Lessons of the Monochrom

[andy.we]

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Hi Jaap,

I hope you will post some nice pictures. Shurely there will be a lot of lessons, the digital B/W- Fotografy will teach us. Perhaps you remember, the experiences of Pete Myers with Kodak 760M. He wrote: "I found it to work wonderfully with the DCS 760m and I finally found myself “dialed in” with the camera as a system after six months of setup." Link: Kodak 760m Review .

 

Iam interessted to see how long people will need to get familiar with this very special camera and wether the result will be indeed different and be worth all the money and work.

 

Greetins from Germany

[Guest malland]

...The Monochrom raw image, developed with RPP/Lightness/L* rather than with a preset curve, is like the Retro-Tonal/Rodinal combination; It's all there, but edge, punch and interesting gradations need to be brought out in post-production.

 

Presets will do the job for you up to a point - my favorites are A25 in RPP and BW-look-2 in Lightroom - but they definitely need extra tweaking in the mid-tones, for which the PS/clarity slider (a colour slider?) and the Efex/mid-tone structure slider, seem effective. Do sliders add an extra layer of interpolation? RPP/Local-Contrast seems to do it right in the development process with no overhead...

downstairs, although I'm a great fan of RPP and think it provides much better resolution for color DNG files, I haven't been using it for developing M-Monochrom files. Andrey Tverdokhleb, the developer of RPP wrote in May that, "Since there is no interpolation I wouldn't expect any difference in resolution in this case, unless LR does something with noise filtering and antialiasing. With tone corrections RPP should be able to pull better details out of shadows. I don't have enough samples yet to be really conclusive."

 

I haven't seen better details from the shadows with RPP compared to LR4, but I haven't looked very hard. So, the conclusion I've come to is that it's better to use LR4 for M-Monichrom files, since RPP is largely limited to developing and one would have to continue in LR4 or another photo editing program — and, in LR4, I like a lot how the Black slider works in connection with lifting Shadows and Whites, as described by Marc (fotografz) in the two links I provided in post #8 above.

 

—Mitch/Paris

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[colint544]

I'm new to the forum (well, I registered a long time ago, but have only just begun posting), so I should say 'hello'.

 

The lesson (so far) I'm learning from the Monochrom is to use the histogram at all times. Images can look severely underexposed on the camera monitor, yet still be fine to work on in post. I'm loving the freedom of being able to forget about colour, and concentrate on shape and form.

 

What I'm also learning is that the files seem to have less contrast than the ones I used to get from my M9-P, especially once they had been converted on Silver Efex Pro. This seems to give the MM files much more leeway in what you might want to wring from them. The tones seem more subtle, yet have an almost medium format sort of muscularity to them.

 

For the time being, I'm not even using Silver Efex Pro - just a warming-over in Photoshop. I attach a photograph I took at the weekend in Manchester, UK, using the MM. I really haven't done much to this file at all.

 

Best regards,

 

Colin

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[snooper]

Yesterday in Paris was very sunny with a very thin and high layer of clouds. A very complex light with large amplitude giving up to 6 f stops amplitude between high and low lights.

I find the result (out of LR4 with just a bit of contrast touch) is more than acceptable.

The shot is not interesting except the possible contiguous high and low lights....

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[philipus]

Colin, Snooper, brilliant images. Very nice indeed.

 

It seems to me - though I may be entirely wrong - that in addition to giving very clean images OOC, the MM also gives images with lowish contrast even with modern lenses.

 

Someone mentioned TMax above - what I mean is that if uses the characteristics of that film and of Tri-X as comparison, the MM's images OOC contrast-wise are closer to TMax than Tri-X. Is that right?

 

Philip

[snooper]

I am no expert but it seems to me that I got my M4-P back with a Plus-X loaded inside that would allow 5000 ASA.

We had much harsher contrasts with the TMax, not mentioning the Tri-X. (I used HP4 at that time).

Attached : ISO 500 Summicron 50mm and its 100% crop in the lowest light.

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[colint544]

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Philipus,

 

Thank you. I think that one of the interesting things about the MM is that the files take on a slightly more 'filmic' look, the more you push the ISO. Digital noise is rendered in a more pleasing manner than it might have been in the past.

 

Ultimately, I suppose, digital files just have a different rendering to film negs, and always will do. I loved the look of Tri-X, and I suspect it could be a long time, if ever, before that can be exactly replicated.

 

I do like the look of the MM files though. It's possible now to take photographs, using fast shutter speeds, in light levels where you really wouldn't have managed in pre-digital days.

 

This shot was on the Monochrom, and the ISO was 2500.

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[dwbell]

Philipus,

 

Thank you. I think that one of the interesting things about the MM is that the files take on a slightly more 'filmic' look, the more you push the ISO. Digital noise is rendered in a more pleasing manner than it might have been in the past.

 

Ultimately, I suppose, digital files just have a different rendering to film negs, and always will do. I loved the look of Tri-X, and I suspect it could be a long time, if ever, before that can be exactly replicated.

 

I do like the look of the MM files though. It's possible now to take photographs, using fast shutter speeds, in light levels where you really wouldn't have managed in pre-digital days.

 

This shot was on the Monochrom, and the ISO was 2500.

 

Lovely shot!

 

I'm loathed to be that pixel peeping guy, and to revisit this topic but is that block of flats exhibiting a light halo?

[brill64]

Just to clarify: this is NOT meant as a combative thread. The intention is to discover the ins and outs of this rather special camera. Please get into film vs digital, interpretation of esthetics and other controversial topics elsewhere. Such posts will be deleted or moved.

 

..but i am truly interested in the mm but not currently in the enviable position to buy or even procure one at this time, however i do wish to carry some of your thoughts across to working with my mp with tri-x, which sees more action lately. I therefore think it is relevant and wish to continue taking part in on or following your discussions in this thread. it should not be allowed to become exclusive in this respect so please do not delete posts as long as they are not blatantly antagonistic or derogatory.

[brill64]

what is the thin, uniform light halo (mentioned above) evident around the building shot profiles where they meet the skyline..? has the cs clarity/effex structure slider been pushed up too far or is it something to do with the conversion to low-res for display here..? it looks as if it needs some readjustment, no..?

Edited September 24, 2012 by brill64

[colint544]

I can see the light halo effect you mention. It's probably largely down to my clumsy Photoshopping on that particular image.

[jbl]

Another interesting aspect: the strong impact the Clarity slider has in CS6.

 

That makes sense. It always helped me with scans from negatives, especially with low acutance developers. Seemed less necessary with Rodinal.

 

-jbl

[jbl]

Great shots everyone. Can't wait to get one of these.

 

-jbl

[brianv]

Perhaps you remember, the experiences of Pete Myers with Kodak 760M. He wrote: "I found it to work wonderfully with the DCS 760m and I finally found myself “dialed in” with the camera as a system after six months of setup." Link: Kodak 760m Review .

 

 

 

Off-topic, but a follow-up to the DCS-760 post.

 

The model number of the M Monochrom is "10760". The engineers at Kodak, now Truesense, had wanted to do a Monochrome Digital Leica for a long time.

 

Is the "10760" a namesake, or coincidence? The model number of the M8 is 10701 (black) and 10702 (chrome). The black M9 is 10704. The anthracite M-E is 10759.