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some M8 thougts-limits and good things?


tom0511

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Ok,

last weekend we had a family meeting and half of the day I took photographs of the kids at various locations (at home, at the playground etc. etc.) Not the kind of " please sit here and smile"-images or "please stand there and wait a moment" but more the try to shoot the kids while they were playing and having fun.

 

1) focus moving kids:

 

I use the M8 , Tri-Elmar and 75lux. There was enough light so that I shot a lot at f5.6 and f8 because I knew kids were moving and it would be not easy to focus.

 

The results are somewhat disappointing. There are some really nice images but there are so many images which are just a little bit or some also clearly out of focus that I am not sure if a ramgefinder is the best tool for photographing people who do move a lot.

I am sure that usinf my Nikon with the 85/1.4 or with the 17-55/2.8 I might not have the 100% brilliance in shots, but I 1) could have used the lenses wide open and 2) would still have much more keepers regarding focus.

 

2) contrasty lenses:

It has been a sunny day with clear weather and I have to say looking at my images it was definatly a plus to use the Tri-Elmar instead of the higher contrast asph primes.

I m not sure yet how I like the transistion in the highlights. I am struggeling quit often with white reflections on skin.

 

3) flash sync

I used the sf24d to lighten up shaddows a little and have to say that I find 1/250 sync a BIG step forward for the M-line.

While I never have liked flash much it helped me for some images to reduce the harsh contrast betrween shaddows and sunny areas.

 

4) Tri-Elmar:

I do switch focal length more often now, even wehen shooting the same scene. This helps me a lot to explore the differences between 28,35,50 FOV on the M8.

While owning 28,35 and 50 primes I do use the Tri-Elmar a lot.

 

Regards, Tom

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Yes- kids and pets on a RF, a challenge. Long experience has taught me that pre-focus and release when in focus helps a lot. The fast response of a RF is very nice then.

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Moving back and forth with your subject instead of trying to focus all the time also helps a lot.

 

Hans

 

Agree: it's a GOLDEN ADVICE when using RF... with experience, you can learn and remember easily, for a given lens, the ratio between DOF you can count on and the "width" of the splitted image in the RF... Does someone remember that years and years ago, Leitz put in the RF of certain Ms (M2, M4, maybe M3 last ?) a sort of "DOF evaluator at two typical stops" ? I don't know when it disappeared (maybe with the RFs of M4-2 or M4-P), but, with its limits, was not a silly thing...

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thanks for the ideas.

In fact I tried to do prefocusing several times, here and then it works, with a good AF its a lot easier and while I love the M8 for many things I wonder if its the right tool for such tasks. Also I feel I had to avoid f1.4 and f.2.0 in order to get acceptable focus, but would have liked f1.4 for subject isolation.

Could have used f1.4 with my d2x or d200.

I am not bashing rangefinders (I love them) , I am just wondering where the limits are.

I can shoot my father at 75mmf1.4, and focus precisly on his eyes, and can shoot someone sitting at a table, but kids ....wooohooo.

I also have to admit I realized some were not sharp because of motion (my own motion ) blur

Regards, Tom

 

Some did turn out to be fine though:

original.jpg

 

original.jpg

 

original.jpg

 

the next one has some jaggies due to compression

original.jpg

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I do not think you have that many problems focussing, Tom, judging by your shots. Great! The things I like about rangefinders are twofold: One can see things coming in from outside the frame area, and the camera is more responsive; the slight hesitation caused by the AF causes me to miss the exact right moment from time to time.

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I did my second shoot of an indoor soccegame this past weekend.

 

The second shoot was occasioned by the first one, where I got almost nothing.

 

The problem the first time was that I shot from the end of the court, so that the players were always moving toward and away from me.

 

This past weekend, I shot from the side of the court, so that the players were (mostly) moving from left to right. I was able to maintain most pix in focus this way.

 

I also stayed away from the 75 'lux -- it's difficult to focus and works better on a monopod with some time to get the focus right. I used a 35 'lux asph and a 50 'lux asph, shooting at 1/250, also on a monopod.

 

I was shooting the M8, using version 1.091 (worked great), and using Edmund's Linear profile built for this version of the firmware. Great results!

 

You can see some here:

http://www.leica-camera-user.com/digital-forum/18119-pix-using-v-1-091-edmunds.html

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For fast moving subjects (kids, dogs, sports), or for long lenses, I just don't think a rangefinder is the right tool. I love my M8, but for certain things, its not the first choice. My view is the camera should make it easy to capture what you want not force you to adopt a different or complicated working style. As an example, there's just no way I would use the M8 for a trip to the zoo or an animal park or a fast moving sporting event. My 5D and reasonably long lenses is a better solution. Why try to hammer a nail with a screwdriver?

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Bill,

sorry, but I think a DSLR with good AF and a fast lens would work much better for sports.

Regards, Tom

 

Tom, I have a friend who shoots sports and depends upon the C---n and the autofocus lenses. There's no question that they make a difference -- for getting stuff in focus. So, those guys own both the full-size sensor and the sports photog markets.

 

What they don't do is produce the images that Leica lenses do.

 

On my second shoot, I got 90% of the pix in focus. Of those 90%, every single one shows the effect of having been made with Leica glass.

 

Now, if I were a sports photog, I'd be sitting in the white-lens crown at the corner of the court, too. But, since that's not my business, I am pleased to report -- and to mention in response to Tom's initial posting -- that this camera CAN do it.

 

Tom, on your second try, I'll bet you you'd get lots of in-focus shots.

 

I don't use slr's. I do mostly portraits and dance photog. For the dance photog, I can zone focus pretty successfully -- just like I did on Sunday.

 

Not so bad for a tool (M8) that wasn't intended to do autofocus and antijitter.

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Here's an example of what I mean.

 

I think this is 35mm 'lux asph, but might be 50 'lux asph. iso 640, 1/250, v.1.091, Edmund's Linear profile for v.1.091 (beta, or maybe better).

 

The M8 was prefocused on number 11 (happens to be my first cousin once removed) and these shots were individually (not using the continuous setting) shot in a row, during maybe 3 seconds.

 

There was some cropping, the original images all show the same aspect ratio.

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Hi Bill,

 

I don't think the pre-focusing technique is working - the first 2 shots are clearly not in focus. The third one, u managed to get some players in focus, but the ball is missing, which is a clear no-no in action sports photography :)

 

The rangefinder has its place, but fast moving sports and kids are, as the other posters say, a domain of AF SLRs....

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Hi Bill,

 

I don't think the pre-focusing technique is working - the first 2 shots are clearly not in focus. The third one, u managed to get some players in focus, but the ball is missing, which is a clear no-no in action sports photography :)

 

The rangefinder has its place, but fast moving sports and kids are, as the other posters say, a domain of AF SLRs....

 

It must have its place since they grow like fungus at the corner of every sports event.

 

Incidentally, in the last shot, the ball is just under the wrist of the player to the left. Yup, it's supposed to be there. But just look at the spectacular shape of my cousin. As a dance photographer, I was watching for the pose. Since I can't follow the ball yet, I'm going to have to consider giving up a career in sports photog.... :)

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I thnk I'd like it a little like this, to turn it into a dance shot.

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How did we do it before there was AF :eek::confused:

 

vlieg.jpg

Noflexar 400, M8, Visoflex:

 

For sure one can get precise focused sports images with manual focus cameras.

However the rate of in focus shots will be much higher with an AF camera as soon as things get moving.

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I don't know if it helps you, but after a sequence of shots, I return to infinity. Then I bring the subject into apparent focus quickly and as they move I leave the camera on "continuous" and shoot bursts as I move the focus in or out, depending on which way the subject is moving.

 

With kids & pets, nothing else seems to work for me.

 

As I've mentioned before, I started doing this for low-light wide open shots with the Noct, thereby bracketing my focus on stationary objects. Works great.

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I don't know if it helps you, but after a sequence of shots, I return to infinity. Then I bring the subject into apparent focus quickly and as they move I leave the camera on "continuous" and shoot bursts as I move the focus in or out, depending on which way the subject is moving.

 

With kids & pets, nothing else seems to work for me.

 

As I've mentioned before, I started doing this for low-light wide open shots with the Noct, thereby bracketing my focus on stationary objects. Works great.

 

This sounds like an interesting approach and I will check it out if it works for me.

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