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Face detection on Q2


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On 9/12/2019 at 1:11 AM, jaapv said:

I prefer to keep control of the content of the image to myself, not hand it over to some goblin in the camera.

 

59 minutes ago, jaapv said:

AFAIK it simply reverts to multi-point focus. I find it hard to see what is wrong with that.

You could at least stay consistent - you just seem to be arguing for the sake of it, changing your position in order to disagree.  Yesterday you didn't like the camera deciding what to focus on, now you find it hard to see what's wrong with it.

Multipoint seems to just pick the thing of greatest contrast in the scene, be it a hard secular highlight off something, a angular manmade object or a large print on clothing .  It is unlikely, in my experience, to pick a persons face, and if there is a face in a picture, thats most often what I'm trying to focus on.  There is a big difference in the level of handover to the camera goblin between "if you see a face, focus on it" and "just focus on anything contastry that catches your eye"

Reverting to single point at least allows you to choose where to focus if face detect fails, rather than reverting to random mode.

Edited by ralphh
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On 9/12/2019 at 1:11 AM, jaapv said:

What is the use of face detection? With me cameras always detect the wrong face... 🙄 I prefer to keep control of the content of the image to myself, not hand it over to some goblin in the camera.

When i take a portrait i prefer to focus on the eyes or the nearest eye,the 2013 olympus pen ep-5 nails focus every time in face/eye detection so it is a useful tool.

It makes no sense that a 2018 Q2 struggles in that regard.

I have a m262 and much prefer using it to the olympus for so many reasons but for static people pics i cannot  match the success percentage of the olympus face detection feature.

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41 minutes ago, TK! said:

You nailed it! 

- tk

An alternative method is to switch to manual which is very easy on the Q. With or without focus assist it is certainly the most accurate method and often with little time penalty. This method also holds good for the Leica CL which can use AF as the starting point.

Edited by wda
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On 6/30/2019 at 9:41 AM, DexL said:

Attended an event yesterday with Q2 in tow excited to have a practical use for face detect.  I’m no stranger to the feature as I have another camera with it.  I have also used it successfully outdoors with wife and son using the Q2.  The feature was a failure about 50% of the time indoors at the venue.  I had to apologize and switch to spot multiple times so loss confidence in feature and stuck to spot focus for later shots.  It wasn’t really dim inside and I was fairly close to subjects but not straight on.  Lastly there is almost no information in the manual to support their implementation of the feature. 

Has anyone else had a similar experience... does anyone else see this as another item in need of a possible firmware update?

I had the same experience. Face Detection on the Q2 simply does NOT work. What I find shocking is that Leica added a feature that works half of the time to a $5,000. This was one of the reasons why I returned mine.

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Face detection thru a 28mm will hardly be improved by software (firmware). The lens is easier to focus with, but as there is potentially lots of information within the frame. The efficiency of the face detection will be depending on the distance (size) of the recognition patterns (a block of pixels that are "seen" as being a potential face). Sony is very good at it (at least on A7RIII)  but it is indeed more challenging with wide angles than with a 50 or 85mm, where it is absolutely perfect 99% of the times, with sharp focus on the eye(s). A 28 mm Summilux wide open is a totally different challenge, and after few testings on Q2, I found that it "only" works with a good success ratio with just one face in the frame, plenty of light, not too far, and eyes on almost same level. I set the Q2 autofocus to spot and have no issue on portraits, unless the light calls for a different setting than the one you (unfortunately?) lock while locking the focus. In that case, should you need to prioritize the light settings, manual focusing seems the best way to get outstanding results...

However, and this is again just a provocative opinion,  Leica's best face detection system remains the M's OVF :D

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On 9/13/2019 at 2:40 PM, steve 1959 said:

When i take a portrait i prefer to focus on the eyes or the nearest eye,the 2013 olympus pen ep-5 nails focus every time in face/eye detection so it is a useful tool.

It makes no sense that a 2018 Q2 struggles in that regard.

I have a m262 and much prefer using it to the olympus for so many reasons but for static people pics i cannot  match the success percentage of the olympus face detection feature.

What focal length do you use on that Olympus?

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7 hours ago, Miltz said:

What I find shocking is that Leica added a feature that works half of the time to a $5,000. This was one of the reasons why I returned mine.

Not big enough reason for me to give up this beauty... but it is one of my biggest gripes for sure....

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4 hours ago, snooper said:

Face detection thru a 28mm will hardly be improved by software (firmware). The lens is easier to focus with, but as there is potentially lots of information within the frame. The efficiency of the face detection will be depending on the distance (size) of the recognition patterns (a block of pixels that are "seen" as being a potential face). Sony is very good at it (at least on A7RIII)  but it is indeed more challenging with wide angles than with a 50 or 85mm, where it is absolutely perfect 99% of the times, with sharp focus on the eye(s). A 28 mm Summilux wide open is a totally different challenge, and after few testings on Q2, I found that it "only" works with a good success ratio with just one face in the frame, plenty of light, not too far, and eyes on almost same level. I set the Q2 autofocus to spot and have no issue on portraits, unless the light calls for a different setting than the one you (unfortunately?) lock while locking the focus. In that case, should you need to prioritize the light settings, manual focusing seems the best way to get outstanding results...

However, and this is again just a provocative opinion,  Leica's best face detection system remains the M's OVF :D

You make some excellent points, however the iPhone is pretty much a 28mm focal length. I used a newer model recently and was surprised how quickly it picked out 8 faces in a group photo. 8 of 8. Pretty stunning really. It appears to me that the R&D resources at a Samsung or Apple are far ahead of the camera manufacturers for smart camera software development. 

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7 hours ago, jaapv said:

28 mm may work considerably less well, probably on the same level or worse than the Q2 - try it.

Set  my slow zoom to 28mm after work and tried it out at different distances and angles on faces on the TV and every time it worked.

I'm not anti-leica in fact i have barely used my olympus since i bought my m262 and prefer to focus the rangefinder however it is a useful tool and would be a good asset on a camera like the q2 if it worked well.

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19 hours ago, Leica Guy said:

It appears to me that the R&D resources at a Samsung or Apple are far ahead of the camera manufacturers for smart camera software development. 

Sure, but a smartphone remains a 12MP sensor in which you have now a chip like an A12X or a A13 Bionic (equivalent power of a desktop computer 10 years ago).. Besides and most of the time, a smartphone will use the hyperfocal aperture to ensure focus. The Q2 has much more pixels to analyse, and probably a processor that can't compete with these new smartphones chips.. But you are right, they do have some pretty good face detection algorithms.

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I've been doing some testing on this face detection and indeed it seems poorly reliable as it is. First, maybe it should be an ON / OFF feature applicable to any other AF mode, meaning face detection (if ON) takes over the current mode (spot, field or multi-field). If no face is detected, the current mode takes over. But I was unlucky no matter what other setting I tried, including the native crop mode with JPG files, where you could expect that not all of the sensor pixels are scanned for faster results. But once again no luck. :(

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On 9/15/2019 at 9:23 AM, DexL said:

Not big enough reason for me to give up this beauty... but it is one of my biggest gripes for sure....

I think it depends on what you shoot. Obviously if you shoot landscapes or random street stuff it doesn't matter. But if you're shooting portraits/people with it, it's terrible. If It was 2013 and a new feature I'd say they will figure it out... But it's 2019 and there is no worse implementation of face detection than on the Leica. And seeing that it works slightly worse on the Q2 or the Q1, Leica clearly doesn't know how to improve it. It's really a shame as the camera has some great qualities but this is inexcusable.

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On 6/30/2019 at 6:41 AM, DexL said:

Attended an event yesterday with Q2 in tow excited to have a practical use for face detect.  I’m no stranger to the feature as I have another camera with it.  I have also used it successfully outdoors with wife and son using the Q2.  The feature was a failure about 50% of the time indoors at the venue.  I had to apologize and switch to spot multiple times so loss confidence in feature and stuck to spot focus for later shots.  It wasn’t really dim inside and I was fairly close to subjects but not straight on.  Lastly there is almost no information in the manual to support their implementation of the feature. 

Has anyone else had a similar experience... does anyone else see this as another item in need of a possible firmware update?

I find it almost entirely useless. I have no idea how reviewers find this feature satisfactory. It may work with a single nearby subject, but I'm going to use spot focus for that anyway. I need Face Detect to work for snapshots in an environment with possible multiple faces, which is where it doesn't seem to work at all. Give the 28mm focal length, that's the most likely shooting environment for this camera.

I hope Leica can improve this in future firmware updates. As it is now, they may as well not have it on the menu.

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