The Red Helium 8k S35 pushed the Sony a7RII further down DXO’s list, by scoring an unbelievably high overall score of 108. DXO might have to rethink their testing methodology soon. It’s also interesting that they included a camera in their rankings that seems to do some denoising, but still refuse to include Fujifilm in their tests.
The RED Helium 8K is the most impressive sensor we’ve ever tested. Rating 10 points above the best of the full-frame DSLRs, it stands alone as our top scorer. Its image quality is even more impressive given its very high maximum frame rates. Our only caveat is that the Helium 8K sensor appears to benefit from some noise reduction to enhance its RAW image quality.
We can likely explain the Helium 8K’s improvement over our previous top scorer, RED’s own Dragon, by a combination of both better sensor technology and temporal noise reduction. The upgrade to 8K video and improved image quality across the board make it a clear upgrade from the RED Dragon – and a clear winner. The Helium 8K is an impressive achievement by RED. For those with the budget, its top-of-the-line image quality, high frame rate, and 16-bit RAW capture capability absolutely make it worth considering as a competitor to high-end DSLRs and medium-format cameras for still image capture.
You can read the full review at DxOMark.
