DxO saves its highest praise for the D7200's dynamic range – its ability to capture extremes of shadow and highlight detail in high-contrast scenes. It comes 20th on the company's all-time ranking, but this includes full-frame cameras with much larger photosites (pixels) for gathering light, so it's a great result for a camera with a smaller APS-C size sensor.
You can take a look at the DxOMark D7200 test results to see all the data, but the Nikon D7200 comes out with a dynamic range score of 14.6EV (14.6 'stops', in traditional photographic terms), while the Sony A77 II scores 13.4EV and the Canon 7D Mark II scores 11.8EV.
The results for colour depth and noise placed the D7200 more or less on a par with its direct rivals, including the Canon 7D Mark II and Sony A77 II. This ties in with our own conclusions in our Nikon D7200 review. Overall, though, DxO Mark's combined Sensor Score for the D7200 puts it ahead of its rivals.
DxO Mark D7200 Sensor Score
- Nikon D7200: 87
- Sony A77 II: 82
- Canon 7D Mark II: 70
The DxOMark tests don't include resolution figures since this is dependent on the lens used – but the TechRadar Test Team does test resolution, and we found the D7200 to be just about the sharpest APS-C camera we've ever tested.
This is partly due to the D7200's 24-megapixel sensor – the joint second highest resolution of any APS-C sensor. But the D7200 has another trick – it uses a sensor with the anti-aliasing effect removed. This produces sharper fine detail at the risk of moiré, or interference patterns, with some fine patterns and textures, though we've not heard any reports of problems from users and Nikon is not the only DSLR maker to start rolling out this feature across its DSLRs – Pentax is doing the same.
DxO is the company behind lens correction and raw conversion software DxO Optics Pro, and its DxOMark test process is part of the in-depth laboratory testing processes it carries out on all major new cameras and lenses.
