How's the photo quality at ISO 1600 for Leica Digilux3/Panasonic L1?

[edtpm]

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Hello,

I am considering to get a DSLR for myself beside D-Lux 3. Can anyone advise the photo quality of Leica D3/Panasonic L1 at ISO 1600? Thanks.

 

Best Regards,

[simon_als]

I would say it's unacceptable for me at ISO1600. I usually shot at ISO100 or 200 and seldom use ISO400 even in low light condition.

[Riley]

while i imagine you are looking for 'real world' examples

perhaps this diagram is of some use in comparison with others

this is to my mind, a most thorough review of L1

 

Panasonic Lumix DMC-L1 full review Cameralabs noise results

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[Hans Roggen]

Don't use anything over 200 iso. You'll find you'll hardly ever feel the need to go much higher because of the image stabilizer. I had the Panaleica LX1 which had way too much noise from iso 200 and up and now i have its successor, the Leica D-lux 3, which has a much too aggressive noise reduction from iso 200 and up. Much detail is lost.

 

But both are great camera's if you know how to use them. Samples: http://www.leica-camera-user.com/architecture/15343-new-york-blues.html

 

Good luck

 

Hans

 

Edit: Oops, it's still early for me...totally read your post wrong. Apart from that, i find the names rather confusing.

Well, anyway, just ignore my post.

[dugby]

I've started to play more with higher ISO's on my D3/L1

 

The ISO 800 and 1600 for B&W looks like good old Ilford Tri-X ASA-400 that we used to push to 800 and 1600 when we were kids in high school.They're very acceptable for B&W.

Just,... dare I say, grainier......

 

As for colour, ....it depends just how big you want to print these. For domestic use, the 6x4 and 5x7 look quite acceptable....I can't comment on anything bigger ....yet

[dist]

Here's a real life shot taken at 1600, f=50mm. I had to crop the image (vertically) so it would fit imageshack's size requirements but it's otherwise unadulterated.

Acceptable? Personally I'd say yes but beauty is in the eye of the beholder...

Cheers,

- Dieter

[joern]

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Dieter,

 

Not bad. I like it.

[John Maio]

The DigiLux-3 isn't up to the Canon 5D (nothing else is either), in terms of low available light performance, but its quite acceptable unless you are going for really large prints.

 

The "don't use it over ISO 200" admonition is, in my experience, simply not justifiable. It does quite well at ISO 400 and, depending on whether you expose to the right, ISO 800. As someone else pointed out, the excellent lens stabilization system, especially in Mode 2, allow lower ISO settings to be used hand-held.

 

This example, taken in the BW mode was hand held at ISO 800, F/11, 1/40:

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[bohtho]

That´s so strange. I am awaiting my Digilux 3 soon so I´m reading all possible reviews and experiences before it arrives, and there are so vastly different verdicts when it comes to noise. For example just read Photography Monthly which had the Panasonic L1 on test and they said, quote: "At ISO 100 noise is more apparent than I would have expected and it got worse from there. Personally, I wouldn´t drop below ISO 200 for critical use unless I really had to, while the mottling effect by the time you get to ISO 1600 is dreadful. Lovers of pointillistic effect will like it."

 

While cameralabs compared noise at all ISO levels to Sony A100 and Canon 400d and it came out well (Nikon d80 rules at higher ISO of course).

 

Why is this ? Is the Leica´s tweaking of the Venus engine and what else so much better than Panasonic´s ? Or is it just that some reviewers have not used the settings and options on the camera to get the best of the camera ?

[Riley]

speaking from a purely Olympus point of view

essentially the guts of the camera are just that

it should be good for iso800

at iso1600 noise is somewhat annoying

 

however it can be a bit hit and miss

but i see stuff that suggests iso1600 is on occasion somehow better

I dont know if you have a login at steves forum

but theres an individual there that does pretty well at this

more disturbingly, he doesnt always use NR software !

 

check this link out and see what you think

 

http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/view_topic.php?id=116916&forum_id=36

 

its enlightening

thats stuff about iso200 is BS by the way

all reviews are equal, but some reviews are more equal than others

[dist]

Dieter,

 

Not bad. I like it.

 

Danke Jörn

Well this was one of those purely luck-of-the-draw situations. Zurich Opera House, world famous soprano Cecilia Bartoli (the vertically challenged one ) during the final applause. Of course, taking pictures is strictly forbidden, so it was hit and miss. No fiddling of any kind possible. Just today I got a 30x40 (12x16 inches approx.) print back in the mail and it looks quite good.

[terrycioni]

Greetings,

 

The Digilux 3 is very capable of 400 ISO and with Noise Ninja or similar software you can smooth 800 and 1600 ISO to the typical plastic digital look. Indeed I never take it off ISO 400. Is it the M8 at 320 not quite but then it cost a whole lot less.

 

Burnaby Heritage Christmas - a photoset on Flickr

 

Just a small point of clarification Kodak makes TRI-X not Ilford.....

 

Best To All. Terry.

[egibaud]

I have an FZ30 and had FZ20, FZ3, tried FZ7.

 

Great cameras as long as you stick to 100 ISO. L1 does not seem to much of an exception keep at 200 ISO maximum.

 

Buy a good tripod for low light pics and you will be very happy with your camera.

 

I am waiting for my M8 and I am positive I'll keep my FZ30 too, nothing can give you a 36-400mm at this quality for this price!!!

[bohtho]

There somebody goes again ! The "200 ISO maximum" statement. And you don´t have a digilux 3, not even a Leica yet ! (But then again, neither do I..) But it´s strange that some say one MUST have a good tripod in low light, while others say the OIS works very well on longer shutter speeds. And then some say pretty high ISOs are allright.

 

I know photo quality is highly subjective, but there seems to be some kind of unbacked "truth" on the internet that the L1/Digilux 3 suck at higher ISOs than 100. This while most owners of the camera are very pleased and post beautiful pictures at even higher ISOs.

 

To be fair, I could just be anxious about my soon arriving purchase, but I also think it´s the "strange", "unserious" look of the L1/Digilux 3 (compared to the standard DSLR look of Canon, Nikon, etc.) and the fact that people are "dissapointed" about it being a Leica made by Matshushita in Japan, that makes people look at it through a bad lens, so to speak

 

Of course it´s not a Nikon sensor in there (or an M8!), I knew that. And yes it has the flipping mirror of the Olympus mechanism with a darker viewfinder, but hey, it´s not a generic black slab of plastic with a rattling kit-lens and "10 MEGAPIXELS" written on the front like some other cameras either

 

 

PS! Nothing personal by the way, egibaud.

[audidudi]

... but I also think it´s the "strange", "unserious" look of the L1/Digilux 3 (compared to the standard DSLR look of Canon, Nikon, etc.) and the fact that people are "dissapointed" about it being a Leica made by Matshushita in Japan, that makes people look at it through a bad lens, so to speak

 

Hmm ... if anything, it's my opinion that "a Leica made by Matshushita in Japan" looks more like a serious camera than the latest generation CaNikOlympons.

 

Of course, as I pointed out in another thread recently, the last SLR I owned prior to buying my L1 in December was a Minolta XK so I'm hardly the one to ask about what constitutes a fashionable camera...

[dugby]

That´s so strange. I am awaiting my Digilux 3 soon so I´m reading all possible reviews and experiences before it arrives, and there are so vastly different verdicts when it comes to noise. For example just read Photography Monthly which had the Panasonic L1 on test and they said, quote: "At ISO 100 noise is more apparent than I would have expected and it got worse from there. Personally, I wouldn´t drop below ISO 200 for critical use unless I really had to, while the mottling effect by the time you get to ISO 1600 is dreadful. Lovers of pointillistic effect will like it."

 

While cameralabs compared noise at all ISO levels to Sony A100 and Canon 400d and it came out well (Nikon d80 rules at higher ISO of course).

 

Why is this ? Is the Leica´s tweaking of the Venus engine and what else so much better than Panasonic´s ? Or is it just that some reviewers have not used the settings and options on the camera to get the best of the camera ?

 

Don't Panic Thomas, the L1/D3 images are absolutely superb, even more so when printed.

 

Don't be mislead by the comments on the net, there has always been an anti-Leica sentiment in the world.

 

Anyone who takes hold of a L1/D3 and shoots any ISO 400 and above image, then presses the x16 magnification will say...see..... I can see noise.

 

Consider A6 paper size is postcard, A4 is your typical letter page, one would need to be print about 2 to 4x poster size to see this noise in print, and then you'd have to be looking at it from 30cm or 1 foot to see it.

 

Heck when we were students, we used to take ASA25 B&W Ilford and project the negatives onto a wall to do poster sized enlargements of crops from the negatives....there was heaps of noise.....well in those days we called it grain.

 

For the usual domestic and even professional use, the D3 / L1 images are superb. It was not that long ago, all a Professional could shoot with was a Canon/Nikon dSLR of 6MP with tiny sensor....and hey....was his images good...?.......by todays standard....no

 

So the next question is the D3 / L1 expensive for what it does ....? Can do the same for cheaper......? They are personal questions that no one here needs to justify. When my son first started to drive a car, he asked me why we have a Lexus, when a cheaper car would achieve the same transportation. Now after 2 years of driving a cheaper car, he said to me recently...... I now know why you drive the Lexus.

 

I'll be the 1st to tell you after 1 week of D3/L1 ownership, having come from a D2, I thought I'd made a big mistake buying the D3/L1..... the initial default camera settings IMHO are not good, and will immediately leave the 1st time user with sub-standard shots, below that which the D3 is capable of. And NONE of us judges...anything by 1st impressions......!!!! do we.....

 

Now 3 months and 20 GB later.....all I keep seeing is .....much much better images and shots over my D2.

 

About 4 months ago, a friend brought his Nikon D80 came along and did some portrait work with me whilest I used my D2. He looks at his printed shots next to those of my D2, and today he still agonises over why the D2 produces better colours. In isolation, the D80 is very sharp (better than the D2) and very good. But we place the prints side by side, everyone keeps choosing the D2 prints as the keepers.

 

The total package of the D2 prints are just superb. It's everything you see: colour, rendition, tone, life, glow and sharpness. The D3/L1 prints are similar for some shots, but overall better, because it's ability to capture images is broader across the photographers working spectrum.

 

All I can tell you is that you chose to be in the Leica realm...... when you use it correctly, you will have immense satisfaction that you chose well.

 

Don't get me wrong it can take equally poor photos just like any M8, it's just that no-one dare post those crap M8 shots on the forum.....

[John Maio]

<snip>

 

So the next question is the D3 / L1 expensive for what it does ....? Can do the same for cheaper......? They are personal questions that no one here needs to justify. When my son first started to drive a car, he asked me why we have a Lexus, when a cheaper car would achieve the same transportation. Now after 2 years of driving a cheaper car, he said to me recently...... I now know why you drive the Lexus.

<snip>

 

What's not mentioned very often is the quality of the Vario-Elmarit 28 - 100mm (equivalent) lens that comes on the DigiLux-3. Its a superb and very useful lens which Panasonic builds, but which meets Leica's design and production quality standards. I've read that if it were sold separately, that lens would be in the $1300 - $1400 range. A new 50mm (equivalent) f/1.4 prime should start shipping in April and I'm looking forward to it.

[audidudi]

I've read that if it were sold separately, that lens would be in the $1300 - $1400 range.

 

Actually, it's more like $1189.78, at least in Japan: eBay: Panasonic LEICA D VARIO ELMARIT 14-50mm F2.8-3.5 ASPH (item 150079471056 end time Mar-10-07 14:22:21 PST)

[bohtho]

Ok, about $2000 in Norway then....

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Hallo,

Look here: Interesting Leica gear

[Riley]

tis a pitty they are sold separately so rarely

plenty of Olympus users admire the lens

others want the body, already having lots of 4/3 glass