I want to thank @Whisperit for shooting me the raw DNG files from the images he posted above, I've had a chance to bring them into Photoshop and have a very close look at just how the two camera's (E90/C23 and Ion L1) Stack up.
First and foremost, the images are shot with roughly the same composition and lighting, though the differences are enough to keep me from making a conclusive determination about a few aspects such as barrel distortion and chromatic aberration - each of which seems to appear in at least one of the cameras while the other did not exhibit these features or; to a lesser degree. In addition, it is impossible to see if the focal length/angle of the cameras are the same but I would say they are very close. A true side by side would require that the two aircraft are booted up and framing the foreground and background precisely the same and both shutters being hit simultaneously.
However I have seen enough to make some determinations about how the cameras stack up. While I can't make as good a presentation here in photos as I could in a video, for those that want to see the process I use to import, process and compare photos see This Video it will show what I am doing to bring out the full depth of these images.
I was give two photos from each camera as shown above, I selected the one set of photos that was more closely composed. Below are three sets of photos - 1 from each camera with a description of what is shown. Obviously we can't see the full size image so I am presenting them as follows:
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SET 1 - Both Images are Raw DNG's reduced down using Bicubic reduction to reduce to 1000 x 666 pixels, no color or lighting corrections to the E90 and only White Balance to the L1 image to get the Temperature and Tint of the pics to look the same. It should be noted that when I copied and pasted these two values from the E90 Image to the L1 - the colors instantly matched. My suspicions are and have been that the L1 almost certainly was given a different color profile so as to separate it from previous Yuneec Cameras.
Note: The different angle of the L1 (more sky) has a slight effect on exposure, especially to the right where the light is coming from but overall the overexposed areas tend to be very close in both cameras though the E90 appears to be just slightly more exposed but not by much.
E90 -
Raw DNG converted to PNG, no corrections, color or sharpening, reduced to 1000 x 666
Ion L1 -
Raw DNG converted to PNG, no corrections or sharpening other than White Balance matched, then the image was reduced to 1000 x 666
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SET 2 - Both Images as above, but this time I have also reduced the exposure and added fill light in the shadows to bring out the full depth of the captured image. Note the detail in the clouds while maintaining the detail in the shadows. In addition, clarity and viberance were bumped about 25% to these images
E90
Ion L1
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Set 3 -
In this set of images both are as above, but to see the detail, the images are left at full size and an area of roughly 1000 x 756 was cropped out and exported as a PNG so as to show how these images compare. I cropped both of these images right at where they were overexposed and at great distance to demonstrate the cameras capabilities in the most difficult areas. Note: Look at the furthest horizon way at the back, notice the detail on the land, particularly the very tall antenna and other structures from each image. Also compare the details in the cloud formations.
E90
Ion L1
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As mentioned, there is a lot we can tell from these images but, there are still just a few questions that may still be answered but, in my estimation, (and this is just my opinion),
there is not much between these two cameras. Here are some things that stand out to me.
Distortion - I definitely see a slight barrel distortion in the Ion L1 – in the last set of photos look at the fence line and the large tree and compare this area on both images and you’ll see that the L1 has a lean. Also look at the tree line in the second set of images – the Ion L1 tree line has a greater curve the E90. This is partly due to the camera be positioned at a greater angle, but it is there.
Color Profile – The color settings are different in the L1 but this is in the programming – once we even out the White Balance the cameras are almost indistinguishable from a color perspective.
Exposure – With only a couple photos to work with it is hard to make a snap call on this but the seem pretty equal though I felt like the E90 held a little more detail in the highs and lows – not a lot but it was there. However, I would want to look though several photos that were staged as mentioned in the opening to make a final call.
Chromatic aberration – The lighting of this composition (light in front of but to the side of the cameras) sets up conditions that can cause CA and here again with only this photo to go on I see just a tinge more from the Ion L1 – look at the big tree in the images from Set 3. Note I looked at the other images with the gate and came to the same conclusion.
Noise - Both images are well lite so noise/graininess is very low, however the Ion L1 does tend to exhibit more noise than does the E90 but I would point out that most noise reduction filters when properly set would be more than enough to handle all but the most difficult condition such as night time.
Overall Image – The size of the images in terms of Pixels are IDENTICAL and there file size is almost so – only kilobits separate them so we can see that the sensors are almost certainly the same.
Conclusion
I think both are very good consumer cameras considering they are slug under an aircraft. The E90 is (in my estimation) ever so slightly ahead of the L1 in terms of image quality, but only slightly and possibly only in certain conditions. Of all the drawbacks I could find there is only one that concerns me the most and that is the distortion. Anything else is up to conditions, lighting and what ones does with the final image. Indeed, a filter can probably be found or created to fix the distortion so that might not be a deal breaker.
What We have seen so far is only what the maximum of the cameras can produce in terms of single images. From experience this tells us that the video side would have similar results but that is undetermined at this point but most likely the video from these cameras would be comparable to one another.
As we are only looking at the cameras, I’ll leave the discussion as to how the cameras and platform price figure in to the whole thing for a later time
I now am anxious to see how the C23 stacks up against these cameras but from my experience with the imagery from my C23, I would say that it is almost certainly a re-labeled E90.
we found that on the Plus, in CCC Mode and with the pan knob in global - giving camera control to the right stick - just like in team mode - the rate switch changes the yaw and pitch rates of the camera so we can can dial in just the right speed of movement. I have never tested team mode on a 520 but the next time you do, have your camera man adjust the rate slider of his ST-16S and see if it does change the camera control rates.
