What I miss from M9 in my M10

[jaapv]

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Actually I process for prints. And I use PS CC.

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[pgk]

Here is a question for everyone to ponder: does anyone think that it is possible to obtain as good a final image SOOC of a copied painting or is it essential to shoot in raw and adjust later? Having copied many paintings I am absolutely in the latter camp but has anyone achieved as precise a reproduction SOOC?

[adan]

In the olden days, I used slide film* for copying artworks, so it mostly had to be SOOC - correct film for white balance; bi-directional lighting to avoid shadows and reflections; color checker or Kodak color control strip, and gray card, included in the frame margin; levels for squaring up the camera to painting and prints. And bracketing exposures to be certain one was perfect for holding light and dark paint texture.

 

https://cms-assets.tutsplus.com/uploads/users/573/posts/22925/image/photograph-prints-paintings-lighting-position.JPG

 

http://kaplanpicturemaker.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/gray_card__color_control_patches__gray_scale.30483542_std.jpg

 

Of course, even so, someone (generally in the printing industry) had to use those color references to make the color separation and printing plates correctly. And someone else had to pull proofs, and even stand alongside the press, checking samples from the actual print run to watch for inconsistencies.

 

https://99designs-blog.imgix.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/05-print-proofs.jpg?auto=format&q=60&fit=max&w=930

 

https://i1.wp.com/careyweb.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/soft-proofing-2.jpg?resize=565%2C399

 

http://www.hungrydogprinting.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Quality-Printing-checking-color-bar.jpg

__________

 

*For fine grain - No artist likes a photographer to "improve on" their brushstrokes and other textures with grain.

Edited October 1, 2017 by adan

[pgk]

Hi Andy

 

Yes, I used to copy artwork with Kodak Colour Separation Guides included (I have some on display in my 'Kodak' Curiosities cabinet) and I once even had the delight of making separations (once was more than enough). Back then the transparencies produced good enough reproductions. Today, working with RAW files, shooting sections, making an overall 'bulk adjustment' to all these in the raw conversion, stitching and adjusting the final files before outputting in 8-bit enables far better reproduction to be made. I copied a painting not long ago and the final print is marginally different in contrast only - colours are extraordinarily accurate. But to reproduce an artwork or painting and expect a SOOC to be as good is simply being exceptionally optimistic in my opinion.

[Dan Bachmann]

I do miss one thing from the M9, that will likely never appear in any digital Leica ever again - permanently-visible naturally-illuminated framelines and the signature third serrated window on the front of every Leica from the M2 on (M3 windows were not serrated).

 

It is just - de trop - to have to turn on a Leica M to see the framelines. It was on the top of my "hate list" for the M240.

 

But ultimately, the other practical improvements of the M10 (speed, ISO, color, viewfinder otherwise) overcame that pet peeve.

Thank you for saying that. I thought I was the only one who thought that about frame lines too.

 

With the electric frame lines, it would be nice to have the option to show only one set matching the lens' focal length. There are a few little tweaks for M10.1.

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Jeff S]

 

With the electric frame lines, it would be nice to have the option to show only one set matching the lens' focal length. There are a few little tweaks for M10.1.

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

As often noted, the frame lines are still mechanically controlled; only the illumination is electronic.

 

Still much like this...

 

https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/66999-anatomy-of-the-leica-m8-framelines/

 

Jeff

[Ko.Fe.]

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Here is a question for everyone to ponder: does anyone think that it is possible to obtain as good a final image SOOC of a copied painting or is it essential to shoot in raw and adjust later? Having copied many paintings I am absolutely in the latter camp but has anyone achieved as precise a reproduction SOOC?

 

Even if you have camera with capable manual WB where are other factors affecting SOOC image. Camera saturation, contrast and color shifts, plus lens saturation, contrast and colors rendering. 

SOOC is totally different concept from it. It is then someone takes same painting picture with mobile and posted it on FB right away. Or someone deliberately selecting "strange" WB and use SOOC result because of this trick. Lomography started with Minotar-1 lens. This lens was rendering very different from Canonikon glass. And pure Lomography is SOOC. With same lens on digital Leica it is possible to obtain interesting SOOC results. 

[Jared]

Here is a question for everyone to ponder: does anyone think that it is possible to obtain as good a final image SOOC of a copied painting or is it essential to shoot in raw and adjust later? Having copied many paintings I am absolutely in the latter camp but has anyone achieved as precise a reproduction SOOC?

 

 

Honestly, to me the question is a little different.  

 

For situations like this, a better question to me is, "why would I WANT to create my final image SOOC?"  Why would I want to give up dynamic range by using an 8 bit format?  Why would I want to limit my ability to tweak white balance?  Why would I want to limit my ability to adjust contrast?  To apply the appropriate output sharpening?  

 

Is it possible to get a good final image SOOC of a copied printing?  Probably.  But I'm stuck with much more "kludgy" tools when the only things I can adjust are the camera settings.  There is a whole world of valuable edits that are available in post.

 

I think a lot of the attitude comes from days when making a "correction" in post was because of an "error" made at time of image capture.  "Don't worry, we'll fix it in post" was/is seen as the sign of a sloppy photographer.  That's simply not an accurate representation of what most of us are doing with our photographs these days, whether it's for display on a screen or for a fine art print.  Even if I do a perfect job at time of image capture--nail the exposure for the image I want to create, nail the focus, choose the correct depth of field for the image I want, get the white balance perfect, choose the appropriate contrast level for the JPG setting, hold the camera perfectly steady, choose the right moment for snapping the image (not relevant for photographing a painting, obviously), and whatever else you can think of that constitutes getting things "right", I still want the ability to choose my output sharpening, to choose the particular cropping I want for the aspect ratio of the print, to selectively apply my noise reduction based on the information that's only available with a larger monitor, etc..  For me, getting things right at time of image capture is the starting point.  It means I have good data to work with.  

 

Most of my photography is actually astrophotography.  Specifically, deep sky photography.  I think that creates a slightly different perspective for the photographer.  It is literally not even remotely possible to generate the photographs I want of a distant galaxy with an SOOC result.  And I'm not talking subtleties here--it's not even close.  I mean the images SOOC often don't even show the galaxy at all until I work on it in post processing.  They are simply too faint.  What's that you say?  I could just expose longer and the details would start to show up?  Yes, they would, but I'd end up clipping the brighter stars, and sky glow would end up washing out the image and using up all of my dynamic range.  Nope, I can't get the picture I want SOOC.  

 

I'll attach a before and after image (essentially SOOC and after Photoshop).  Yes, they are two different presentations of the exact same data.  For me, the only reason I would ever want results SOOC is speed--speed in presenting results.  Yes, I want to get the camera settings right, and if I cared about the speed of my workflow I would even care how the camera handles things by default.  But for the types of photography that interest most buyers of Leica cameras, SOOC is and should be virtually irrelevant.  Any picture I print--any picture I care about--has significant post processing, and that's not because I was sloppy at time of capture.  It's because I like the results I can get when I choose adjust my images.  It's not because the camera got it "wrong" or because it wasn't a good camera.  It's because my camera can't read my mind, and it doesn't know my intent.

 

Now, as promised, two images of the galaxy NGC 6946, the "Fireworks Galaxy"...

 

SOOC...

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

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And after processing...

[jmahto]

Honestly, to me the question is a little different.

 

For situations like this, a better question to me is, "why would I WANT to create my final image SOOC?" Why would I want to give up dynamic range by using an 8 bit format? Why would I want to limit my ability to tweak white balance? Why would I want to limit my ability to adjust contrast? To apply the appropriate output sharpening?

 

Is it possible to get a good final image SOOC of a copied printing? Probably. But I'm stuck with much more "kludgy" tools when the only things I can adjust are the camera settings. There is a whole world of valuable edits that are available in post.

 

I think a lot of the attitude comes from days when making a "correction" in post was because of an "error" made at time of image capture. "Don't worry, we'll fix it in post" was/is seen as the sign of a sloppy photographer. That's simply not an accurate representation of what most of us are doing with our photographs these days, whether it's for display on a screen or for a fine art print. Even if I do a perfect job at time of image capture--nail the exposure for the image I want to create, nail the focus, choose the correct depth of field for the image I want, get the white balance perfect, choose the appropriate contrast level for the JPG setting, hold the camera perfectly steady, choose the right moment for snapping the image (not relevant for photographing a painting, obviously), and whatever else you can think of that constitutes getting things "right", I still want the ability to choose my output sharpening, to choose the particular cropping I want for the aspect ratio of the print, to selectively apply my noise reduction based on the information that's only available with a larger monitor, etc.. For me, getting things right at time of image capture is the starting point. It means I have good data to work with.

 

Most of my photography is actually astrophotography. Specifically, deep sky photography. I think that creates a slightly different perspective for the photographer. It is literally not even remotely possible to generate the photographs I want of a distant galaxy with an SOOC result. And I'm not talking subtleties here--it's not even close. I mean the images SOOC often don't even show the galaxy at all until I work on it in post processing. They are simply too faint. What's that you say? I could just expose longer and the details would start to show up? Yes, they would, but I'd end up clipping the brighter stars, and sky glow would end up washing out the image and using up all of my dynamic range. Nope, I can't get the picture I want SOOC.

 

I'll attach a before and after image (essentially SOOC and after Photoshop). Yes, they are two different presentations of the exact same data. For me, the only reason I would ever want results SOOC is speed--speed in presenting results. Yes, I want to get the camera settings right, and if I cared about the speed of my workflow I would even care how the camera handles things by default. But for the types of photography that interest most buyers of Leica cameras, SOOC is and should be virtually irrelevant. Any picture I print--any picture I care about--has significant post processing, and that's not because I was sloppy at time of capture. It's because I like the results I can get when I choose adjust my images. It's not because the camera got it "wrong" or because it wasn't a good camera. It's because my camera can't read my mind, and it doesn't know my intent.

 

Now, as promised, two images of the galaxy NGC 6946, the "Fireworks Galaxy"...

 

SOOC...

NGC6946_SOOC.jpg

 

And after processing...

NGC6946.jpg

Excellent. Can you please give technical details for the picture? I had always been fascinated with Astro photography but have never done it.

[Jeff S]

Even in past film days, darkroom adjustments to prints were considered the norm, not the exception, even for the greatest photographers. Sure, there were some that disdained cropping, but use of other adjustments, global and/or local, were common.

 

Jeff

[jlindstrom]

Excellent. Can you please give technical details for the picture? I had always been fascinated with Astro photography but have never done it.

I would be very interested hearing these as well. Very nice astro photos... color me impressed!

[otto.f]

Thank you for saying that. I thought I was the only one who thought that about frame lines too.

With the electric frame lines, it would be nice to have the option to show only one set matching the lens' focal length. There are a few little tweaks for M10.1.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I even suspect that they slow down the start-up process, so I wouldn’t advise Leica to just show the lens that’s on, because that would last even longer

[pgk]

..... my camera can't read my mind, and it doesn't know my intent.

 

 

How succinctly and accurately put!

[Jared]

I would be very interested hearing these as well. Very nice astro photos... color me impressed!

The location was Mt Tamaplais in Mill Valley, CA. The telescope was a 10” Ritchey Chretien reflector with a field flattener. That’s equivalent to a 2,000mm lens at f/8. The mount was an Astro-Physics brand German equatorial (so it tracks the night sky to counteract the Earth’s rotation). The camera was made by Santa Barbara Instruments Group—sorry, Leica won’t work for this sort of object.

 

The camera is monochrome, like most astronomy cameras. To get a color image you take separate pics through red, green, blue, and clear filters and combine them in software. That gets rid of the Loss of resolution from Bayer interpolation. Since objects like this don’t move at all over human time scales there is no reason to capture all the color channels in a single exposure. I believe this one was based on one hour of luminosity and thirty minutes each of RG&B. I generally use five minute sub exposures with this camera/scope/location combination. There was an autoguider to make sure the telescope tracked accurately—a separate camera taking exposures every three seconds and adjusting the mount. The camera is cooled to -15C

 

The data were calibrated with dark frames (stack of 50 separate ten minute exposures), 100 bias frames (0s exposures with the lens cap on) and flat frames to eliminate vignetting and map out the dust on the filters, CCD, etc. About five hours total in the field to capture 2.5 hours of data. Maybe an hour each way of driving.

 

The raw frames are all in FITS format which is the standard for astronomy. Essentially 16 bit raw files. After calibration, they were all normalized, registered, and stacked. The stacking is basically an averaging of the frames. That drops the noise floor. Then deconvolved (to increase contrast on finer structures) and stretched. Luminance and RGB were processed separately, then combined in Photoshop. All this takes perhaps another five hours. Then what most photographers would think of as normal post processing. Done.

 

For deep sky, getting good data is half the job. Processing is the other half. And this isn’t even a very good picture, either artistically (just didn’t have he focal length for this one) or technically (seeing conditions were poor—I should have given up and just enjoyed the viewing). Still, it’s a cool object in a more star rich section of the sky than most galaxies.

[TangoCharlie27]

I have both M9 and M10.  And certainly in terms on JPEG the colours of the M9's images are preferable.  Not sure what it is, I cant put my finger on it.  More film-like?  Interestingly there are more options in the colour saturation setting (Low, Medium Low, Standard, Medium High, High, Black and White, Vintage Black and White...phew!).  Whereas the M10 has just Low Standard and High.
The M10 has the bluetooth connection which is very useful of course.