounts for just 15 percent of tropical forest lossworldwide. Unfortunately for the atmosphere and the forests themselves, workingout an agreement with the tropical timber industry will be far easier thaneliminating rural poverty.
Industrialized nations, which created most of the greenhouseproblem, should lead the way to finding solutions, says State Departmentofficial Richard Benedick, who represented the United States during negotiationsfor cuts in CFCs and who was a conference attendee. The first priority, hesays, should be strong conservation efforts—an area in which the United States lags far behind such countries as Japan. Theeffect of such measures, Benedick feels, can only be positive and the cost isnot great. "Certain things make sense on their own merits," he says.Technology can be transferred to developing countries. In some Third World nations a partial solution can be as simpleas modernizing energy production and distribution. Upgrading India'selectric-power distribution system, Benedick says, could double the effectiveenergy output of existing coal-fired power plants.
Addressing the conference, Canadian minister of energyMarcel Masse noted that there is cause for optimism. One need look no furtherthan the energy crisis of a decade ago. From 1979 to 1985, thanks primarily toconservation, substantial cuts were made in the use of fossil fuels byindustrialized nations. Only since 1986 and the current oil glut, said Masse,has there been a resurgence in oil use and coal burning.
Michael McElroy concluded, "If we choose to take onthis challenge, it appears that we can slow the rate of change substantially,giving us time to develop mechanisms so that the cost to society and thedamage to ecosystems can be minimized. We could alternatively close our eyes,hope for the best, and pay the cost when the bill comes due."
Emotion researcher Jaak Panksepp
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The Pied Pipers of Production: For Its Next Trick, Alloy, Inc. Will Corner the Online Young Adult Market
Two of the most popular stars on YouTube are Ian Hecox and Anthony Padilla, a couple of overgrown teens with potty mouths and boy-band haircuts. You likely wouldn't recognize them in a lineup, but their YouTube channel, Smosh, has more subscribers—eight million-plus—than any other on the platform.
The Smosh boys have been churning out installments since 2005, and in any given video, you can tag along as the 25-year-olds bound wide-eyed through a world of their own pointless creation, hamming it up for the camera. And kids these days just love it.
"What's this?" Mr. Padilla says in a video posted late last month, titled "My Stupid Dying Grandpa!" "It's my stupid grandpa," Mr. Hecox replies, shoving his old relation through the kitchen on a gurney. "I have to take care of his dying ass."
Other videos include such gems as "Pokemon in Real Life!" (32 million views) and "Stuck in a Toilet!" (nearly 13 million views). Read More