What I miss from M9 in my M10

[wattsy]

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Actually, I don't know any professional photographer who doesn't shoot raw (other than, I suppose, news photographers but then I no longer know any and they seem to be a disappearing breed) - I suppose that pros are simply all 'camera club types' making a living from utilising their 'camera club mentality'. Come on Ian you can do better than this  .

 

 

Are you saying that this forum doesn't reek of camera club type thinking? Your own post ("news photographers" blah blah) betrays an orthodoxy that is frankly stifling.

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[jaapv]

 

 

 

Blah blah. white point. blah high-pass blah blah. Like I say, a camera club type mentality.

 

Agreed. Rather a large club, though

 

 

 

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[jaapv]

Are you saying that this forum doesn't reek of camera club type thinking?

 

 

It does, indeed. The activity on the film forums, the extensive discussions about developers, etc. proves your point even better.

The forum is a kind of community, nothing special in this internet age.

[pgk]

Are you saying that this forum doesn't reek of camera club type thinking? Your own post ("news photographers" blah blah) betrays an orthodoxy that is frankly stifling.

 

It can do - its a problem with photography forums in general but doesn't mean that shooting RAW is in any way diminished.

 

 When I freelanced for the local papers it was all darkroom work and speed meant working long and late. I gave it up but those who carried on shot fast and jpeg. The news photographers I have known (a few, locally) have either (sadly) been 'let go', died and not been replaced or have to some degree or other moved into other types of photography too. Speed has often required jpeg shooting, but the use of (often very poor) 'amateur' images has certainly impinged significantly. As far as I'm concerned, if a photo is worth taking, its worth taking well.

[wattsy]

It does, indeed. The activity on the film forums, the extensive discussions about developers, etc. proves your point even better.

The forum is a kind of community, nothing special in this internet age.

 

 

Yes, of course. Nor is there anything wrong with camera clubs if that's your thing. However, what I tire of is seeing how members who threaten to disrupt the prevailing forum wisdom (almost always concerning technical, rather than artistic, matters) get shouted down by people such as yourself. For example, by unsubtly suggesting you have higher standards than the person you disagree with.

[jaapv]

I don't have higher standards as such, but I object to the suggestion that out of camera jpegs are indicative of  the technical quality of a digital camera, any more than the contact prints of a film are an indication of the level of prints the photographer is to obtain.

The denial of the second part of photography: darkroom work and/or postprocessing, is simply false.

And yes, it is about the technical aspects of the image. Any discussion about the content can safely stay away from camera type, film brand, or whatever.

[almoore]

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what I tire of is seeing how members who threaten to disrupt the prevailing forum wisdom (almost always concerning technical, rather than artistic, matters) get shouted down...by unsubtly suggesting you have higher standards than the person you disagree with.

To be fair to the shouters, they yell just as loudly when disparaging art, or 'art' as they invariably style it.

 

There are no absolute technical rights and wrongs, as Jaap's before and after image efforts show. Some people - including me - prefer the original version, others, I'm sure, prefer the punchier version. Pre-digital, nobody thought it was 'wrong' that photographers worked with Kodachrome or E6. Slight alterations might have been made at the point of scanning or printing, but, more often than not, the aim was to simply replicate what came straight out of the camera. With digital, I've always worked from raw, but I wouldn't dream of claiming that the use of JPEGs is a sign of incompetence. I don't see much evidence that the majority of forum members are extracting every last bit of quality from their Leica raw files. If anything, I see more images that are so heavily overprocessed that, to my eye, a more pleasing image could have been taken with an iPhone.

 

Unless we're working for somebody else, the only standards that matter are our own.

[jaapv]

For the record, you'll find no post of mine about "art" in all those years.  I see my personal efforts more as a craft, respect those that describe themselves as artists ( they probably are).

However, I could not agree more about overprocessing. That is not the postprocessing I mean.

To me, postprocessing should be aimed at one of two things: either a specific visualized effect of the photograph or to restore the image to the scene as seen by the photographer when taking the shot.

Out-of-camera results rarely if ever attain this.

[jmahto]

Doesn't SOOC require decisions to be made *before* taking pictures (like film modes, pic styles, jpeg sliders.... etc. etc.)! In B&W you decide what color filters to use *before* taking the picture.

 

Therefore actual discussion should be about value/effectiveness of decisions taken before or after taking the picture. In my opinion, it depends on the eventual goal. A sports photographer shooting thousands of athletes (in a marathon) will decide differently than a photographer shooting sunset at the beach.

 

The phrase "SOOC" is too much simplification to be useful in any discussion.

Edited September 26, 2017 by jmahto

[pgk]

To be fair to the shouters, they yell just as loudly when disparaging art, or 'art' as they invariably style it.

 

With digital, I've always worked from raw, but I wouldn't dream of claiming that the use of JPEGs is a sign of incompetence.

 

So does Eggleston actually shoot RAW of JPEG?

[BerndReini]

A lot of my friends are set photographers. Yes, they do shoot raw. However, other than applying the standard profile in their raw converter, they do very little to the mass of photographs they take every day before they have to deliver them to the studio. SOOC absolutely matters, and I believe that the minuscule adjustments that Jaap made, whether you prefer them or not, still clearly profit from the out-of-camera rendering of the M8, or should I call it "signature."

 

It is ridiculous to downplay the color signature of a camera, when we are all using Leica. This is one of the things people always tout as special about Leicas, and I tend to agree.

[@ndy_ellis]

I agree with Jaap.  I was taught that taking photos, especilally candid or street photos, is best thought of as making notes.  The second half is in reviewing, selecting and post-processing.  The whole thing is making photographs.  The lazy part of me didn't want to learn Lightroom but I'm glad I invested a little time in it. 

[almoore]

For the record, you'll find no post of mine about "art" in all those years...However, I could not agree more about overprocessing. That is not the postprocessing I mean.

To me, postprocessing should be aimed at one of two things: either a specific visualized effect of the photograph or to restore the image to the scene as seen by the photographer when taking the shot.

Out-of-camera results rarely if ever attain this.

I certainly didn't have you in mind with regard to my comments on attitudes to art, although another moderator once bluntly told me that he felt my defence of the work of Nan Goldin was a willful act of provocation, because to him there could be no doubt that her work was absolutely worthless.

 

In the film era, I enjoyed my early years working in black and white, endured my E6 years, before finally settling with C41 which seemed to combine the best of both worlds. Recent digital sensors are interesting in that they offer so many processing options, allowing us to go as subtle or punchy as we want.

[happymac]

I don't miss my M9, which I sold to finance the M10. I am surprised about the increased image quality of the M10, especially green colors. And I see a remarkable improvement of the image qualitity with extreme wide angle lenses (e.g. 18mm).

 

Two things I’m missing: 1. USB and 2. frame lines independent from batteries (it is annoying to switch the camera on and to wait 2 seconds to make them visible...)

 

Tom

Edited September 27, 2017 by happymac

[Tailwagger]

Back when I was a youth and before my father came to view me as a worthless miscreant, he carved out a little corner of our basement to serve as a darkroom area for my personal use.  He had his own digs in this regard; full color, temperature controlled, Omega, etc for processing output from Hasselblads, Linhofs and the like. I, on the other hand, was armed with a Zeiss Ikon Contaflex Super-B, later a Yashica-mat, a few plastic trays and a tiny tin can of an enlarger.  In the end, the love affair was short-lived. I set photographic activities aside for other pursuits, though not due to any limitations of my kit. Rather, as a young teen and despite a decent level of enthusiasm, every time the red light glowed, I'd fall asleep.  And so, save for a stint working in a friend's professional studio, I stopped being all that serious about photography.

 

I did, however still manage to learn a few things in those days.  In the moments when I wasn't snoring away in the darkroom, I discovered that much of the magic, and indeed the joy, of photography was carried out on the back end. If you took an image without considering how you'd treat it in that phase, it wasn't possible, at least for someone of my talent level, to create anything all that worthwhile regardless of how well exposed and composed the shot might have been. Worse, when the processing wasn't performed with care by ones own hands, the results tended to be even more unsatisfying.  I came to believe that to realize what I wanted, it was mandatory to retain as much control as possible from start to finish.  But as in those days I valued the images from dreams over those of prints, I pretty much walked away from having any expectations about the photographs I did occasionally manage to continue to take.

 

The digital age might not be all ponies and ice cream cake, but in my case, along with perhaps a smidge more maturity and resolve, it has returned a level of control in a far more accessible and infinitely less time consuming way.  That has resulted in me fully embracing those steps in the process I so long ago chose to abandon.  While I get there are many who'd like a single step to capture what they saw in the moment, real or imagined, in my view, it is a fanciful way to think about the photographic process. What I find particularly odd is that many I've met, who at least seem serious about photography, are quick to bemoan the rise of cell phones, yet in nearly the same breadth desire a finished result SOOC. Instant gratification on the front end is the devils work, yet on the backend, it is the holy grail. To my mind, the front end defines the content, the back end makes clear the author's commentary on it. Like it or not, excellence (not that I achieve it personally) requires both activities are carried off with care.  At least thats the way I try to go about things. 

Edited September 27, 2017 by Tailwagger

[35photo]

I think the best thing I can do is to continue experimenting in Lightroom until I find something that suits me, although I have used to process my images as little as possible. I prefer a natural and unedited look. But I love my M10 and I will never go back!

 

I use VSCO presets which are awesome for my M9 in lightroom as a starting point.... You'll probably like the Ektar 25 preset which is my second fav for color Fuji Velvia being #1...

[Luke_Miller]

I'd love to find a way to make the pictures look more like what I got from the M9, so I had the best of both worlds, at least some times. But I haven't yet figured out exactly what it is. Is it the colors, the contrast, or something else? Should I add some noise? Is it possible whatsoever with the Lightroom tools to get something similar?

 

Starting with the M8.2 I found the output produced skin tones on some individuals that gave them a ruddy complexion.  I resolved that by using the Adobe DNG Profile Editor program to create a custom profile from an image of a gretagmacbeth ColorChecker card.  The profile is placed in Lightroom profile folder and can be invoked using the Camera Calibration Tab. This resolved the issue and I continued to do this with the M9 and M-240.  This produced consistent and reasonably accurate (to my eye) color across the model and sensor changes.

[Ko.Fe.]

You may be partly right, but I still think it is not a good example of the technical output an M8 is capable of.

This is actually a good example: Only white point, black point, high-pass 0.8 --> soft light sharpening, nothing else. And on a minuscule JPG too...

 

Note the increased detail, expanded tonal values and general crispness.

 

correction.jpg

 

As a positive side remark, what about the persistent myth that a rangefinder cannot capture action?

 

I promised to stay away, but you get it all funny.  And because I have respect for you, here is @correction:

 

I didn't post this image as example of ultimate M8 capabilities. I posted it as example of SOOC I like. 

And for another remark with another attack on this image from you, which I haven't quoted here. It was taken with Jupiter-12 from fifties. One of the first lens like this made. S/N 5000128. I received it as the gift from rangefinder.ru moderator and big Leica RF fan and many Leica cameras and lenses owner Max Aleshin. 

So, it is SOOC image with old lens. In case, if you missed it, here is the thread for lenses like this on this forum: https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/268173-the-view-through-older-glass-merged/ With OP originated from M8 and old lenses thread.

 

I like this image SOOC and with old lens rendering on M8 without IR cut filter. And honestly if you don't like it due to some "higher standards" it is nothing but   to me. 

 

Cheers  , Ko. 

 

PS: About your positive remark. German Olympics before War has significant remark on sports photography. It was due to sports taken with Leica for one of the first time. I read about it in the article at old ILF magazine. So, here is no myth about Leica RF ans sports for 70+ years... 

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Hallo,

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[jaapv]

Yes, I did say I was a bit harsh, my apologies. Obviously, you have the fullest right to like any look that you want to have for your images, no question there.

 

However, this IS a technical subforum, not an aesthetic one, and the fact remains that the output of the camera -any camera- is not yet at its optimal level, and that postprocessing is an inseparable part of taking photographs. After all, your postprocessing/viewing program has already taken a number of decisions about the way your images looks, not your camera - nor you.

 

As you are a video guy, I would compare this to me claiming that one should show all one's videos unedited out of camera, as this is the way they were taken. As a matter of fact, most of mine are , as the computer job I hate most is video editing.  And I will never get my results better than passable for home use too. Video and stills - people sometimes don't realize how different the disciplines are. There are but few who excel at both. .

[Ko.Fe.]

Now we are talking!

I worked two paid jobs at the same time, broadcast engineer and computer graphics artist. As an artist I have to deal with technical standards. Some colors interfere with sound in modulated signal if it is in SECAM broadcast format.

Where are some standardization in printing. ISO 12647. 

 

But for computer processed images here is no such limit. Here is no defined technical standards, I'm aware of.

It could be low quality processing engine like GIMP. Which is destructive on quality. Or it could be non-destructive like LR (if you know how to use it).

The rest has nothing to do with technical. So is your editing. Here is no standards in image editing, if it is for the screen. Well, I assume we have dedicated video graphic cards, which are capable to render and reveal all necessary details.   

So, from my PoV, which is through decent and dedicated video card and on quality monitor, you over edit my image. And here is nothing high or technical about it. It is all personal liking or not. Technically speaking.

Edited September 30, 2017 by Ko.Fe.