Typha latifolia – broad-leaved cattail, South Boulder Creek trail, 2015. The upper picture was taken with a Sony α6000 camera and a 310-mm (35-mm equivalent) lens; the lower with a Canon SX280 point-and-shoot camera and a 600-mm (equivalent) lens. Consumer Reports rated the image quality of both cameras “Very Good,” but they cautioned that you cannot compare ratings across camera types.
So I decided to compare the 2 cameras myself. The 2 images are cropped to show the same areas and reveal individual pixels. The SX280 image shows some electronic noise and a bit of chromatic aberration. The α6000 image, though taken at half the focal length, is far better. The α6000 may show better gray scale, but that may be an artifact of the exposure, which I have not compared. Nevertheless, if you do not want to push the limit, the SX280 image is very serviceable indeed.
