M8 dynamic range

[Guest Olof]

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Does anybody now how many stops of dyamic range the M8 has ?

[sergiolov]

Does anybody now how many stops of dyamic range the M8 has ?

I'll try, ( and apologize for my english)

Data sheet for the sensor says that DR is nominal 71,5 db, or something more than 11 stops. This number derived from the ratio between saturation signal (the maximum number of electrons each pixel can store - 60k- and the base noise electrons-15

In practice, the actual DR is always lower than that, because to accept an image, you want to see it with a quantity of noise in the shadows that is subjectively evaluated.

So the practical DR is between 1 or 2 stops lower , ending at 9 to 10 stops.

I use a simple method to verify that value, that avoids the difficoulties of using a grayscale:

 

-I take a photo af a white object against a dark background in raw, and using exposure slider in ACR set it to 255, noting the correction slider setting. (at base iso)

-Take a series of photos of the same subject underesposing 1 stop at a time

-convert all shots with the same noted exposure setting

 

The number of stops of the last exposure in which the white object is still faintly visible,

is my dynamic range. (for the m8, something more than 9 stops)

 

If at this point you push the exposure with acr slider, increasing luminance and visible noise, you'll notice that, with a lot of noise, kodak sensor specification number is more or less reached.

 

attached shots- I hope they will maintain readability:

1 normal exposure

2 underexposure 7 stops

3 underexposure 8 stops

4 underexposure 9 stops

 

note: test done in tungsten light. with white light dr should be a little better, as noise mainly in blue channel.

I notice a little loss of readability in last image

 

Hope this helps.

Sergio

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[arthury]

Isn't the human eye 12 stops and you're telling me the M8 has 9-10 stops?

B&W films have 7 stops, don't they?

[sergiolov]

Isn't the human eye 12 stops and you're telling me the M8 has 9-10 stops?

B&W films have 7 stops, don't they?

 

Dynamic range is getting better and better with technology. Something more than 9 stops is the usable dynamic range,(at least with my test) absolute range is more.

There are today a few cameras with that range. To cite one, Canon 5D raw file contains 9,5

stops of DR when file is optimally converted for DR. see here:

Canon EOS 5D Review: 23. Photographic tests: Digital Photography Review

DR of film depends on type of emulsion, development, etc. I don't know the maximum value actually reached.

Sergio

[jonoslack]

Dynamic range is getting better and better with technology. Something more than 9 stops is the usable dynamic range,(at least with my test) absolute range is more.

There are today a few cameras with that range. To cite one, Canon 5D raw file contains 9,5

stops of DR when file is optimally converted for DR. see here:

Canon EOS 5D Review: 23. Photographic tests: Digital Photography Review

DR of film depends on type of emulsion, development, etc. I don't know the maximum value actually reached.

Sergio

 

Hi Sergio - Anders Uschold did some testing of the Dynamic range of the M8 in his article in the British Journal of Photography (always interesting articles). He came to the conclusion that not only was the colour more accurate, but that you could get an extra 1/2 stop of dynamic range out of the M8 when shooting jpgs.

 

Comments please

 

Incidentally, your english is, as usual, immaculate and beautifully readable

[sergiolov]

Hi Sergio - Anders Uschold did some testing of the Dynamic range of the M8 in his article in the British Journal of Photography (always interesting articles). He came to the conclusion that not only was the colour more accurate, but that you could get an extra 1/2 stop of dynamic range out of the M8 when shooting jpgs.

 

Comments please

 

Incidentally, your english is, as usual, immaculate and beautifully readable

 

Hi Jono,

unfortunately my online subscription to BJP has ended, so I could not read the test.

I was very surprised of Ushold's findings. Not for color, as you too noticed that it was very good in your photos, and I got the same impression

(Leica probably knows its colors better than raw converter developers) but for DR.

My test is what it is, but just out of couriosity I will repeat it tomorrow in jpg.

(OT-received also the tri elmar,and, if you want, I'll email findings)

 

Incidentally, you are, as usual, very kind.

 

Sergio

[macusque]

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(OT-received also the tri elmar,and, if you want, I'll email findings)

Sergio, you mean the 16-18-21 Tri-Elmar ?

If so, please report here your feedback asap !

 

I'd love to hear your comments, particularly about distortion, which in Erwin Puts' preliminar test seems quite high with an odd shape.

 

Grazie mille !

 

Ciao

 

Marco

[Jamie Roberts]

Hi Sergio - Anders Uschold did some testing of the Dynamic range of the M8 in his article in the British Journal of Photography (always interesting articles). He came to the conclusion that not only was the colour more accurate, but that you could get an extra 1/2 stop of dynamic range out of the M8 when shooting jpgs.

 

Comments please

 

Incidentally, your english is, as usual, immaculate and beautifully readable

 

@ Sergio--your testing completely fits with my gut feel that the M8 has about 10 stops of usable DR, shooting RAW. Yes, that's a lot...

 

@ Jono--I read the BJP article too, and was quite surprised. Without replicating all the tests, I'm pretty sure it depends on your RAW processing techique...since the JPEG in the camera is working with the RAW data too (and can't, theoretically, have more headroom or exposure latitude or DR--whatever you want to call it--than the RAW data!)

 

Even assuming shooting JPEG has some DR advantage, I'm not even sure how you'd use JPEG DR the way you can RAW DR--take multiple JPEGs I guess With a RAW conversion, I can do three separate ones for shadows, mids and highlights then merge them to "compress" the final print output. I don't know how I'd do that with a single JPEG. Use a curve, I guess

[Woody Campbell]

I do dynamic range tests slightly differently (I've been flamed for this in another forum) based on my early Zone System training.

 

Properly expose a shot of a gray card. Take a series of overexposures at one stop intervals, and a series of underexposures at one stop entervals. "Develop" consistently in C1. The top of the range (corresponding to Zone X) is the frame that just reaches 255; the bottom of the range (corresponding to Zone I) is the first frame that lurks around 0 or 1.

 

For the M8 this method reads a photographically useful range of 3 1/2 (maybe 4) stops on the upside and 6 or 6 1/2 stops on the downside for a total of 9 1/2 or 10 stops. This is obviously sufficient to accomodate Ansel Adams' 9 stop Zone System if exposure is accurate, so it should be (and in fact is) possible to produce a fully nuanced grayscale with the M8. This is in rough agreement with Sergio's analysis (and Jamie's gut), and is consistent with my experience using the M8 to produce actual images. The bias on the blown highlights side is typical of digital cameras - I believe that manufacturers compensate in designing exposure meters and that this is why "digital" gray cards are lighter than 18% gray.

 

I get roughly the same results for my 1DsII (I haven't tested my 5D - life is too short to spend every day shooting gray cards), which is slightly disappointing from the M8's standpoint because I had hoped to get something closer to the 11 stops suggested by the technical specs.

 

This is a quibble though, because the M8 does produce beautiful files.

[Jamie Roberts]

{snipped}I get roughly the same results for my 1DsII (I haven't tested my 5D - life is too short to spend every day shooting gray cards), which is slightly disappointing from the M8's standpoint because I had hoped to get something closer to the 11 stops suggested by the technical specs.

 

This is a quibble though, because the M8 does produce beautiful files.

 

Woody--I agree with you on the 1ds2--which most folks underestimate in terms of DR--except I do think the M8 handles extreme over-exposure significantly better than the 1ds2, which tends to band when, say, shooting directly into the sun. The M8 doesn't, or doesn't nearly as quickly, which after shooting the Canon for a long time is really amazing to me. The DMR is the same in this regard.

 

But beyond the DMR, the DR / exposure latitude of the M8 holds up even in edge conditions. To be fair to the 1ds2, that camera *does* excel in the shadows when underexposed (which probably has something to do with its high ISO capability as well).

[sergiolov]

It seems to me that Uschold is right. Not so easy to put all variables on par doing a comparison dng-jpg but essentially dr is equal, if not with a slight advantage for jpg.

Obviously, to take advantage of that, exposure in jpg must be absolutely perfect, while on dng you have 1or 2 stops of margin.

Sergio

[etienne_werner]

I hope I'm not going to step on anyones toes with this but if you want to compare high ISO, then by all means compare to the best: 5D. I you want to compare to the fastest; D2h,D2X,D1 etc.. But if you want to compare DR why not compare to the best in that field? I realise that the Fuji S3 has many short comings but DR it does better than any other DSLR. As the editor in chief of a photo agency, I see all kinds of digital files from nearly ever camera in use. I find the quality of the D5 very impressive but not as far as DR is concerned. Perhaps with a lot of tweaking but for that, there is very little time when working for the wire-service were as the S3 even in JPG produces beautiful DR.

 

I hope you understand that I not bashing any of the cameras mentioned, especially the M8 as I just got mine.

 

Kind regards,

 

Etienne

[Guest guy_mancuso]

My gut feeling from this maybe a shade better than the DMR so my guess and what i have been seeing is 10 to maybe 11 stops. This is very close to MF which really quite good. This is one of the main reasons I shoot leica and CCD which i still contend CCD has more range than Cmos. This comes from the gut and experience than science.

[Woody Campbell]

Not to beat a dead horse, but Jamie's last post makes the excellent point that the DR of the DNG file is actually longer than that of the Tiff that C1 outputs.

 

So going back to my series of gray card shots, on the low side I find that I can apply an EV adjustment in C1 of up to +1.5 and find shadow detail (actually a significant amount) two stops down. I can apply an EV adjustment of up to -0.7 on the upside and find highlight detail (but just barely) one stop up. This suggests an overall DR of 13 or so (I got an honest 10 in the output files developing them consistently) in the DNG files, which is really impressive.

 

The algorithm that Leica uses to produce the jpgs must use a bit more of this range than C1 does in outputing tiffs.

 

I'll be curious to see what Sean reports on this topic.

 

All of my DR test shots are at ISO 160.