Deliberate1 Posted June 23, 2018 Share #1 Posted June 23, 2018 Advertisement (gone after registration) Yesterday, a mate and I traveled to an island off the Maine coast for a day of shooting - me with my S kit and him with a Nikon bag and his iPhone. We ended up in a splendid mid 19th century Congressional church high on a hill which was irresistible. So I mounted the 35mm on to the body, and the rig onto the Gitzo/RRS tripod. The perspective of the shots I set up involved a series of strong right angles created by door frames, walls and other elements. After no small effort, given the absence of LF movements available with my Toyo 4x5, I finally got the camera as aligned as possible to avoid as much lineal distortion as possible. Though my success could only be approximated by chimping. The interior also involved a wide tonal range, from zone 2 to zone 8, more or less, from transcendent stained glass light to shadows cast by neatly configured pews. As I was going through the alchemy of exposure and orientation adjustments, my pal was happily clicking away with his phone. When we were done results were compared. And I confess a certain level of disbelief and envy. First of all, while his effective 28mm lens showed some expected distortion, he brought up an app that allowed him to correct it, on the screen, with the touch of a finger. Mine will require time in LR/PS with what I would say are less sophisticated tools since he could do targeted adjustments to parts of an image. Equally surprising was the color fidelity that came from that little device. A stained glass window had panels of yellow and light green that were similar in hue. The S failed to capture the not so subtle distinction, but the I phone nailed it. Perhaps because the phone put the images through a jpg process and I was shooting in RAW. I was in no way humbled by the capability of this phone device. More impressed than anything. He had the right tool for his purposes - images that will live, mostly as shot, on a computer, while the best of mine will live on a wall. But I could not help but be impressed by the technical sophistication of the phone, and it got me to thinking how extraordinary the S could be if the same R&D dollars were aimed at it. But I suspect there are just a few more customers world wide for cell phones than our Leica boxes. Fortunately for me, I enjoy sitting in front of a computer bringing RAW images to life. That said, I have a Q, and could very much put that in camera distortion correction to good use. Time to make my wife a "Photoshop widow" for the morning. Cheers David 2 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted June 23, 2018 Posted June 23, 2018 Hi Deliberate1, Take a look here Color accuracy: S vs. I. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
AlanD Posted June 23, 2018 Share #2 Posted June 23, 2018 One of the strengths of the iPhone is that it is a wide gamut display. If you have a desktop with 10-bit color and wide gamut, you will find where the S is able to capture those subtle hues too. But a standard screen will mask the differences that the iPhone display can show. The other strength is the raw processor in the iPhone. Apple, Samsung and Huawei have spent considerable effort in their processing. Dedicated camera manufacturers should follow Fujifilm (and of all companies, Samsung) cooking their JPEG output. We have RAW for dedicated editing but Fuji’s RAW allows you pull back the highlights and boost the shadows, which is what 75% of Lightroom editing involves... 2 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deliberate1 Posted June 24, 2018 Author Share #3 Posted June 24, 2018 Very interesting. Thanks for the explanation. I have been running a calibrated NEC monitor for several years. And when I put the island images up today, I saw all the colors that I remember. So I learned that the S screen does not accurately reflect the fiull gamut of colors captured by the sensor, unlike the Iphone screen. No criticism meant. Not a fair fight comparing state of the state of the art phone screen with five plus year old tech. Always good to learn the limitations of the camera - to avoid disappointment or unreasonable expectations. David Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlanD Posted June 24, 2018 Share #4 Posted June 24, 2018 Yeah. It is one of the weaknesses of my M9 and S 006. The rear screen simply does not tell you much about the final picture output. The Fuji lineup is much better in that regard. Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
John McMaster Posted June 24, 2018 Share #5 Posted June 24, 2018 I have never thought of judging colours on a cameras screen! john 3 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jip Posted June 25, 2018 Share #6 Posted June 25, 2018 Try put a S file in TIFF form on an iPhone in 16 bits... then you'll see it in great colour too... Or buy a wide gamut display... The viewing of your images is only as good as the screen you're watching it on. The iPhone X wide gamut HDR display is amazingly good, and much better than many people have on their desktops at home for photo editing. 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
hoppyman Posted June 25, 2018 Share #7 Posted June 25, 2018 (edited) Advertisement (gone after registration) David the S LCD (or any camera?) cannot possibly display the same gamut or resolution or contrast etc as a modern smartphone which is intended as a display device for the processed images (that also makes phone calls ). It’s not intended to of course. It is an information display that can show a low resolution PREVIEW based on a default jpg rendering too even when you are capturing in the DNG raw format. Imagine carrying your S around to show photos to your friends or holding it at arms length for selfies! Edited June 25, 2018 by hoppyman 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
albertknappmd Posted August 2, 2018 Share #8 Posted August 2, 2018 The phones have improved tremendously over the past decade... No way Leica or anyone can keep up with that.. However appealing, the phone pictures cannot be enlarged.. Nice for a screen, no good for a wall! Albert 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
paulsydaus Posted September 12, 2018 Share #9 Posted September 12, 2018 Do you have a colour target by any chance? Could you manage to shoot it with your S and said IPhone? I’d be interested to help you resolve what is going on... Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deliberate1 Posted September 12, 2018 Author Share #10 Posted September 12, 2018 Do you have a colour target by any chance? Could you manage to shoot it with your S and said IPhone? I’d be interested to help you resolve what is going on... OP here. Obliged for the offer. But I have moved on to other mysteries. Cheers. David Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jrp Posted September 15, 2018 Share #11 Posted September 15, 2018 Apple have a division of about 800 people working on cameras. As they showed this week, the end game is computational photography (auto hdr, lens correction, adjustable depth of field, etc). 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deliberate1 Posted September 16, 2018 Author Share #12 Posted September 16, 2018 (edited) OP again. Last weekend, my pal with the I phone (see original post) came over with some images from Myanmar for me to print. I brought them up on my NEC monitor and did some minor adjustments and then printed. Frankly, the color fidelity and tonal gradation for the monochrome images processed inside the phone was remarkable. There is a portrait function, in the app, that isolates the main subject with a background gradually blacked out in a very elegant way. It takes me a fair amount of work in Photoshop to that effect, when it works. And the images, which I printed to 11x14 on my Epson 7800, were lovely, especially the monochrome ones. I would not give up a "proper" camera for the phone. But I think the definition of what a "proper" camera is is something that we all may have to come to grips with. This same pal has invested thousands in Nikon glass and bodies. And the images he asked me to print for this competition were all from the device in his back pocket, Edited September 16, 2018 by Deliberate1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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