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Is the M9 a serious Landscape Camera?


salim

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Still an M9 with best lenses and a good tripod can certainly be a rewarding choice for nature photography and does have some remarkable advantages too...............

 

An important advantage being that it is portable for those without sherpa's, and in situations where there are no SUV's available.

I am just back from a backpacking trip to the utmost north of Indonesia (the Philippines are not far away), and the climate there is very unclement (had to rip off my backscreen protector when it started to show fungus on the inside).

 

A thought: the constant worry about the temperature of one's films has been supplanted by the bane of sensor dust: a pain! I shudder to think what digital life would be with a 4x5.

Plus: all weather protection is moot when a lens has to be changed. In my experience the Leica M9 can stand quite some duress, rain, moisture etc.

 

Some examples:

 

Bunaken Village Beach Zenfolio | Sander van Hulsenbeek Photography | Bunaken Island and surroundings

Siladen Beach (HDR) Zenfolio | Sander van Hulsenbeek Photography | Bunaken Island and surroundings

Manado Tua from Siladen Beach (Panorama,Tripod) Zenfolio | Sander van Hulsenbeek Photography | Bunaken Island and surroundings

Dodola Kecil, off Morotai Coast: Zenfolio | Sander van Hulsenbeek Photography | Morotai and Tobelo

Halmahera Coast with at left (active) Dukono Volcano. Tarakan on the right (HDR) Zenfolio | Sander van Hulsenbeek Photography | Morotai and Tobelo

More: Zenfolio | Sander van Hulsenbeek Photography | North Indonesia 2011

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I was wondering if anyone has tried a polarizing filter on an M9? It is a little difficult without liveview but just curious. I am going to give it a try and was curious if anyone has had positive results?

 

Just paint some identification marks around the outside of the filter, hold it up to the scene and turn it until the effect is what you want and note which mark is at the top. Then when it is screwed onto the lens put the same mark at the top. The marks can be numbers, letters etc, but they don't need to be perfectly set out, they are just notation guides.

 

Steve

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Thanks a bunch Steve. I did read that method, and was not really wanting to add another item like the one Leica is selling. I was leaning that direction and going to experiment with it this fall.

 

In regards to the search function, I already had done that Jaap. I almost always hit that before asking. I didn't know I had to start every post with 'I have already searched this item' before asking. Often times thing change between 2007 and now. It would be nice to hear people's real world experience with using the Leica filter. Sorry I asked.........

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Here is why, IMO, the Canon is NOT a good landscape camera:

Look in the corners of you picture, there is a "smearing" of the detail. In the center its sharp, but the corners are really not good enough, even with the best lenses stopped down on canon.

 

I have a 5DII and the new 24 1.4II wich supposedly is their sharpest wideangle, but still I get the smearing at f/8 and f/11.

 

The perfect digital landscape camera right now (without going to medium and large format) is the M9. Put one of the new Elmar lenses on it and you got a Killer setup that fits on a small tripod and wont break your back (but might break your bank but thats another story)

 

Polarizing is a problem, but there are solutions for this.

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I agree with your Canon assessment. Graduating filters for M9 would also be a bit of a challenge as well as there is no TTL or good holder for this size of lens. But I consider myself reasonably intelligent and will find a solution. It is supposed to be an excellent fall colors year here and I am just trying to get prepared. But my career is making that a bit of a challenge :(

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pic 1 is outstanding, but pic 2 is the £eica and no I didn't cheat I made my mind up instantly before reading the chat.

 

we did same experiment with prints from slides; Nikon F5 with 18mm ED lens versus M7 ditto, spread them on a table and almost everyone chose the £eica shots, usually without quite knowing why.

 

The lenses and the accuracy pay off, at a price.

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Serious landscape camera = 8 x 10 ;)

 

Indeed! It just seems more enjoyable that way if I have the time and space to bring the large format with me.

 

That said, the M9 is what I use most of the time, it's great when I'm out hiking, and it fits perfectly in the center glovebox of my jeep for when I'm out offroading. That's what I got it for, a small camera that is good for landscapes.

 

 

 

on a different note, is this a serious landscape, if it's smiling? :D

 

http://www.buckshotsblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/charmlee_8x10_02.jpg

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Graduating filters for M9 would also be a bit of a challenge as well as there is no TTL or good holder for this size of lens. But I consider myself reasonably intelligent and will find a solution.

 

This is what post processing software is for. Just make a bracketed sequence and blend them however you want.

 

Steve

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I was wanting to get a little more in camera correct. I don't believe the bracketing takes the reflections off the leaves, etc. I may be wrong, and please correct me if I am.

 

 

if nothing significant in the image where you want your grad to be is moving, bracketing and blending later will be just as good if not better than a grad filter. For one thing, there's less glass, so less chance of flare and ghosting. And shooting a shot with a faster shutterspeed (the darker image for your grad) is doing basically doing what an ND filter does, brings down the exposures. Reflections and everything will be equally stopped down just as with the filter. But you get to choose how you place the grad while looking at your image on a nice big monitor, rather than through the viewfinder. And if you want to do more than just a grad, you can do so, or use multiple grads, or a paint brush.

 

Doesn't work as well when tree leaves/branches are moving in decently fast wind, that's about the only situation where it doesn't work as good for landscapes. Usually any cloud movement is not significant enough from shot to shot if you are bracketing to really be a problem. Heavily moving tree leaves and branches aside, bracketing and then blending a grad in post works very well. I've been doing that pretty much since I've been shooting digital some 10 years ago, works great :) You can do other stuff to, like putting more (or less) contrast in the sky, or in the ground with a gradient, tinting the sky with a gradient (if that's your thing), and lots of other stuff. Maybe that's not enjoyable to some photographers, but to others it may be just fine. :)

 

 

Some digital cameras have more highlight range in their RAW files, and often a 2nd bracket exposure isn't needed to bring down the exposure by 1 or even 2 stops with a grad. Just bring down the exposure with a gradient, or process it a 2nd time darker and blend with a gradient. Unfortunately the M9 doesn't have much highlight data in the RAW file at all, so bracketing is usually required if you have sky/clouds that are blowing out. and you want to bring down by more than 1/2 a stop or so.

 

 

With some photographs, I've done more extensive masking of different exposures (where nothing moved or changed accept for the camera exposure time), shooting directly into a back-lit sunset with no fill flash. Here's an example of that, gives the car a very studio-lit look, bright almost white reflections of the over-exposed sky, but a well exposed background and surrounding area. Takes a bit of time to get it perfect if you are cranking on the image hard, but this one holds up to a 3' print.

 

http://404photography.net/color/41.jpg

 

 

 

I'm not quite sure what you are talking about with "reflection in the leaves", are you referring to a polarizing filter? If you are, there's not much that can really done digitally to really match what a polarizer does.

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These blinded comparisons are interesting, as I am not sure that one can make major differences unless looking closely at the pixel level. Both cameras did a fine job. I dont think that one is markedly better than the other, but this is an opinion, and others may disagree.

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I was wanting to get a little more in camera correct. I don't believe the bracketing takes the reflections off the leaves, etc. I may be wrong, and please correct me if I am.

 

No a bracketed sequence will not take reflections off leaves, and neither would a graduated filter, which if you forgot was what you were asking about:rolleyes:

 

Steve

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No a bracketed sequence will not take reflections off leaves, and neither would a graduated filter, which if you forgot was what you were asking about:rolleyes:

 

Steve

 

I asked about polarizing filters first then mentioned the difficulty with grads as there was no holder for these lenses. So I don't understand your comments other than trying some one-upsmanship. ;)

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