Bug in highlight metering (Firmware 1.3.0)

[hdmesa]

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59 minutes ago, Tailwagger said:

Seems relevant to me. Given the variance we just need to make sure it was the camera and not the peyote. 😆

I was going to Photoshop @Pelu2010's head from his profile picture on the ends of all the cactus buds, but my desire to get a few laughs was outweighed by sheer laziness.

[Tailwagger]

Just now, hdmesa said:

I was going to Photoshop @Pelu2010's head from his profile picture on the ends of all the cactus buds, but my desire to get a few laughs was outweighed by sheer laziness.

I'm in no rush for a giggle.  Whenever the spirit moves you. 😃

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[hdmesa]

Here's how my SL2-S handles the Multi-field versus Highlight-weighted metering. I did note there are some situations with the SL2-S where both these metering modes can give the same exposure, but so far I've never seen Highlight-weighted give a brighter exposure than Multifield like it does with the M11.

SL2-S: Top = Multifield / Bottom = Highlight-weighted

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Edited April 18, 2022 by hdmesa

[Kwesi]

What I find interesting about your two examples is assuming you are using auto iso on both cameras, that with the SL2-S, the ISO remains constant and the shutter speed is what changes.

With the M11 the ISO is all over the place. I've found this to be the case whenever I use auto ISO. the results look great but the numbers are alarming to me coming from the previous generation M's where we've conditioned ourselves to using the lowest possible ISO

[hdmesa]

2 minutes ago, Kwesi said:

What I find interesting about your two examples is assuming you are using auto iso on both cameras, that with the SL2-S, the ISO remains constant and the shutter speed is what changes.

With the M11 the ISO is all over the place. I've found this to be the case whenever I use auto ISO. the results look great but the numbers are alarming to me coming from the previous generation M's where we've conditioned ourselves to using the lowest possible ISO

Yes, that's another puzzling thing about the M11 metering. Auto ISO should stay locked at the lowest ISO possible as long as the shutter speed doesn't get too low for the focal length calculation (which I had left on the default setting).

[elmars]

vor 19 Stunden schrieb hdmesa:

Here's an example of what I get with the different metering modes when using the rangefinder. Image composition was the same for each: patchy, high-contrast light. One of brightest areas in the scene was placed in the center of the frame. All of the metering modes blew the highlights. Highlight-weighted as implemented on the SL2-S would have delivered a much lower exposure than the other two modes in a situation like this.

Aperture was f/2 for all three. Shutter speed and ISO set to Auto.

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Do these curves mean, that highlight weighted metering does not only shift the exposure but also flattens the contrast curve? That would fit to my observation in some of my photos and photos seen from other testers in the betatester forum. But there I never couldn´t achieve a deeper discussion about that.

[Kwesi]

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@elmars

Slightly off topic but I've come to notice that with the M11 in full auto, (ISO and shutter set to auto) at a fixed aperture the ISO increases before the minimum shutter speed is reached.

Do you know if there is any reasoning behind this? Or is Leica just so confident in the low noise characteristics of the new sensor that they are more comfortable using it as an exposure variable?

[Kwesi]

15 minutes ago, Kwesi said:

@elmars

Slightly off topic but I've come to notice that with the M11 in full auto, (ISO and shutter set to auto) at a fixed aperture the ISO increases before the minimum shutter speed is reached.

Do you know if there is any reasoning behind this? Or is Leica just so confident in the low noise characteristics of the new sensor that they are more comfortable using it as an exposure variable?

Let me ask in a different way:

Did the M11 auto ISO behavior come up in the beta testers discussion group?

[Guest]

21 hours ago, SrMi said:

For the record, I am one of (few?) people who are so far happy with the highlight weighted metering. On sunny days, it prevents blown highlights (compared to multi-field) and does not unnecessarily lower the exposure.

I had my daughter shoot some pictures of me yesterday in our back yard - her first time with an M, she liked it!

The camera was set to aperture priority and auto ISO, highlight weighted metering.

Across 60 pictures, areas of my face were blown out in every single one. With Raw Digger I saw on average on channel (mostly green) blown highlights 0.7% of total pixels (min 0.3%, max 1%). That doesn't sound scary but unfortunately most of it ended up being on my face, I guess you could call it 'sunny side up', the only recovery was to convert to black and white as the red channel was less affected.

I would appreciate for similar situations (e.g. less experienced photographer operating the camera) a way to have a more 'protective' interpretation of highlight weighted (e.g. my Nikon Z7 seems to be safer to play in this regard).

FWIW I have not noticed 'jumps' in metering between pictures when shooting single or low speed continuous, I have only ever used firmware 1.3, so not sure if that was mostly an issue with the older releases.

Edited April 18, 2022 by Guest

[elmars]

Am 17.4.2022 um 12:45 schrieb mosh1:

I think I found an issue with Highlight Metering in firmware 1.3.0. It only works correctly for me when these two conditions are true:

- Live View enabled

- Exposure Preview setting set to permanent in Capture Assistant.

When both are true you can see in the Live View the camera taking a second to adjust exposure so highlights aren't blown. When shooting with Live View disabled or Exposure Preview not set to Permanent then Highlight Metering behaves essentially the same as multi-field metering. I think this bug is why many are seeing Highlight Metering not working as expected. Even when working as expected, Highlight Metering takes a second to calculate the exposure and if you shoot too quickly it can still blow highlights.

Can someone else experiment and confirm?

 

 

This is strange and I can confirm it, but only with permanent exposure preview. Not a big difference but it is there. No difference with exposure preview half pressed.

LV-mode

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rangefinder-mode:

 

Edited April 18, 2022 by elmars

[Kwesi]

24 minutes ago, elmars said:

This is strange and I can confirm it, but only with permanent exposure preview. Not a big difference but it is there. No difference with exposure preview half pressed.

LV-mode

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rangefinder-mode:

 

Interesting. Assuming aperture was fixed and same for both shots, which exposure variable changed between shots?

[elmars]

I tell tomorrow. 

[hdmesa]

3 hours ago, elmars said:

Do these curves mean, that highlight weighted metering does not only shift the exposure but also flattens the contrast curve? That would fit to my observation in some of my photos and photos seen from other testers in the betatester forum. But there I never couldn´t achieve a deeper discussion about that.

Most of the scene was dark shadows, so when reducing the exposure to include the highlight spike at the right, the curve correctly moves to the left side of the histogram. At least that's my understanding of how its supposed to work.

[elmars]

vor 11 Stunden schrieb Kwesi:

Interesting. Assuming aperture was fixed and same for both shots, which exposure variable changed between shots?

Both ISO 64, the first one 1/1250, the second one 1/750.

[elmars]

vor 9 Stunden schrieb hdmesa:

Most of the scene was dark shadows, so when reducing the exposure to include the highlight spike at the right, the curve correctly moves to the left side of the histogram. At least that's my understanding of how its supposed to work.

Look at the wideness of the peaks. It seems that this area ist wider in highlight weighted metering than in both others. Sorry, due to my bad English I cannot describe it better.

[budjames]

Another bug is that I can’t change the function of the depressing the thumb wheel. No matter what I set it to, it always stays set on exposure compensation.

Regards,
Bud James

Please check out my fine art and travel photography at www.budjames.photography.

[AndrewK]

1 hour ago, budjames said:

Another bug is that I can’t change the function of the depressing the thumb wheel. No matter what I set it to, it always stays set on exposure compensation.

Regards,
Bud James

Please check out my fine art and travel photography at www.budjames.photography.

Have you tried press and HOLD~~

[Photoworks]

2 hours ago, budjames said:

Another bug is that I can’t change the function of the depressing the thumb wheel. No matter what I set it to, it always stays set on exposure compensation.

Regards,
Bud James

Please check out my fine art and travel photography at www.budjames.photography.

in the menu Customize wheel has 2 option. Focus aid and Exp comp.

I set it to Focus aid to change zoom, and on press exp comp.

I would suggest not to set it to exposure comp initially since it can change you setting by robbing on the jacket and turn.

Edited April 19, 2022 by Photoworks

[hmzimelka]

18 hours ago, elmars said:

This is strange and I can confirm it, but only with permanent exposure preview. Not a big difference but it is there. No difference with exposure preview half pressed.

LV-mode

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rangefinder-mode:

 

Thank you!!!! 

I've changed the setting from Permanent to Shutter Half Pressed and it seems to make it a lot better, for me at least. Highlight weighted metering is still behaving incorrectly, but at least both Highlight and Multi Segment metering is close to the same or only marginally different between LV and Rangefinder shooting modes. 

 

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[hdmesa]

10 hours ago, elmars said:

Look at the wideness of the peaks. It seems that this area ist wider in highlight weighted metering than in both others. Sorry, due to my bad English I cannot describe it better.

Maybe what you describe is due to the different ISOs the camera was randomly choosing. I’d need to test it with ISO set to base for all of them to rule that out.

Also remember we’re looking at the histogram in Capture One after profile is applied — Not the same thing as the actual RAW histogram as seen in an app like Raw Digger.

If Raw Digger showed the same thing, then that means Leica may be cheating the exposure in firmware so as not to clip the shadows, which would result in a compressed curve in the histogram.

 

Edited April 19, 2022 by hdmesa