M Color

[wlaidlaw]

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My immediate impression is too yellow but I don't know what lighting was used.

 

Erl,

 

That was indoor but sunlit with SF58D flash infill on slow sync. Colour Temp 6300ºK. My grandson is quite tanned as he spends every minute he is allowed to outside (preferably sitting on a tractor), so only very slightly too yellow but definitely too much magenta.

 

Below is the same image but developed in Capture One with the sole alteration, correction of skin tones to deep rose. I think it is a little better than the LR5 image to my eyes, with slightly less magenta but maybe still a bit yellow.

 

Wilson

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[k-hawinkler]

Wilson,

 

Your assessment seems to be correct IMHO.

Thanks.

[01af]

I still think LR5 is too magenta.

Yes, it is. Really wonder why Leica Camera is asking for "samples with false skin rendition" ... can't they take a few snaps and see with their own eyes?

 

Still, I think my recipe is at least a slight improvement over the built-in profile in Lightroom/Camera Raw. However, your Capture One sample in post #581 looks much better still. Wow! Why can't Lightroom look like this?

 

Regarding the renditions being too yellow—dealing with white balance is not the profile's job. So adjust the Color Temperature slider until it looks good.

[wlaidlaw]

Yes, it is. Really wonder why Leica Camera is asking for "samples with false skin rendition" ... can't they take a few snaps and see with their own eyes?

 

Still, I think my recipe is at least a slight improvement over the built-in profile in Lightroom/Camera Raw. However, your Capture One sample in post #581 looks much better still. Wow! Why can't Lightroom look like this?

 

Regarding the renditions being too yellow—dealing with white balance is not the profile's job. So adjust the Color Temperature slider until it looks good.

 

Olaf,

 

I tried correcting the colour temperature on that image with the eye-dropper on the white surfaces on the high seat and by pulling the slider around. Not an improvement - it went from slightly too yellow to yellowish with a blue tint as well - really quite unpleasant. The skin tones tool did a much better job. If I had then gone into the colour wheel and tweaked it a bit more to reduce yellow saturation, it would be quite close I think but I was trying to show what a basic develop could do. We can all work away on each image until it is perfect but unless it is an image for an exhibition or one we are going to earn serious money on, life is too short to do this to each image.

 

I think the basic ICC profile needs improvement on C1. They need to purchase (if they don't already have it) X-Rite Profile Maker Platinum and then make a really accurate profile using the X-Rite Color Checker Digital SG 140 patch chart. Currently, if you have an image with a big block of orangey red, the standard profile is not good. This colour can almost become fluorescent.

 

Wilson

[leicashot]

I don't think there is any issue achieving accurate skin tones. The issue is with white balance out of camera

[jaapv]

I don't think there is any issue achieving accurate skin tones. The issue is with white balance out of camera

 

 

If that were the case it would be an inconvenience, not a problem.

[glenerrolrd]

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Erl,

 

That was indoor but sunlit with SF58D flash infill on slow sync. Colour Temp 6300ºK. My grandson is quite tanned as he spends every minute he is allowed to outside (preferably sitting on a tractor), so only very slightly too yellow but definitely too much magenta.

 

Below is the same image but developed in Capture One with the sole alteration, correction of skin tones to deep rose. I think it is a little better than the LR5 image to my eyes, with slightly less magenta but maybe still a bit yellow.

 

Wilson

 

I must really be missing something or my monitor needs a profile update . It looks to me like the issue is color saturation not WB . In the C1 rendering ..its moved the WB to a colder color temperature ..thats it . Look at the cup ..bluish white . Look at the whites of the eyes ..bluish . The tint has moved toward the greenish side ....look at the hair .

 

On the LR rendering you have over saturated magenta and yellow ..but the cup is white .

 

Maybe using a grey card ? Balance to a grey card and you will still see oversaturated yellow and magenta in the LR profile . The yellow comes out of the camera and the magenta is an over correction for the greenish bias .

 

Am I missing something ?

[wlaidlaw]

I must really be missing something or my monitor needs a profile update . It looks to me like the issue is color saturation not WB . In the C1 rendering ..its moved the WB to a colder color temperature ..thats it . Look at the cup ..bluish white . Look at the whites of the eyes ..bluish . The tint has moved toward the greenish side ....look at the hair .

 

On the LR rendering you have over saturated magenta and yellow ..but the cup is white .

 

Maybe using a grey card ? Balance to a grey card and you will still see oversaturated yellow and magenta in the LR profile . The yellow comes out of the camera and the magenta is an over correction for the greenish bias .

 

Am I missing something ?

 

Roger,

 

I think it may be your monitor. Mine were all calibrated earlier this week (I just took advantage of the DataColor introductory offer to upgrade from a Spyder 3 Express to a Spyder 4 Professional). On my monitors, the cup looks dead white on the Capture One image and fractionally pink on the LR one.

 

I took a WB reading from the white parts on the high chair for the LR image. In C1, you use the skin tones tool in place of WB - it is an either/or tool. If you use one then the other globally, you get weird results. You can use WB on a brush on the non-skin bits of the image and a skin tones brush on the skin parts. However as I explained earlier, I was trying to show what could be achieved with a few clicks rather than hours spent fiddling around with an image.

 

Wilson

[pop]

On my monitors, the cup looks dead white on the Capture One image

 

A digital analysis of the image shows that the mug is yellowish. It's dead white in the area facing the camera because colors are clipped in that area.

[jaapv]

But how can you know whether the cup matches the colour of the original cup or not, Philipp?

[pop]

I can not know the color of the cup itself. However, I can state that the jpeg image assigns it a yellowish color. Hence, when Wilson says it looks white we can see a discrepancy. The cup does look yellowish on my screen, though.

 

Thanks to this thread, I am starting to use my colorchecker passport. Any day now, real soon.

[jaapv]

True - in Wilson's perception or in the JPG though? Or maybe in using the word white loosely in describing the cup? As you can see I am a disbeliever in absolute color rendering, based on the way we see colours.

[pop]

I could have thought sooner of it: Here's the mug and a profile line showing the brightness of the three color channels along the black line drawn.

 

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[erl]

 

Thanks to this thread, I am starting to use my colorchecker passport. Any day now, real soon.

 

Pop, I am very interested to know how you go with that. I am undecided which path to proceed on. On the one hand I am seduced by the lure of 'accuracy' with colour, on the other hand I am with Jaap about how we really see or want to see it. I have always been of the the latter persuasion, but wonder if I get 'absolute correct' first, then throw in my personal bias later.

 

Looking at getting a color checker passport, but worry that it would be superfluous for my style.

[Steve Ash]

True - in Wilson's perception or in the JPG though? Or maybe in using the word white loosely in describing the cup? As you can see I am a disbeliever in absolute color rendering, based on the way we see colours.

 

Isn't the colour perception an individual matter aswell?

[Guest malland]

...I am undecided which path to proceed on. On the one hand I am seduced by the lure of 'accuracy' with colour, on the other hand I am with Jaap about how we really see or want to see it. I have always been of the the latter persuasion, but wonder if I get 'absolute correct' first, then throw in my personal bias later.

 

Looking at getting a color checker passport, but worry that it would be superfluous for my style.

Seems to me that it's got to look right to the photographer, no matter what the color checker says. Think of an indoor shot lit with tungsten and daylight coming in the window. Whether on film or digital, it's not the"correct" look look that matters — rather, it's the look that the photographer wants. Now, the trouble I have with most of the M240 pictures I've seen is that the colors show a yellow-green bias — and when the skin tones are corrected other colors look "off". That's not a problem I find with the M9, or to up the ante, with Kodochrome: I've just looked at some 200 photos by Alex Webb, and wouldn't want to try to get this type of color with the M240. On the other hand, Thorsten Overgaard writes, "It might be of interest to know that the Leica M9 and Leica M9-P, as well as the Kodak-Leica developed CCD-sensors for Leica M8 and Leica R9/DMR digital back, were developed with Kodachrome slide film as the ideal color look." That doesn't seem to be the case with the M240.

 

—Mitch/Paris

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Eggleston said that he was "at war with the obvious"...

[wlaidlaw]

Philipp,

 

I agree that there are some yellowish shadows inside the cup (I assume you are talking about the C1 image not the earlier LR one). However your clip on my screen, looks a fraction yellower to me than original image on the post above - go figure. The point which looks pretty white on my screen is half way between Mr. Happy and Mr. Angry (representative of the LUF membership).

 

In that I was not using WB on the C1 image but trying to get the skin tones looking natural, it would not be a total surprise, if that resulted in pure whites not being totally equal RGB numbers. In that the purpose of the image was to send something to his great aunt, which she could print, good face colours were the important thing, rather than the shade of the cup.

 

Wilson

[pop]

I certainly agree that you process this kind of images in order to please the beholder, and in that you succeeded nicely.

 

However, the whiteness of the cup is not a good measure for the color fidelity of your camera plus PP. The part between the two figures looks very white, indeed, but mostly because all three values are clipped. You are right, I used the C1 image.

 

I'd be willing to place a bet that my crop has exactly the same colors as the original. I do agree, however, that they do not look the same. I attribute this to the fact that color perception for any spot changes depending on the colors immediately surrounding it.

 

Make it a small bet, payable in person next time when you're in Basel.

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[mwilliamsphotography]

Yes, the cup is no measure of how to get "normal" skin tones.

 

An eye-dropper on the shadow portion of the cup that's not blown out shows a heavy bias to yellow. The skin tones also look to yellow. BTW, tanned caucasian skin is not "jaundice yellow".

 

A blue cast in children's eye whites, and subjects closest to the on-camera flash, is not unusual.

 

Generally, the variants of normal caucasian skin tone are either magenta skewed (pleasant pinkish) or have a touch less blue to produce a (pleasant peachy) complexion. We can adjust from the norm for personal reasons or for some creative impact ... but struggling to get a base skin tone on every image is not ideal or even near ideal.

 

This isn't a WB issue, it is a color balance/saturation issue. An eye dropper reading on average peachy skin tones reveals a near balance of mag and yellow ... on the last kid sample above, it shows a bias toward yellow by a good percentage. Doesn't matter what exposure area of the face, that yellow bias remains consistent.

 

When it infects the whole image this way it also muddies the other colors.

 

Here's a kid shot using flash. An eye dropper reading almost anywhere on the skin shows a near dead number match for magenta and yellow from the brighter areas to the deeper rosy cheeks ... with a slight yellow skew only towards the edge shadow areas.

 

However, even on my posted shot below, the shadow edges show a lower proportion of cyan relative to magenta/yellow than the shadow edge areas of the "kid and cup" shot.

 

Thus the concern that the M240 is yellow-green biased, and that it is due to a possible biased saturation issue right out of the camera ... and while monitors can differ, even calibrated ones, actual percentage read-outs can be helpful.

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[mwilliamsphotography]

Here's another example from the Leica S2 (proving they know what skin should look like IMO):

 

Eyedropper almost anywhere on the skin reveals a near match in percentage readouts for magenta and yellow regardless of exposure level.

 

BTW, this one was printed in an album along with 90 other people images and the skin tones looked consistently natural and ... human.

 

-Marc

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