Leica M240 and lux 35/1.4 really outperformed by Sony RX1R?

[Guest malland]

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....Correcting colour cast in RAW developer is often too late...The difference of warming in camera and warming in RAW, for example is perceptible. Software colour is convenient, yes. Not always natural though.

Paul, apparently that is not true: Jim Kasson, who is very knowledgable on this writes, "The in-camera white balance settings simply change the metadata, not the rgb raw values. Setting color temp in post will yield the same results as setting the same temp in-camera if the raw processor uses rgb scaling for white balance...."

 

You can see his post here, and there is further information in his post #190, which follows the one I've linked.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

[Paul J]

Yes, but most of us are shooting RAW. Makes no difference in RAW. Correcting in camera makes no difference.

 

The artificial light source challenges of the M8 and M9 especially at higher ISO are known.

 

Paul, apparently that is not true: Jim Kasson, who is very knowledgable on this writes, "The in-camera white balance settings simply change the metadata, not the rgb raw values. Setting color temp in post will yield the same results as setting the same temp in-camera if the raw processor uses rgb scaling for white balance...."

 

You can see his post here, and there is further information in his post #190, which follows the one I've linked.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

 

Thanks. Though since I don't have the same issues I'll stick to my workflow. Those I have read about, they have been using AWB....Lets not forget that AWB is a mathematical algorithm and a RAW developer is also programmed mathematical algorithm and is also part eye, part hardware. Convenience does not mean best and certainly not most natural. Digital colour, outside of RAW, in photoshop is usually less natural as judicious adjustment is not a built in factor, it comes from the user.

 

As said, if colour is critical then I use my Minolta Color Meter IIIF. And filter it in camera.

 

Also and often, particularly with people, I see some issues of supposed "camera colour" simply as the colouring of the person. The ambient temperature and that which is on a monitor is usually different so it's quite easy for it to be overlooked. Skin and lip colour, in particular, in my experience, can change dramatically with environmental variables. Blood flushed lips from hot coffee in a coffee shop is one of them and will only be exacerbated with a camera's adjustment of artificial light. It's one of the reasons why makeup is adopted in professional applications so vehemently.

 

Lastly, artificial light and mixing different sources has ALWAYS been the bane of colour photographic process. It didn't magically disappear with the digital age. A new and convenient way to cope with it and mask it, yes, but not eliminate.

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[Guest malland]

...Lastly, artificial light and mixing different sources has ALWAYS been the bane of colour photographic process. It didn't magically disappear with the digital age. A new and convenient way to cope with it and mask it, yes, but not eliminate...

Absolutely. However, recently I've been doing some night street shooting in sometimes (wildly) mixed lighting, such as fluorescent, tungsten and colored LED lights coming form different directions. In such a situation — and I'm choosing an extreme example intentionally — it's often not desirable for aesthetic reason to try to neutralize the colors: they are so strong in such cases and correspond to what the eye sees. Maybe I'm stating the obvious.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

[Ozkar]

Thanks. Though since I don't have the same issues I'll stick to my workflow. Those I have read about, they have been using AWB....Lets not forget that AWB is a mathematical algorithm and a RAW developer is also programmed mathematical algorithm and is also part eye, part hardware. Convenience does not mean best and certainly not most natural. Digital colour, outside of RAW, in photoshop is usually less natural as judicious adjustment is not a built in factor, it comes from the user.

 

As said, if colour is critical then I use my Minolta Color Meter IIIF. And filter it in camera.

 

Also and often, particularly with people, I see some issues of supposed "camera colour" simply as the colouring of the person. The ambient temperature and that which is on a monitor is usually different so it's quite easy for it to be overlooked. Skin and lip colour, in particular, in my experience, can change dramatically with environmental variables. Blood flushed lips from hot coffee in a coffee shop is one of them and will only be exacerbated with a camera's adjustment of artificial light. It's one of the reasons why makeup is adopted in professional applications so vehemently.

 

Lastly, artificial light and mixing different sources has ALWAYS been the bane of colour photographic process. It didn't magically disappear with the digital age. A new and convenient way to cope with it and mask it, yes, but not eliminate.

 

 

The M9 skin tone issue, in my case, was not limited to just artificial light. It was also a problem outdoors. I set WB manually but it made little to no difference. It is related to the IR sensitivity of the Kodak sensor in the M8 and M9 and the magenta lips issue is not consistent with every subject. It affects people in varying degrees and sometimes is not an issue at all, as is the case with your subjects. In thread that I linked, it was suggested that an IR filter is the best solution. However, I've been there/done that with the M8 and I have no intention on stocking up on IR filters for my various lenses.

 

Anyway, the M9P is now sold. Once some of the early teething issues with the new M have been resolved, I will probably buy one (all this talk of a sexy new FF NEX is very distracting). In the meantime, I'm thoroughly enjoying my M6 which, along with the 50 LUX ASPH and Fuji Provia, are a match made in heaven.

[John Ricard]

Lucky you, Paul. This Paul, on the other hand, is facing the same problem as me:

 

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/leica-m9-forum/283325-leica-m9-magenta-colour.html#post2393867

 

Same problem I have with the M9.

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/digital-post-processing-forum/297448-how-would-you-eliminate-redness-here.html

[pgk]

"The in-camera white balance settings simply change the metadata, not the rgb raw values. Setting color temp in post will yield the same results as setting the same temp in-camera if the raw processor uses rgb scaling for white balance...."

Try changing the in camera white balance and watch the histogram - it will shift, as will your exposure, depending on the colour temperature set - so whilst true there are 'real world' issues to deal with as a result of white balance shifts. In my experience these are usually fairly minimal though.

As said, if colour is critical then I use my Minolta Color Meter IIIF. And filter it in camera.

This assumes that the colour meter and camera are matched in how they 'measure' colour temperature - my Canons and Leicas substantially disagree about their readouts of colour temperatures and I'd be surprised if the colour meter agrees with either.

 

Also there appears to be the assumption that light balance actually constitutes a colour temperature, often it does not and requires further adjustment even if not of mixed source/influenced by reflections.

 

IMHO colour is a compromise somewhere and whilst it can be adjusted technically to some degree, it will always need some fine tuning - if that is, it is genuinely critical which in many instances it is not.

[Paul J]

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Try changing the in camera white balance and watch the histogram - it will shift, as will your exposure, depending on the colour temperature set - so whilst true there are 'real world' issues to deal with as a result of white balance shifts. In my experience these are usually fairly minimal though.

 

This assumes that the colour meter and camera are matched in how they 'measure' colour temperature - my Canons and Leicas substantially disagree about their readouts of colour temperatures and I'd be surprised if the colour meter agrees with either.

 

Also there appears to be the assumption that light balance actually constitutes a colour temperature, often it does not and requires further adjustment even if not of mixed source/influenced by reflections.

 

IMHO colour is a compromise somewhere and whilst it can be adjusted technically to some degree, it will always need some fine tuning - if that is, it is genuinely critical which in many instances it is not.

 

You are right in that different cameras have different bias to colour, that is the nature of digital and computer programming, but light and colour temperature is a standardised and quantifiable medium to work with. If you can control it and bring it back to a standard, albiet at times a compromised standard, you have far less problems with colour accuracy and far less issues further down the chain.

 

The problem with digital I have experienced, is the moment you touch it, you are changing the pixel values and compromising their integrity. You can mask it in other ways but the less you do it in computer (wether that's in camera or RAW developer) the better off you are. You are leaving the changes which occur on a vast scale, at pixel level, up to a computer and it doesn't create organic and natural colour by nature.

 

I fully agree that colour is a compromise. Even with the colour meter (it's very accurate and I have it calibrated every year) and Wratten2 filters there are different fluctuations between individual sources which can be slightly out. But it is the best method I know when colour is absolutely critical. This is not something I do even just with the the Leica either.

 

I'm not saying the M9 is free of quirks but I have enough faith in my M9 to use it on a project which has a £50K budget with highly demanding and savvy clients. I'm not sure what more kind of personal commendation I can give than that. It works and it works well. The only thing I need to be aware of with the M9 is the moire and the way it handles highlights. There is one thing for sure though, it rewards careful exposure with fabulous quality images.

[Paul J]

Absolutely. However, recently I've been doing some night street shooting in sometimes (wildly) mixed lighting, such as fluorescent, tungsten and colored LED lights coming form different directions. In such a situation — and I'm choosing an extreme example intentionally — it's often not desirable for aesthetic reason to try to neutralize the colors: they are so strong in such cases and correspond to what the eye sees. Maybe I'm stating the obvious.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

 

Hi Mitch,

 

I'm not speaking of intentional "misuse" of colour, which I use a lot in my own work. Non-local colour included. I'm talking about local colour and it's accuracy when it's required.

[MirekE]

Try changing the in camera white balance and watch the histogram - it will shift, as will your exposure, depending on the colour temperature set - so whilst true there are 'real world' issues to deal with as a result of white balance shifts. In my experience these are usually fairly minimal though.

 

 

Let me suggest another comparison.

 

Take the same shot with daylight and tungsten WB. In this case a white wall. This is handheld, so there might be a tiny difference in framing.

 

This is how it looks like in LR without further corrections:

http://elsners.org/misc/wbs.png

 

Since the in camera histogram is apparently a jpeg histogram, let's take a look at the raw histograms instead. Open them in new tabs and flip between them:

 

http://elsners.org/misc/tungsten-hist.png

http://elsners.org/misc/daylight-hist.png

 

Considering that the wall shot was handheld, they look identical to me. It seems that setting different WB in camera does not have any impact on the actual raw data.

Edited September 19, 2013 by MirekE

[pgk]

It seems that setting different WB in camera does not have any impact on the actual raw data.

I did say were fairly minimal! It all depends on just how critical you are going to be. In the vast majority of images the differences will be insignificant (ie not visible).

[Paul J]

Try the same thing with different light sources though. Flouro, Tungsten. HMI. Shoot them at different WB and then lets have the same conversation. Shoot them together with AWB and then do the same.

 

Software is also programmed to a mean standard. Shoot tungsten, over expose it with the wrong white balance and then try and correct the highlights, try balance it with the rest. Fudgable, but it looks terrible.

[MirekE]

Try the same thing with different light sources though. Flouro, Tungsten. HMI. Shoot them at different WB and then lets have the same conversation. Shoot them together with AWB and then do the same.

 

Software is also programmed to a mean standard. Shoot tungsten, over expose it with the wrong white balance and then try and correct the highlights, try balance it with the rest. Fudgable, but it looks terrible.

 

This particular test was done on M240, different cameras may have different behavior. The point is that WB settings do not have any effect on exposure or image data. So you can't make it better or worse by setting the WB differently. I could do the test with different types of light, but I think it is conclusive enough.

 

I agree that if you burn the highlights in one of the channels, the image will look bad, but apparently changing WB in camera is not going to change that. You would have to use good old color temperature conversion filters to force the data in the histogram to record more evenly between channels.

[Ken Thomson]

You may be right, but in context with other articles on his subscription site, I understand his thoughts about RF more in these lines:

 

- RF can be off and with M9, which does not show good 100% preview on the LCD, you don't know until you load your images into LR

- RF can't handle focus shift

- RF can't handle field curvature

- RF will cause focus & recompose error

 

Also, rather than "unable to focus a rangefinder properly" I understood his statements more like "unable to consistently gain the full potential of Leica lenses and AA-less sensor".

 

So I guess no moving, arresting or simply interesting photos have ever been taken with a rangefinder camera due to the crippling deficiencies of it's design.

 

I subscribed to the Leica portion of the site for a year but came to the conclusion he's more interested in engineering issues than photographic concerns, and that nothing is or ever will be really good enough. I come across enough negativity in my everyday life without paying for more

[jaapv]

It doesn't matter. the keyword is unable.

[pgk]

The point is that WB settings do not have any effect on exposure or image data.

Differing light sources WILL affect the exposure - though I accept that the camera meter won't illustrate this - you have to use the histogram to assess exposure, and, since this is based on a jpeg, some experience to appreciate that biasing the image with a different colour light source may require an adjustment in the capture setting for an 'optimal' exposure. But in all honesty, you do have to be hyper critical........

[algrove]

Disagree

The only advantage for me is the quiet shutter.

I much prefer holding to my eye although at some times it's more challenging

I imagine the M with LV mostly solves that issue.

 

And the RX-1 with LV mostly solves that issue too

[algrove]

Preferably I use magnification and have the camera on a tripod. But, for me one of the nails in the coffin for my purchasing the M240 was the lack of scrolling in the EVF; I use this feature heavily when tripod mounting a camera particularly for macro, zooms, and long lenses.

 

Rich

 

Agree that is still a missing item on the M. Although I am going to keeping mine.

[KenFaulkner]

I use both and I think this is a load of rubbish

 

The RX1 is good but so is the Leica if used properly and I can focus the Leica just as quick and it is just as sharp

 

Regards

Ken

[Brett Cambern]

When the RX series is introduced with interchangeable lenses I will sell all my Leica gear. The electronics are far far superior and the image quality of the 35 mm lens is better. Leica is struggling with a faulty/buggy EVF and firmware. Sure the Leica lenses are pure bliss, but it won't be long before Zeiss and Sony close the door on compact FF cameras. Not to mention, the Sony focuses faster by far. Even battery life is better in the Sony. It is only a mater of time...

 

Rick, it looks like you wish has been granted with the A7/A7r.

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[dwbell]

Certainly not a member of the flat earth society, that Rick chap.

 

I believe he's preordered, as have I.