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Shooting with the S2 in Savannah, GA


dfarkas

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David's photo's are always terriific. In fact, I'd suggest you could hand David any camera, and he would produce the same high quality professional capture's...However, by placing a new Leica S2 in his hands you get breathtaking quality.

 

Nonetheless, I would have wanted to see David making more use of his M9 so that we could have had a more balanced comparision.

 

With my respects,

 

Lee

Grand Cayman

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Thanks for another great post Dave. The shot of the "Penniman" gravestone really blows me away in terms of depth of focus. I'm not talking about depth of field....I'm talking about the transitions between in-focus and out-of-focus parts of the image are some of the most film-like that I've ever seen come from a digital camera. It reminds me of the old days of viewing 4x5 film on a light box. If there is one thing that I've missed since the advent of digital it would be the super smooth focal plane transitions of film. The lack of filters on the S2 is really delivering this smooth film-like quality and it's wonderful. In my opinion, it's the number one or two reason to own the S2 :). It's a personal prejudice so others are free to disagree, but I'm so sick of the schmeary mess that some of the "other" digital cameras produce in the transitions because of shooting through heavy filters.

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It's interesting that you never felt limited by the use of just the single 70mm lens. I've been thinking similar thoughts... that maybe it's only necessary to own the S2 and a single lens. 50mm was always my favorite focal length for 35mm. Any word on when the CS lenses may become available?

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It's interesting that you never felt limited by the use of just the single 70mm lens. I've been thinking similar thoughts... that maybe it's only necessary to own the S2 and a single lens. 50mm was always my favorite focal length for 35mm. Any word on when the CS lenses may become available?

 

I didn't feel limited, though I would ideally like the 35 and 120mm lenses as well in order to cover a wider range. But, I would probably end up using the 70mm most frequently, as I am also a classic 50mm-shooter.

 

All the CS lenses are slated to be released by July.

 

David

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As one who shot a 70mm twin lens rollie for a period of time, I can appreciate David's perspective of being just fine with one focal length.

Having tested the S2 I can also appreciate how nice the viewfinder is. Well I would add, it could be considered addictive.

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Thank you David!

 

Great photos as always, great report as always!

 

It shows what I know but always struggle to really believe - you just need a great camera with 1 lens (preferably standard focal length) and you are done.

 

The M9 and the S2 are great tools!

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Dear David,

 

Impressive shots. I noticed you used 80 pull on the 8s f13 shot. Where does the noise creep in? That 100% was very clean and yet Phase backs at 100 (close) would have a lot more noise in the darker areas in a shot like that (full res, not Sensor+)

It looks like a calm nite, but would still like to keep shots under 2s due to wind, ambient light from traffic etc., so wouldn' mind seeing low noise up to 320. (I am not interested in the ISO 64000 1/250 sec f16 shot! LOL )

 

Keep it up....I can almost believe we WILL have all lenses by end of summer!

 

best regards

Victor

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Dear David,

 

Impressive shots. I noticed you used 80 pull on the 8s f13 shot. Where does the noise creep in? That 100% was very clean and yet Phase backs at 100 (close) would have a lot more noise in the darker areas in a shot like that (full res, not Sensor+)

It looks like a calm nite, but would still like to keep shots under 2s due to wind, ambient light from traffic etc., so wouldn' mind seeing low noise up to 320. (I am not interested in the ISO 64000 1/250 sec f16 shot! LOL )

 

Keep it up....I can almost believe we WILL have all lenses by end of summer!

 

best regards

Victor

 

Thanks.

 

Yes, I used Pull 80 on that bridge shot because it wasn't quite dark yet and I wanted to soften the water as much as possible without going past f/13 (avoiding diffraction). I've been meaning to pick up the Singh-Ray Vari-ND filter in E82. That would give me between 2 and 8 stops of ND, which would solve the problem of aperture. I didn't see any ill effect with regards to noise at Pull 80. Likewise, going to 8, 12, 20 seconds, etc. didn't prove to introduce any noticeable noise. The dark-frame subtraction method works very well on the S2. Oh, and for that shot I had the S2 on a Leica table-top tripod on a piling on the pier, triggered with the 2 second self-timer.

 

You can see some 100% crops from ISO 320 shots on my blog, which should demonstrated the noise characteristics. I've found ISO 320 to be very clean. In fact, I wish I had just left the camera on ISO 320 so that I could have gained a stop of shutter speed or more DOF, or half a stop of both. Next time, I suppose.

 

Here is a 100% crop of ISO 320 with some dark areas and fine detail:

 

513064254.jpg

 

The full image for reference:

 

510789281.jpg

 

David

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It's not strictly on subject, but I have not yet seen any remarks re the mirror action (slap) of the S2. May I assume therefore, that it is negligible whether handheld at normal speeds, or tripod mounted?

 

John.

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I haven't done an exact comparison test, but it does not seem an issue from slap. it is well modulated. The bigger issue is how steady are you in hand holding such a camera?

 

Your hand shaking will be visible faster than vibration from a mirror slap.

 

Right David?

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I haven't done an exact comparison test, but it does not seem an issue from slap. it is well modulated. The bigger issue is how steady are you in hand holding such a camera?

 

Your hand shaking will be visible faster than vibration from a mirror slap.

 

Right David?

 

Correct.

 

Human movement is visible, mirror slap is insignificant. I shot many of the Savannah pictures on a Leica tabletop tripod with a 2 sec self-timer.

 

The camera is very well damped.

 

David

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