M9 at the backstage of fashion week | Some post processing idea

[maxofrome]

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M9 back stage used.

 

What I understand in the few days I used the M9 for my reportage on the back stage of the Rome's fashion week, is that the Leica is a good camera with some pros and cons that I would like to share with you.

 

What I use: M9, 35mm summicron always at f/2 and ISO 500, no flash.

 

The aim of my works was to go behind the scene and shot model ,designers,and workers before they go on the catwalk to catch their emotion, fear and happiness. I have to admit that use a M9 is much comfortable than any DSLR, is less intrusive and allow me to be close to the subject without interfering too much with them.

 

The main issue was the low light, I had no flash and so I had to push the ISO to 500 (not so high indeed) and aperture to f/2, setting the speed at 1/125 to avoid too blurry image. The main concern on that is that at ISO 500 often the noise is too much and even in LR4 I cannot use properly many of them. Some can be used for the web but not to print. With a flash I can avoid such issue but I have no one.

 

In few case the color image can be used with few post processing as this one

But many image required some post processing I am not familiar with, as this example: export from the raw file, left the color version without noise correction, right side with noise reduced in LR4 nd converted in BW and the last image is exported for the web

 

Most I do is to reduce the black and the shadow before to use the noise reduction panel that is the last step. I many case it works properly and I have a good enough output for the web. What do you do to obtain better results?

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[01af]

What I use: M9, Summicron-M 35 mm always at f/2 and ISO 500, no flash.

[...]

The main issue was the low light, I had no flash and so I had to push the ISO to 500 (not so high indeed) and aperture to f/2, setting the speed at 1/125 to avoid too blurry image. The main concern on that is that at ISO 500 often the noise is too much and even in LR4 I cannot use properly many of them. Some can be used for the web but not to print.

[...]

What do you do to obtain better results?

M9 pictures taken at any ISO setting—up to and including ISO 2500/35°—will print perfectly nice in colour ... when exposed and processed properly.

 

Your mistake is to needlessly hazard underexposure only in order to stick with the ISO 500/28° setting—which is not a good idea. Crank the ISO setting up as required, then expose properly.

 

Nice pictures, by the way!

[maxofrome]

M9 pictures taken at any ISO setting—up to and including ISO 2500/35°—will print perfectly nice in colour ... when exposed and processed properly.

 

Your mistake is to needlessly hazard underexposure only in order to stick with the ISO 500/28° setting—which is not a good idea. Crank the ISO setting up as required, then expose properly.

 

Nice pictures, by the way!

 

I thank you for your tips! I really do not dare to go up to 500 ISO after having seen my first file being too afraid to cannot correct all the noise. I will try more next time

[wparsonsgisnet]

I regularly shoot dancer performance at up to 2500 (We have been told that this correlates to about 3200 on Canon and Nikon cameras) with pleasing results.

 

Typically, I run the image thru Neat Image noise reduction software.

 

I'll find an image and post it here.

[maxofrome]

I regularly shoot dancer performance at up to 2500 (We have been told that this correlates to about 3200 on Canon and Nikon cameras) with pleasing results.

 

Typically, I run the image thru Neat Image noise reduction software.

 

I'll find an image and post it here.

 

I thank you a lot for your answer

[tobey bilek]

Nik Define 2 is excellent at NR. You can brush it into required areas , say models skin, and avoid areas where detail may be lost.

 

see Nik site and watch tutorials on how to do it and also useU Point technology to select areas.

 

NR is done before any other manipulation to the image.

[tobey bilek]

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Define 2 on skin with U point. other areas untouched

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[jaapv]

I think I prefer the original grainy texture to the digital noise blots left over by Define.

As said elsewhere in this thread - get the ISO-phobia out of your mind, choose the value that will allow you to get a nice full exposure and it will be a whole lot better. Don't let specular highlights faze you and fool your metering - they are supposed to be blown out.

[Phil U]

I think I prefer the original grainy texture to the digital noise blots left over by Define.

 

+1

[jaapv]

From the M9 FAQ:

 

 

Note that we are on ACR 7.1, LR4 and Process 2012 now, which works the about same but has even better results.

 

 

 

Question:

I have heard conflicting stories on high-ISO performance of the M9. But I have seen beautiful results as well, even at ISO 2500. How do I get the best quality images at high-ISO?

 

Answer:

 

There is a vital difference between the M9 and all other high-end digital cameras. The M9 has virtually no in-camera noise reduction at high ISO, resulting in more detail, but also more visible noise. To avoid this noise, there are two steps to be taken, but first consider the type of photograph:

Low contrast diffuse light or high contrast with specular highlights.

The first trick is to gather as many photons on the sensor as possible to improve Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) without overexposing. That means: use the histogram. And go manual.

 

It is easiest with the flat image - just bunch the peak up to the right and flatten the lefthand side of the histogram.

 

The high contrast image will need clipping of the specular highlights. So move them off the righthand side of the histogram, and you will see the signal coming up on all other light levels. There is your optimum SNR which you must try to preserve whilst taking photographs by manually adjusting the exposure to the amount of real light, i.e. disregarding the bright spotlights that are trying to fool you into underexposing.

This presupposes that you are on manual and are spending some time “ shooting the histogram in” before starting to shoot in earnest.

 

Note that at ISOs below about 1250 you have enough SNR leeway to start trying to preserve highlights - a whole different game than avoiding noise!

 

Now we come to the second step: the capture sharpening and noise reduction in Adobe Camera raw 6 and Lightroom 3. I will describe the procedure for ACR 6.0, Lightroom users will be able to translate this easily, as it is basically the same.

 

First make sure the program is set to Process Version 2010. You will find the setting under the Camera Calibration menu.

 

If an exclamation mark appears on the lower righthand side of your preview it means you have an image that has been processed in Version 2003. Click the exclamation mark to reset the Process Version.

 

With the image open (make sure your output parameters are set to Profoto RGB and 16 bits!) adjust the color balance and exposure to taste, and switch to the detail panel and hit alt-option(command)-0 to go to 100% view.

 

We will use the sliders from top to bottom( more or less), bearing in mind that ACR is non-destructive and, with a subsequent adjustment made it is wise to got back to the previous steps for finetuning. It takes some experience to “ play” all settings to their optimum.

 

Sharpening slider.

Set for the optimum detail separation (normally between about 10 and 40), never mind that you seem to increase the noise, in conjunction with the next

 

Radius slider

Use the range of 0.5 to 1.5, never more. 0.5 is for high-frequency detail images like wooded landscapes, 1.5 for low-frequency detail images like glamour portraits.

Once set, bearing in mind that visible halos and artefacts introduced here will get you in trouble later, skip the next

 

Detail slider

for the time being.

And go to the

 

Masking Slider.

Then drag it with the alt key held down and you will see an edge mask being created on the fly. This will only be visible with the image at 100% or larger. It shows ( in white) what areas are being sharpened and (in black) which ones are being protected.

So drag it until only the edges you want sharpened are showing. Never mind the small detail. For that you have the

 

Detail slider.

Alt-drag that one until you have your fine detail back without enhancing too much noise.

 

Now go to the noise-reduction group.

 

First go to

 

Color.

Normally the default setting of 25 will be fine to suppress the color noise completely, but by all means play with the slider to find the optimum setting. If you get some color bleeding on color edges you can move the

 

Color Detail slider

from its default of 50, but be careful not to go too far left as it will make the image digitally smooth.

( the same for the Luminance Detail slider)

Normally you won’t be using those two.

 

The most important slider of the group is the

 

Luminance slider

Pull it right to see the noise disappear. When you are happy, go back to the sharpening group and tweak if needed, back to luminance, etc. (*)

 

And you are done, go back to the adjustments panel. Now if you have a mixed frequency image, you can correct by using the adjustment brush and tweak the sharpening, both to more sharp ( for instance the eyes in a portrait) or softer ( for instance the skin of somebody in a landscape) (**). Then go on and open the image.

 

Now this is a long instruction manual, but with a bit of practice it gets really quick and easy, and you can of course make a few presets for image types you commonly shoot.

 

 

(*)This is a most interesting slider. At a setting between 0 and 10 it will act as an extra sharpening slider for low-noise images, as it seems to add a bit of fine random structure, which enhances the impression of sharpness

 

(**) Of course, for the more Photoshop-minded the elegant way to do this is to optimize for one frequency, open as a Smart Object, copy and redo for the other frequency, create a layer mask in PS and paint in the effect, but on the whole I find that a bit of overkill for routine use.

[maxofrome]

I thanks for your tips. I am working carefully with it and I see improvements in my output.

[250swb]

I think the noise/grain in the skin tones is accentuated by the low key treatment, you are looking so hard for detail that the only thing that registers is noise. Here is a higher key image where the skin looks clearer despite the grain being the same. The posterised areas behind her head wouldn't occur when using a full size file.

 

Steve

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[jaapv]

And if you block up the shadows in the background a bit by moving up the blackpoint ( maybe masking the face) you will get rid of quite some noise there as well.

[01af]

The posterised areas behind her head wouldn't occur when using a full-size file.

Actually I'd be more concerned with the posterised areas in her face. Looks terrible! It's the digital equivalent of getting rid of a stain in your shirt by cutting it out ...

[jaapv]

Yes - but this one is on a web jpg. A full 16 bit file will give a completely different result.

[250swb]

Actually I'd be more concerned with the posterised areas in her face. Looks terrible! It's the digital equivalent of getting rid of a stain in your shirt by cutting it out ...

 

Pretend they are freckles.

 

As Jaap says, there is nothing much that can be done with a small file, only to get the general idea.

 

Steve

[01af]

Yes—but this one is on a web JPEG. A full 16-bit file will give a completely different result.

Yes, most likely it will. Still, my point is this: There is nothing wrong with a little noise. You may try to suppress it as much as possible if you don't like it—but don't get carried away in the process, or you'll end up with something that looks much worse than just a little noise.

[250swb]

Yes, most likely it will. Still, my point is this: There is nothing wrong with a little noise. You may try to suppress it as much as possible if you don't like it—but don't get carried away in the process, or you'll end up with something that looks much worse than just a little noise.

 

Good grief, if you are going to get dog-in-a-manger about it here is one without the freckles. Again, proviso's apply due to the small file.

 

Steve

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[01af]

... here is one without the freckles.

 

You don't understand a single word of what I'm saying, do you? You can stop posting processed-to-death copies of a picture of a beautiful lady. It's not even your picture in the first place.

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Hallo,

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[250swb]

 

You don't understand a single word of what I'm saying, do you? You can stop posting processed-to-death copies of a picture of a beautiful lady. It's not even your picture in the first place.

 

No, to be honest I don't understand. With a small file you can achieve one thing or another, but not both. You decided you didn't like the example I suggested for making the noise less obvious, which is what the OP was asking about, so I gave an alternative. They are only examples, not the finished item. But as yet again you have plenty to criticise and nothing to add nothing is new.

 

Steve