Connexion
Remembering Rishi Sanyal, DPReview’s former Science Editor — a rare mix of scientist, photographer, filmmaker
From ISO invariance to computational photography, Rishi’s insistence on understanding a camera from the inside out influenced how DPReview – and much of the industry – thought about image quality.
Carey RoseIt is with great sadness that we have to announce that DPReview’s former Science Editor, Rishi Sanyal, has passed away. Rishi, whose full name was Saurarshi Sanyal, died on June 26, 2026, at his home in California. He was 46.
During his years with DPReview, Rishi was a driving force behind the site’s scientific approach to camera testing, setting the standard for how we investigated cameras and lenses and, just as importantly, how we interpreted the results.
Rishi’s enthusiasm and intellect were evident from his very first interview with DPReview, and came to define his time with the site. Rishi wasn’t interested in data for data’s sake. He wanted to know what was happening inside a camera, why it was happening, and how a photographer could use that information to improve their work. A test result became interesting when it explained something a photographer might see in an image or, ideally, use to their creative advantage. Rishi might have been a journalist for a consumer website, but he was also a highly accomplished photographer and filmmaker, and as a scientist he was more than capable of meeting engineers on equal terms.
With his rare combination of deep technical understanding and an artist’s eye for color, light and composition, Rishi made a genuine and lasting impact on our industry. He changed the way many of us think about image-making, and exemplified DPReview at its best, as a site that could not only inform but also inspire. Among his many contributions, he was instrumental in our collective understanding of what is now known as “ISO invariance” (a term he helped coin), and his early fascination with the potential of computational photography led him to take on a camera performance engineering role at Apple.
Rishi’s scientific range had always been unusually broad. At Princeton, where he studied molecular biology, his thesis work included the design of a DNA nanomachine; he later earned a Ph.D. in biophysics. The subjects changed, but the instinct was recognizably the same: understand the system deeply enough to see what others might miss.
As far back as ten years ago, long before the distinction between “camera” and “software” became as blurred as it is today, Rishi was digging into how advanced processing algorithms could overcome traditional hardware limitations and change what photographers could expect from small sensors. Work that attracted the attention of some of the foremost imaging scientists working today, including Marc Levoy.
Levoy, then at Google and now Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at Stanford and Vice President and Fellow at Adobe, recalls interacting with Rishi many times during his tenure at Google. One example came around the Pixel 4, when Rishi independently estimated the improvement in signal-to-noise ratio achieved by capturing, aligning and merging bursts of Raw frames.
“That is not a calculation one expects a journalist to do,” Levoy wrote, “and speaks to Rishi’s deep understanding of photographic technology.”
Of course, like many perfectionists, Rishi could be exasperating. Not only to his coworkers and managers (his genuine bafflement in the face of deadlines was legendary) but also to the camera and lens manufacturers with whom he corresponded, both publicly in articles on DPReview and privately in lengthy, densely argued emails. To his editors, often the biggest challenge was persuading him that merely excellent was good enough, that it was time to hit publish, and perfect might have to wait.
His editors were not the first people who had tried to convince Rishi that a problem had been solved well enough to move on. His father, Gautam, remembers giving him essentially the same advice from childhood: there comes a point when the work is already excellent and you have to let it go. Rishi was rarely inclined to believe that point had arrived if he thought there was still something left to understand.
That drive was visible early. In seventh grade, Rishi built a working magnetic-levitation demonstration for a regional science fair, earning a gold medal and an invitation to attend the International Science and Engineering Fair as an observer.
The same instinct could also be remarkably generous. Scott Everett, who worked closely with Rishi and later managed him at DPReview, remembers showing him a photograph he had taken at White Sands National Park that he wanted to print. Rishi liked the image, and almost immediately became invested in making sure the finished print lived up to what he knew was there in the file. What followed was characteristically thorough: Rishi took over the processing and sent long text threads about monitors, color, printing technology and how to prepare the file properly. It was far more information than Scott needed, but that was partly the point. Rishi knew what was possible, and because the photograph mattered to his friend, he wanted the finished print to live up to the memory behind it.
More than anything else, the same instinct ran through all of it. Rishi wanted to understand things deeply and make them better, whether that meant a science project, a photograph, studio analysis or hardware design.
Above: Rishi excelled at science projects and science fairs.
Those of us who worked closely with Rishi remember the good times we shared with our friend. Long days in the studio, figuring out some esoteric aspect of a camera’s behavior. Press events. Tradeshows. Video shoots in locations all over the US (he may have been the world’s worst camper, but he played a mean campfire guitar). And jet-lagged interviews with executives in Japan, whose obvious respect for his abilities spoke for itself. More than anything, we remember Rishi’s beaming warmth, and the ease with which he could strike up a conversation with almost anyone. The same curiosity he brought to imaging science extended to everyone he met. We’ll miss him.
Not long ago, former editor Barney Britton was looking through a book of photographs of the Grand Canyon, taken by a renowned National Geographic photographer. The daytime images were strong, but the nighttime landscapes and starscapes were technically disappointing. Before Barney was even conscious of making the comparison, one thought occurred to him:
“They should have given Rishi the job.”
Long before DPReview, Rishi was already bringing the same instincts to science and photography. As a teenager, he became fascinated by sonoluminescence, a phenomenon in which sound waves moving through liquid can produce tiny flashes of light. He spent night after night in his family’s basement building an apparatus to reproduce it. Eventually, he succeeded and, naturally, photographed the result.
His parents still have the glass vessel Rishi used for that experiment, the same one in which he finally managed to turn sound into visible light.
Tributes from colleagues and readers
To honor Rishi’s legacy, we invited current and former DPReview colleagues to share memories of Rishi that have stayed with them. Their recollections are below, in their own words.
We know that many members of the DPReview community will have their own memories of Rishi. We hope you’ll add them in the comments below and in the forums.
At some point around 2014, I mentioned to Rishi that my iMac was struggling. He was almost offended that I was doing photo and video work on a machine without maxing out its RAM and SSD. On that generation of iMac, upgrading meant pulling the display off and disassembling a good portion of the machine to get inside, which Rishi treated as a minor implementation detail. Before long, Rishi, our colleague Eugene, and I were crowded around the desk with the machine in pieces, while Rishi talked us through everything in great detail.
Buried deep in my phone’s text history is a sort of archive of Rishi’s mind as I often experienced it: long threads about display calibration, HDR tone mapping, and the exact way an image should render on a screen. A simple question routinely became an exhaustive technical breakdown, because he simply wasn’t capable of leaving an interesting problem halfway explored.
And those conversations weren’t only about technology. Rishi and I often bonded over film and music. He especially admired Christopher Nolan films and Hans Zimmer scores, and cared deeply about experiencing them as well as the equipment would allow. All that calibration ultimately had a purpose.
One of these nights I’ll dig up those threads, calibrate my setup exactly as he would have insisted, put on Interstellar, turn the volume up, and watch it the way Rishi believed it deserved to be seen
Working with Rishi was like having access to a personal masterclass. He didn’t just want you to understand how cameras worked; he wanted that understanding to change the way you took pictures. I’m a better photographer today because of the things Rishi taught me.
Rishi loved whiteboards. I recall many an afternoon in the DPReview office, standing at one with him as he walked me through an important concept or technology. By the time we were done, the board would be covered with graphs, equations and illustrations. He was passionate about sharing his knowledge, not just with other DPReview staff but with everybody.
I saw him explain new camera technology to famous photographers with multiple National Geographic covers to their credit. When the two of us interviewed Academy Award-winning cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, Rishi went off on a tangent and started geeking out about the dynamic range of the Nikon D810. I’m pretty sure Lubezki came away from that conversation having learned something from Rishi, and not the other way around.
The first time I met him was when he interviewed me for a job at DPReview. He asked tough, technical questions that required me to synthesize a lot of information. When I told him I wasn’t sure about something, he stood up and walked to – what else? – the whiteboard, and talked me through the answer. He might be the only person I’ve ever seen turn a job interview into a teaching opportunity.
If there’s one thing I can be certain of, it’s that he’s already cornered an angel or two in front of a whiteboard, explaining dynamic range.
Rishi possessed a remarkable intellect, a patient teaching demeanor, an almost painful obsession with perfection, and a talent for photography. He understood that abstract lab measurements were meaningless unless they could be translated into tangible benefits when capturing real-world images. By combining his unique blend of scientific expertise and artistic vision, Rishi revolutionized the way we evaluate camera technology. He brought scientific rigor to our testing processes and earned the respect of the entire industry.
Rishi was also, for the last 10 years or so, someone I was lucky to call a friend – albeit a friend that would regularly drag me into drawn-out conversations about the latest developments in sensor technology or the failings of smart home technology. Not that I ever complained; Rishi’s infectious enthusiasm for his work was contagious, and I always gained something valuable from our interactions. Above all though, Rishi was the sweetest, kindest, and most genuinely humble person I’ve ever known, and his passing is a profound loss for everyone whose lives he touched.
I didn’t expect to ever have to write this, and I don’t know quite how to begin. So I’ll start with a gripe, which I know my friend Rishi would relate to. Among the most common lines of criticism of any technical analysis of a piece of photographic equipment is: “fine, but what relevance does this have to ordinary photographers?” I’ve always found this irritating. The idea that scientific testing is somehow “un-creative” is understandable: how many photographers (ordinary or otherwise) spend their time shooting test charts? But the best reviewers don’t test cameras and lenses because they enjoy plotting charts. They do it because they want to know how to use those data to take better photos, and to share that knowledge with others.
Rishi exemplified this goal. His ability to communicate the creative potential of technology that even camera manufacturers sometimes seemed not to fully understand was rare, if not unique. He knew what data mattered to photographers and, equally as important, he knew what didn’t. He was a scientist, yes, and a highly accomplished one, but he was also an artist, in the truest sense. A highly, highly unusual combination, even among imaging professionals.
My main memory of Rishi is just how immensely likable he was. I first met him more than ten years ago when he approached us about a position at DPReview. We interviewed him over lunch, and I recall Rishi actually struggling to eat in his excitement, almost choking at one point, so enthusiastic about what we did and what he might do with us, overflowing with ideas that seemed to come tumbling after one another, faster than he could verbalize them. He brought the same endearing enthusiasm to everything he did at DPReview. Outside of work hours, he was an avid cinophile, a borderline-obsessive audiophile, an accomplished musician and a loyal friend.
Even now, years after we last worked at DPReview, Rishi’s name still comes up in conversations I have with photo industry figures. Not just because of his intelligence and professional accomplishments (although they earned deserved respect) but because of his character. His warmth, his genuine interest in people, his unflagging creative passion and his total lack of cynicism (again—rare) impressed everyone he came into contact with. He was an extraordinary person, and he will be greatly missed.
When I had my first conversation with Rishi, I was still a photographer at the local power company. I had just applied to a rare opening at a website I visited almost every day, DPReview. I knew that Rishi was the Science Editor there, and I knew he was very smart, and I also knew that this conversation I was about to have was going to be a bit of a test.
When I picked up the phone around the end of the workday, I worked out my nervous energy by pacing endlessly around a corporate courtyard, phone pressed hard enough to my ear and face to leave a mark afterward. Introductions were made, and we promptly dove in.
Though I don’t remember exactly how we ended up on it, Rishi and I soon found ourselves animatedly extolling the virtues of Nikon’s 3D-Tracking autofocus to each other, and lamenting that so many photographers we knew never used it. (I later discovered that many a conversation with Rishi, if gone on long enough, would land on Autofocus eventually.)
Fast forward to my in-person interview, and Rishi comes in with a Sony a7R II. Now, I had never even seen a mirrorless camera in person before, much less used one, and perhaps sensing my naïveté, Rishi proceeded to absolutely blow my mind with the camera’s Eye Autofocus feature. Not only was this system fundamentally more accurate than what I had experienced with my DSLR’s, but it could track someone’s eye almost to the very edge of the frame.
For someone used to a middling clump of central AF points in an optical viewfinder, it was a revelation for me. And that really sums up what I remember and admire most about Rishi. When you got him on a topic he was into, and there were a wide variety of those, his enthusiasm would fill the room. He found so much joy in all of the details, and he couldn’t help but share that joy (and all those details) with everyone around him.
I’m so grateful to have gotten to know and work alongside Rishi for six years at DPReview. We spent a lot of time in the studio together, a lot of time shooting videos together, and a lot of time on press trips together. We had the privilege of working two of the best jobs on this earth, and I will treasure those memories for the rest of my life. Farewell, Rishi. I’ll miss you.
Rishi’s influence expanded the way I approach photography, both from a technical and a compositional standpoint, almost certainly more than any other colleague I’ve worked with over the past 20 years. His brilliance and creativity behind a camera, and unmatched knowledge of imaging science, were a rare and potent combination that made Rishi an infectious person to be around and especially to talk shop with. But it wasn’t just Rishi’s technical chops that made him a delight; it was also his big open heart.
Rishi wasn’t afraid to open up about deep, personal topics. He was also a fantastic and reliable listener, and someone I felt safe sharing my own inner musings, both good and bad, with. Our working relationship started rocky – what do you expect when you put two guys from Jersey in the same room? – but blossomed into something really special. Rishi, I miss you profoundly, but am so glad our paths intertwined as they did. A true friend and celebrated colleague, I’ll think of you every time I expose to the right in-camera and pull my shadows in post.
I’ve never worked with anyone else quite like Rishi. We butted heads often, usually around deadlines and such, but we could always laugh about something in the middle of it. I’ll remember those moments with him most of all. Making Rishi laugh always felt really good, and he laughed easily, even when we were annoyed with each other about something. He was truly one of a kind.
Rishi was a dear friend who changed the course of my professional career a decade ago.
We had become friendly while attending press trips, with him representing DPReview and Chris Niccolls and I still working for The Camera Store’s YouTube channel. While I felt I had adequate technical skill to review cameras, Rishi’s astounding depth of knowledge was somewhat intimidating, but more importantly inspiring. I began messaging him directly for clarification or information on sensors and autofocus systems whenever I got a wall.
Eventually, Chris, Rishi and I were on an extended press trip in Thailand, having one of our regular conversations that careened from the incredibly nerdy to surprisingly personal when he said “You guys should come work for DPreview with me.” The opportunity to work side-by-side with Rishi and learn just a fraction of his incredible scientific knowledge was too good to pass up.
While I wasn’t able to see Rishi in person as I may have hoped, our near-daily text exchanges were a source of inspiration, levity and occasional temple rubbing frustration as I attempting to understand topics that seemed obvious to my co-worker. My time at DPReview was an incredible education, and Rishi was a massive reason for that.
We both went our separate ways in a few years, with Rishi leaving to work with Apple, and Chris and I taking our YouTube show to PetaPixel. While those text exchanges were no longer daily, I’d still regularly hear from Rishi, especially when an exciting new camera or lens was announced. Thankfully though, reviewing the latest iPhone every year gave me the opportunity to grab a bite and catch up with Rishi when I was in Cupertino. While it only happened annually, we always picked up like no time at all had passed.
There is a lot to love about my job making videos, from using the latest technology to traveling to beautiful places, but the best part is the opportunity to get to know many amazing people I’d otherwise never have the chance to interact with. Rishi Sanyal was one of those.
I’ll miss you man.
