jffielde Posted April 28, 2013 Author Share #141 Posted April 28, 2013 Advertisement (gone after registration) Since no one wants to deliver the ewe to me, I'm going to assume that they're going to tell me my camera is fine and the the banding is normal and within normal operating perameters. They are going to ask Germany and QA what they did and then report back t me by end of week. I'm getting sick over this, and I think leica is going to leave me with a defective camera. If they do, I'm going to go to war with them. I'm also offering my camera to any testers so they can evaluate the performance of my "normal" camera. I take leica at their word that my camera is representative. I have one who I believe will accept already. I think the staggering banding in the M240 may have tainted the QA people to find mine acceptable. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted April 28, 2013 Posted April 28, 2013 Hi jffielde, Take a look here Monochrom Banding Normal?. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
raumplan Posted April 28, 2013 Share #142 Posted April 28, 2013 In their last email to me I have a strong feeling that they aren't going to do anything...which I hope I am wrong Now i just refrain from using iso 320 when I know I need to capture critical moments within a matter of minutes. otherwise when I shoot at 320, I just wait for the buffer to clear. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wjkotze Posted April 28, 2013 Share #143 Posted April 28, 2013 Since no one wants to deliver the ewe to me, I'm going to assume that they're going to tell me my camera is fine and the the banding is normal and within normal operating perameters. They are going to ask Germany and QA what they did and then report back t me by end of week. I will appreciate if you could get as much technical information from them as possible. I have also gathered some additional data which might be useful . I have noticed that if you repeat the controlled testing with jpegs you get far fewer frames with banding and even those frames shows far less banding than normal. I initially thought that this was due to the jpeg processing engine but that is not the case. When you do the same testing using DNG+JPEG you find that the banding in the DNG and jpeg files are identical which eliminates the jpeg processing as a variable. I think the pattern that is starting to emerge is that we are sitting with a data throughput problem either in and out of the buffer or through the sd card interface. It might be a marginal situation which affects some cameras more than others. I have also noticed in the April edition of the LFI magazine that the underlying problem for the discreet mode issue is data throughput limitations so there might be a connection here. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jffielde Posted April 28, 2013 Author Share #144 Posted April 28, 2013 Will post everything I learn. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
xrogers Posted April 28, 2013 Share #145 Posted April 28, 2013 I was trying autoreview on my M9 recently (to do a quick check for blown highlights after taking a shot) and noted occasional regular banding in low exposure areas when boosted a crazy amount. Maybe this is relevant to you lucky MM owners, so FWIW... For my M9, shooting a burst of 5 continuous shots, Panasonic Gold 16Gb cards, with 1 second review, I got 4 banded shots. With autoreview off, I got 1 banded shot. I retried this several times with the same results. My older Sandisk Extreme 4Gb cards give 2-3 banded shots with or without review. I'm shooting normally now (not in artificial bursts) using my Panasonic cards with autoreview off, and have noted no banding issues. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
k-hawinkler Posted April 28, 2013 Share #146 Posted April 28, 2013 I was trying autoreview on my M9 recently (to do a quick check for blown highlights after taking a shot) and noted occasional regular banding in low exposure areas when boosted a crazy amount. Maybe this is relevant to you lucky MM owners, so FWIW... For my M9, shooting a burst of 5 continuous shots, Panasonic Gold 16Gb cards, with 1 second review, I got 4 banded shots. With autoreview off, I got 1 banded shot. I retried this several times with the same results. My older Sandisk Extreme 4Gb cards give 2-3 banded shots with or without review. I'm shooting normally now (not in artificial bursts) using my Panasonic cards with autoreview off, and have noted no banding issues. Which M9 Firmware version are you using? Thanks. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaapv Posted April 29, 2013 Share #147 Posted April 29, 2013 Advertisement (gone after registration) Autoreview? - hmmm- never use it and no banding problems... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
k-hawinkler Posted April 29, 2013 Share #148 Posted April 29, 2013 Autoreview? - hmmm- never use it and no banding problems... In my experience that is an important clue. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
xrogers Posted April 29, 2013 Share #149 Posted April 29, 2013 Which M9 Firmware version are you using?Thanks. 1.196. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wjkotze Posted April 29, 2013 Share #150 Posted April 29, 2013 I was trying autoreview on my M9 recently (to do a quick check for blown highlights after taking a shot) and noted occasional regular banding in low exposure areas when boosted a crazy amount. Maybe this is relevant to you lucky MM owners, so FWIW... For my M9, shooting a burst of 5 continuous shots, Panasonic Gold 16Gb cards, with 1 second review, I got 4 banded shots. With autoreview off, I got 1 banded shot. I retried this several times with the same results. My older Sandisk Extreme 4Gb cards give 2-3 banded shots with or without review. I'm shooting normally now (not in artificial bursts) using my Panasonic cards with autoreview off, and have noted no banding issues. I do not use autoreview on my MM. So all the banding results are without autoreview. It is however interesting to see that your M9 shows behavior that corresponds to some degree with what is reported in this thread on the MM. There are a number of similar M9 reports including a few in this thread. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest borge Posted April 29, 2013 Share #151 Posted April 29, 2013 Autoreview? - hmmm- never use it and no banding problems... Same here. Auto-review is always disabled and I have never had any banding problems with many different memory cards and batteries (including 3rd party batteries). Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jffielde Posted April 29, 2013 Author Share #152 Posted April 29, 2013 I have never used auto review and the banding is perfectly predictable, but thanks for the insight. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
charlesphoto99 Posted April 29, 2013 Share #153 Posted April 29, 2013 Always use auto review, never continuous mode, and Panasonic Gold 16gb cards and never any banding. M9 and MM. M9 fw is 1.162 though which might make a difference Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
k-hawinkler Posted April 29, 2013 Share #154 Posted April 29, 2013 Always use auto review, never continuous mode, and Panasonic Gold 16gb cards and never any banding. M9 and MM. M9 fw is 1.162 though which might make a difference FW 1.162 has most of the improvements but is still pretty fast, faster than later versions, especially if you shoot only DNG compressed. Panasonic Gold 16gb cards or something equivalent, that's what I use on my M9 to avoid problems. YMMV. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jffielde Posted May 4, 2013 Author Share #155 Posted May 4, 2013 Still no word from Leica despite promised to call me by end-of-week for two weeks now, which says alot. I'm done for. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wjkotze Posted May 4, 2013 Share #156 Posted May 4, 2013 Still no word from Leica despite promised to call me by end-of-week for two weeks now, which says alot. I'm done for. Have you actually received your camera back ? If yes, have they done anything to it ? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
k-hawinkler Posted May 4, 2013 Share #157 Posted May 4, 2013 Well, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jffielde Posted May 6, 2013 Author Share #158 Posted May 6, 2013 I have received the camera back, but I have been abroad and have no chance to test it out. However, I have talked to the Leica repair folks today, and they agreed that it was tested to death, but no solution was found. They said that the first revised firmware may address the issue, but until then, I should bracket my critical photos to ensure that I get an un-banded exposure out of one of them. I think they are distracted (as is this forum) by high-ISO banding, which they noted ad nauseum was unavoidable. They noted that a brightened photo at base-ISO can occasionally show banding in shadows (which is relevant to me). I did get the feeling that Leica USA wasn't going to let this be the end of the issue and found the response I was given (which they confirmed) unsatisfactory. Bizarrely, I now feel like Leica USA is going to make it right somehow (when we talk next week). Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
raumplan Posted May 9, 2013 Share #159 Posted May 9, 2013 I have received the camera back, but I have been abroad and have no chance to test it out. However, I have talked to the Leica repair folks today, and they agreed that it was tested to death, but no solution was found. They said that the first revised firmware may address the issue, but until then, I should bracket my critical photos to ensure that I get an un-banded exposure out of one of them. I think they are distracted (as is this forum) by high-ISO banding, which they noted ad nauseum was unavoidable. They noted that a brightened photo at base-ISO can occasionally show banding in shadows (which is relevant to me). I did get the feeling that Leica USA wasn't going to let this be the end of the issue and found the response I was given (which they confirmed) unsatisfactory. Bizarrely, I now feel like Leica USA is going to make it right somehow (when we talk next week). What a disappointing response from Leica! They either don't listen or simply don't care. The key to save critical shots is to either not use iso 320 or not shoot within the buffer. Bracketing the shots while the camera is writing ain't going to do much good. I have very specifically written to Leica Germany and I was told by their London rep that they have read this post but just cannot replicate and identify the problems. Some people here may respond that these problems only happen to a small amount of copies but clearly the same problem is consistent among those affected cameras. If Leica is not willing to admit the problem then how can the long overdue firmware address the problem? Perhaps there are just too many problems with the new M240 where they are now focusing on and the MM is just not on top of their priority list. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pieterpronk Posted May 9, 2013 Share #160 Posted May 9, 2013 Tested mine, and by using continuous mode and shooting a high contrast scene I managed to get banding that was visible when turned up exposure by more than 3 stops. To be honest, I never got any problems during my normal use shooting about 1500 pictures. So personally for me this is a non-issue, but I hope you guys get what you want/need from Leica. Seeing as it seems that this doesn't happen at 400 one would think this should be fixable if you find out why it doesnt happen at 400. To those people on the fence about the MM, I would suggest thinking about how you normally shoot (do you often shoot multiple exposures in quick succession), if the banding is serious to you (seems fixable in post). I guess one could use iso 400 when putting the camera in continuous. I wouldn't blink to buy this amazing camera again. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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