gmaurizio

Many of you know I've been vocal against Leica's customer service and speed in the past. My M8 experienced a new problem, progressive backfocus as time goes by. But this time, Leica NJ, under Mr. Horn guidance, step up to the task. Not only they communicated quickly and accurately, but they decided on the spot to replace the camera. Kudos! Bravo! Way to go Leica NJ!!! That is the kind of customer service Leica user's deserve, and I am glad that the changes we are seeing after Mr. Lee was sacked are indeed very positive. It might be chance, but my guess is that we are facing a new Leica now. I felt obliged to Leica and its employees to post these congratulations. I look forward to exciting new pictures and the upcoming models, specially a dCL, pretty please!!! With 35mm F2 (EFOV) Leica please!!!!!

You are welcome Eric. Somehow the Gamma discussions remind me of those theories that say El Greco (spanish painter) had a vision problem that made him render his models with long faces. Would that have been the case, his paintings would have been perfect, since when he looked at the canvass he would have seen the same distortion. L*, 1.8, 2.2 and others are just fine, as long as you understand which device expects what gamma. This is the reason most people have bad results using Epson's Advanced B&W from LR. Epson expects a grayscale 2.2 and LR sends a 1.8 if you do not convert.

Eric, I guess the M8 just does sRGB, under ECI standard. Not eciRGB as wide-gamut colorspace. Also, the lenses and MP count of the M8 render it useless for art reproduction. You need extremely flat field lenses, like the Zeiss Planar and very accurate focusing. a 1DSMKIII would be on the entry level, but a Betterlight scanback or a 8x10 technical view camera are in order. The top of the M8 is brass.

Dear Photoskeptic, how are you doing? I am sorry to hear that you are experiencing problems. So far, my worst problems have been metilen and cobalt blues. After long research, we found that the human eye has a low sensitivity window in some part of the red spectrum, seldom found in real world. These particular blue pigments, do show strong emission in that particular window, therefore rendering the color purple instead of blue. This is perfectly ok according to the sensors, but not to the human eye. It is clearly a metameric/perceptive failure. How did we correct the problem? We isolated those areas in the image, and we did careful color shifts using photoshop while printing on canvas, showing it to the artist and its gallery manager until we got it right. Now we can automate that process to a great success. Other similar problems happened with ocres and oranges. As per raw standards, the problem is the manufacturers encode a lot of proprietary info in their files, allowing for their SW to recover much more detail. That is the case with Nikon, Canon and others. While a standard can be beneficial for the users, it might slow down the introduction of new models and features. Also, get ready for 3-CCD or 3-CMOS sensors real soon now. That will be the next big thing, already on the works. Kiss bye bye to AA filters, aliasing and other problems of the Bayer approach.

Sandy, good work. What are your conclusions, sparing us of the technical stuff? Some people think that Color Management beyond sRGB everywhere (the default) is a waste of time for most people. Others say that without color management we are lost in the shadows... I find that the monitor is the worst component, since it barely shows sRGB --except of course those fine EISOs that are very expensive. Also, technical art reproduction has challenges that no one has solved up to now. I still use large format and film for those specific purposes, since digital becomes much more expensive and time consuming. Will you share your thoughts?

I've browsed quickly through the article. It is thorough, interesting, but not entirely accurate. The problem not addressed is the following: The reproduction of artwork consists of digital/chemical capture of 'reflected and emitted light' by an artpiece. Therefore, the spectral response and correspondent human perception depends on many factors. You must add to that an output stage, where the digital capture will be again illuminated and perceived by a different observer. It is impossible to accurately reproduce. On top of that, the L* ICC color models do not consider the perception of the brain of different adjacent colors. For example, take a look at any Kincaid 'painter of light' picture. Move the pixels a bit and the overall effect changes a lot. We need better color models, but we might never achieve what the writer of the article proposes.

Chris, I've yet to read your article. Seems interesting since I've been doing some art reproductions for a painter friend of mine and found a lot of problems with metamerism with her cobalt blues... I think that LR uses an internal color space that, while similar to Profoto (by Kodak), it is not exactly the same. The point is, when you are done with your fixes corrections, you should save an uncompressed TIFF file with a color profile (stable) associated if you are looking for the long term. I guess the problem comes from the fact that cameras are not easy to be profiled, and many have a wider gamut than AdobeRGB. Also, demosaicing (is that a valid verb?) algorithms change with different releases, so it is not surprising that they differ from SW to SW. Even different samples of the same brand/model produce different raw files in the same conditions!!! Since the human color response does not have a filter equivalent match, these problems are never ending. They existed in Film and will continue to exist in digital, even with 3-CCD cameras or sensors, like Foveon and Better light. We are complex image processing machines, and so far nothing even comes close to the human brain and its contextual interpretation of reality. Thanks for the pointer, and this is a nice topic!

Chris, how are you doing? I did your experiment as follows: Created a Lab mode 600x600 image in PS3, filled with L50-0-0. Saved as Tif. The same file was converted to profile and saved in Tif with Profoto, AdobeRGB and sRGB. Every single file still showed L50-0-0 with PS3, while of course RGB triplets were different in each case (although adobeRGB and sRGB showed the same values, as expected). Imported in LR and Aperture, and every picture looked the same in color calibrated monitor. Exported to full size JPG in every case and got a compressed file with THE EXACT SAME COLOR INFO (L50-0-0 and corresponding RGB values). I think the mistake or error you are making is correcting exposure guided by the 49.8% showed under the Loupe or WB tool. You do not know exactly what is the internal color space of Aperture or LR, so it is a mistake to judge by RGB values shown in a slider. Other than that, I see no problem whatsoever with both pieces of SW, which by the way are designed to handle RAW files. Please let me know if I am missing something, and what was the point you are trying to make since I do not completely get it. Thanks

My new DP1 is going with me to the Sony Ericsson Open Tennis trnmnt. So far, mightly impressed. I could manage to get good sport shots with MF/AF and very good quality. The oranges and reds, blues and cyans are just superb. Will try to post some examples later on, as well as D3 for comparison. Sorry M8, you do not get to go to this assignment....

My 2¢ worth of opinion. While the limited edition concept appeals to art gallery owners, we all know it is not completely enforceable. In the digital world, you can expect to do many copies almost exactly alike anytime. So the limited edition can only be enforced by trust on the photographer/printer. Why not go for a reasonably priced copy and sell volume? I wonder why we keep embracing the advantages of the digital world with one hand, and dismissing them with the other... I think the price/value will be in direct relation to the quality and impact of the image. It should be independent of the lame attempt to limit the amount of prints. Take a look at Brook Jensen's opinion on the subject. He makes a fine living selling 8x10 prints at $20 each.

You can always print on Pictorico Transparent inkjet paper an internegative at 8x10 or larger and then do a chemical contact print, be it silver, palladium or whatever. 35mm is way below that level of detail. But the tonality of the newest inkjet papers, baryta-like, is way better than any traditional print in the darkroom. My 2¢

Make sure you check DO NOT IMPORT DUPLICATES and that you erase the card after import, to be on the safe side.

Paypal is designed to protect buyers, and provides little or no protection to occasional sellers. They can, and WILL go after your bank accounts and CC, no matter what you think. We were almost victims of a scam with a MF digital back on eBay. The buyer did a chargeback on their credit card and 'almost' disappeared. We had to retain a lawyer to prevent Paypal and started criminal procedures, in all, a very lengthy and expensive procedure. After the threat of severe litigation, they backed off and payed for the legal expenses, and the culprit is now waiting for his prosecution. Just avoid paypal for small occasional transactions. You'd better wait for a honest buyer that will send you a money order, bank transfer or the sort. In the US, you can use UPS Cash on Delivery, or many other alternatives. In Europe, just use bank transfers. There are good buyers that will accept that provided you have a reasonable history and your item is as described.

We sold our Noctilux in LUF. Do not accept Paypal, just ask for a bank transfer, and ship DHL insured (around U$S 200 to any part of the world). Make sure you get an email and ask for photo id for the buyer, using his/her work email for at least a couple of emails. You should be fine. Describe your item in the most complete form, avoid embellishing your descriptions. If there are flaws/issues, let them know beforehand. Make sure you handle VAT correctly if within Europe.

Second Jaap's suggestion: Use search first. Forget film and scan. Every decent camera 10+MP, be it Leica or Nikon or Canon will defeat color/slide film scanned (35mm) hands down. B&W is another matter, but there you will need either a Medium Format film or 4x5. M8 hands down for any print size from 5x7 and up. 4x6 and 5x7 is hard to tell, since print is so small. Apples and Oranges here. IQ-wise, it's (in my humble opinion) a tie --PROVIDED YOU USE THE FINEST NIKON GLASS, OK????. Print sizes up to 13x19 no difference. Up to 20x30/30x40, slight advantage to Nikon. If shot in low light, Nikon wins hands down against every other existing camera today. Including 21MP 1DsMkIII. Forget about sensor size. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Leica M8 is just fine. More than enough any printer/magazine today. You get about 9 stops, maybe 10 if your technique is superb. No printer has that latitude.