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At ISO 6400, ZR is way better than Komodo X, and equal to S1ii. With noise reduction, even ISO 25600 is useable. And thats what matters for the target market. They're mostly one man with no or very limited lighting equipment. Underexposing and lifting the shadows in post is not what they usually do. Its good to have lower noise floor, but you don't want to go much down there anyway. Because despite less noise, you're still dealing with poor SN ratio, due to shot noise, which is inevitable side effect of underexposure. That's why much of R&D money in CMOS sensor industry is directed to improvement in saturation level (more room for overexposure), and solve the noise problem with AI.

They are from the same sensor and if the ZR can achieve the same as the S1ii, then it would already be very very good (RED Raptor territory). The S1ii has the DR boost mode which showed 10 stops of latitude, that is Alexa LF level, but with 27ms, which is not great at all.

Nice video from Nikon India.

The best camera is the one you hold ; ) ...and that's the "toy" when in good hands! :- )

You seem to post nothing but angry negative stuff. Why waste your time with all of us talentless hacks?

For sure. The “18 stops” claim comes from the manufacturer (sensor-level, special HDR mode). It’s plausible as a sensor specification under controlled conditions/multi-exposure HDR — but practical DR measured in real cameras has been substantially lower due to optical and pipeline factors. Although the sensor itself has a “theoretical” 18 stops, many other factors (noise, analog-to-digital conversion, image pipeline, compression, amplifier architecture, pixel readout, linearity, saturation capability) limit the actual practical performance. Manufacturer's claim = sensor under optimized conditions (two/more readings, dual-gain, on-sensor HDR, internal measurements). This isn't necessarily the DR you'll get in a final phone/camera. Actual limits: optics (flare/veiling glare), amplifiers, pipeline noise, compression, RAW/JPEG processing — all of which reduce useful DR. https://www.imatest.com/docs/full.html Imatest/DxOMark measure the system, not just the sensor die (photodiodes (light-capturing pixels), transistors, amplifiers, readout lines, A/D converters, etc.). Lab values applied to cameras tend to show much lower useful DR on sensors of this size — hence the large difference between manufacturer claims and practical DR. However, if this OmniVision sensor actually comes to fruition with 18 practical stops, that will be revolutionary for such small sensors — it would be worth watching for announcements and technical tests.

For anyone who knows one or two things about imaging science, it was obvious we can't go beyond 16 stops with current combinations of tech, as DR is not just about pixel's saturation. You can save harsh highlights from clipping but you get an overall contrast level that doesn't match to that saved highlights, which is what exactly demonstrated here.