M11 adopts the Japanese~American look to color science

[Jim B]

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While people are wondering what went wrong, a quick trip over to the M11 images thread will leave you more confused than ever!  Why wasn’t more attention paid to maintaining color science between the various bodies?  That guy that got banned was right, the magic is gone… they look like they could have been shot on any of the modern high res cameras. What a shame.

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[Photoworks]

The photographer make the image, and it reflex the photographer view and moods.

Camera doesn't have to do with how you process the image.

 

If you are educated to  Japanese American taste, that is what you will get.

 

[FlashGordonPhotography]

5 hours ago, Jim B said:

While people are wondering what went wrong, a quick trip over to the M11 images thread will leave you more confused than ever!  Why wasn’t more attention paid to maintaining color science between the various bodies?  That guy that got banned was right, the magic is gone… they look like they could have been shot on any of the modern high res cameras. What a shame.

Actually they look more like a small format Hasselblad than any of my Asian based cameras. Not that it matters. The sensor wafer is such a small part of the colour equation anyway. Change software and you're going to get different. colours.

None of the digital Ms or digital Leicas, for that matter have tried to colour match their predecessor.

People might not like the colours. That's perfectly valid. But it isn't the silicon. It's everything else above it.

Gordon

[SrMi]

I hoped that nobody would respond to this post and that it would drop into oblivion. No such luck :).
I would never judge a camera's output by other people's forum posts. 
I agree with Gordon.

[frame-it]

what IS the Japanese-American Color Science Look?

 

[SrMi]

16 minutes ago, frame-it said:

what IS the Japanese-American Color Science Look?

 

Whatever it is, it must be something bad.

Colors of Fuji Velvia and Kodak Ektachrome combined?

[frame-it]

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16 minutes ago, SrMi said:

Whatever it is, it must be something bad.

Colors of Fuji Velvia and Kodak Ektachrome combined?

are you implying velvia colors are bad?

[SrMi]

3 minutes ago, frame-it said:

are you implying velvia colors are bad?

Not at all, and neither is Ektachrome bad, IMO.

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Inside sources report that the upcoming Lederhosen edition of the M11 will feature Bavarian color science.

Here is a screenshot from an early prototype:

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[adan]

3 hours ago, frame-it said:

what IS the Japanese-American Color Science Look?

I don't know - maybe this 1970s Fujifilm ad explains.....

But I agree with those who point out how many links in the color chain there are, after the data leaves the sensor. Software choice, profile/calibration choice, whose "Auto" or "As Shot" or "Custom" white balance is used, and so on.

To me the M11 at "default" settings, does hail back to the "basic" M9 color - some magenta tint, at least with the Adobe Standard M9 profile. Which many people love.

But again was "optional" - I made, and saved as the default setting, my own M9 profile, which dialed out some of the Kodak/Leica/Adobe magenta, and that was "my" M9 color.

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[LEGEND]

10 hours ago, frame-it said:

what IS the Japanese-American Color Science Look?

 

Like the new one of Leica M11...    Just joking uf course...  

[Adam Bonn]

The colour science erm alchemy rather depends on stuff like lens used, exposure choices, ambient light at point of capture, WB settings, which RAW app you used and which RAW app profile you selected (also if relevant), which SOOC jpeg settings you used.

FWIW I've personally owned three different Ms and played with sample DNGs from all of them and none of them had exactly the same colours and tonality as each other, also every new M platform  has more DR than the previous one (and a different sensor and CFA and base chip calibration) and this inherently changes the look of the 'SOOC' base RAW image.

I have to wonder if the OP would be happier being an M10R user, making gritty photos and finding his groove some where around the key of G.... 

Edited June 3, 2022 by Adam Bonn

[tom0511]

Are you talking about your own experience with M11 or looking at random images in the internet? Be careful, IMO the LR profiles were not great in the beginning.

In my case it took me always some time when I was switching from M9 to M240 to M10..to M11, but then I found which profiles and parameters to use and never wanted to switch back. One time I switched back to M9 (from M240) just to realize that I already started to value the sensor of the M240 (with its higher DR and more consistent color in mixed light) For me its more important how my own files come out vs what I see in an image thread.

 

Edited June 3, 2022 by tom0511

[lct]

I see nothing wrong in the M11 raw files. Compared to my M240 i see a bit less yellowish tint and significantly less red clippings but in both cases dng files are easy to tweak in PP. Perhaps the OP is a jpeg shooter?

[Viv]

17 hours ago, frame-it said:

what IS the Japanese-American Color Science Look?

It's the mother-in-law of the Leica Glow.

 

 

[Overgaard]

On 6/2/2022 at 5:10 PM, Jim B said:

While people are wondering what went wrong, a quick trip over to the M11 images thread will leave you more confused than ever!  Why wasn’t more attention paid to maintaining color science between the various bodies?  That guy that got banned was right, the magic is gone… they look like they could have been shot on any of the modern high res cameras. What a shame.

I agree that Leica haven't been able to explain what their color philosophy has been for the M11, and amidst confusions as to firmware glitches, camera profiles available, three sensor resolution sizes and more ... it's still seems up in the air if it's Leica's deliberate colors or if it is the default that the sensor/firmware could produce. Whatever the color philosophy is, it's not very well documented. So you can be happy with what you get, which many seem to be, or you can be wondering, as you do, what the philosophy is, or as I do, if they are still working on it.  

[frame-it]

5 hours ago, lct said:

I see nothing wrong in the M11 raw files. Compared to my M240 i see a bit less yellowish tint and significantly less red clippings but in both cases dng files are easy to tweak in PP. Perhaps the OP is a jpeg shooter?

seems like its another hit-n-run thread..the OP hasn't replied since their 1st post

[Adam Bonn]

2 hours ago, Overgaard said:

I agree that Leica haven't been able to explain what their color philosophy has been for the M11, and amidst confusions as to firmware glitches, camera profiles available, three sensor resolution sizes and more ... it's still seems up in the air if it's Leica's deliberate colors or if it is the default that the sensor/firmware could produce. Whatever the color philosophy is, it's not very well documented. So you can be happy with what you get, which many seem to be, or you can be wondering, as you do, what the philosophy is, or as I do, if they are still working on it.  

Have Leica ever explained a colour philosophy?

Sure us users like to say oh the M9 looks just like Kodachrome (sic) or slide film etc, but pretty sure that info isn’t in the brochure

So much criticism of any camera’s colours is actually more the way the RAW app chooses that camera’s colours… the exact same DNG looks very different in C1/LR/DxO etc etc and how much help does the camera company even give the software houses (apart from maybe a loan unit for them to make their profiles or even just some sensor data)

Leica embeds a profile in all their DNGs but this profile is so basic it doesn’t even meet adobe’s recommended spec for an embedded profile, so IMHO the Leica profile is just the bare minimum the DNG needs to get by (see notes below)

It’s entirely possible (and historically likely based on past Ms) that Leica will tweak how the WB works to change the colours a little. It’s just as historically likely that adobe won’t change their profile (they hardly ever do, like not since the M8 irrc)

From the outside looking in (I’m not an M11 owner, M9 and 10) the M11 seems like the 240 all over again… folks complaining it has too many bells and whistles, not a real M (sic), renders like a Sony, works like all the other mirrorless cameras, lots of bugs.

and much like the 240, firmware updates from Leica and users getting to grips with the camera and reading about the best way to work with it (a lot from your website I think Thorsten!)  will see the M11 elevated in standing soon enough…

boring notes

off the top of my head… in a dual illuminant profile adobe recommends 36 core lines of code, supplemented with appropriately 1800 colour tweaks to transform un-white balanced RAW data into colours. Leica’s profiles have 18 core lines of code.

and incidentally, the adobe pipeline expects those lines of code (well the 36 anyway) and if it doesn’t have them it basically tries to guess the D50 chromatic adaptation for itself! (ie no we’re not getting a purer RAW experience with Leica’s stripped down profiles)

(this doesn’t mean that the adobe profile is always nicer than the Leica one. Far from it in fact)

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[John Black]

Pretty much agree Adam.  I've owned every digital M generation and don't remember Leica advertising any given model as mimicking XYZ film.  There are some other handling / function issues that bug me about the M11, but color is one area where I think the M11 does well.  I am hesitant to say that every M11 DNG starts in a better place vs this or that previous digital M, but it is not too often I see something that looks really out of whack.  Thus far, the Leica M11 raws have been the most malleable in terms of moving around colors in Capture One and Photoshop.

[adan]

10 hours ago, Adam Bonn said:

Have Leica ever explained a colour philosophy?

Sure us users like to say oh the M9 looks just like Kodachrome (sic) or slide film etc, but pretty sure that info isn’t in the brochure

It was kind of an assumption, since the M8/M9 sensors were Kodak products with (presumably) at least some "Kodak color science" involved.

.............

BTW, I have been tracking "color science" for over 50 years (beginning at age 17 in high school - has it really been that long?!) Not as a scientist, but as an informed user. Color rendering was always very interesting to me.

The "short version" (hah!)

1971 - subscribed to the TIME-LIFE Library of Photography, and read its book on COLOR. Learned how standard "tri-layer" color film worked, as well as a partial history of other processes (Autochromes, Polaroid instant color-print film). Was introduced to the work of color innovators like Ernst Haas.

https://www.amazon.com/Color-Library-Photography-Robert-editor/dp/B00125UBV0

Shot and processed my first roll of color film (High Speed Ektachrome (ISO 160) pushed to EI 400 in E4 chemistry). Examined how it reproduced color, and how that changed with push-processing. Shot some Agfa CT-19 (a dedicated process before Agfa gave up and adopted E6 chemistry) - more magenta than Kodak products.

1973 - shot a comparison of Ektachrome-X (ISO 64) with Kodachrome II (ISO 25) freshman year of college, and noted that Ektachrome was more saturated than K-chrome II (I preferred the Ektachrome color - K-chrome was clearly sharper and less grainy, though).

1974 - Explored the "new" Kodachromes with the actual names 25 and 64 instead of II and -X. Studied Nat. Geo's use of color photos.

1976 - tried a roll of GAF (ISO) 500 color slide film as part of my senior photo project - warm romantic color, and so grainy it looked like Seurat's pointillist paintings.

1977 - tried the new Kodacolor 400 negative film (first at that speed) for a grad-school (I) photoessay on women's field hockey.

1982 - working at a hospital, got to be part of a field-test for Polaroid's new PolaChrome instant 35mm slide film (weird additive-color process rather like a Bayer filter array, except linear filters: color lousy, visible RGB "stripes" if enlarged, but processed in 3 minutes).

https://fstoppers.com/film/weirdest-35mm-film-polaroid-ever-made-558319

First tried out Fujichrome film (50 RF) for my own work - found it to be both more saturated and neutral than Kchrome, although slightly less sharp and more grainy. Used that from then on.

1984-85 Grad school (II) in Photojournalism - learned how newspaper/magazine printing-press color separations worked, and how run-of-press (ROP) color was proofed and "controlled."

1986 - Went to work for a newspaper that was using the new Scitex proprietary color-scanning/pre-press/layout system, and observed how it worked.

1992 - Fuji replaced my beloved RF50 with RVP50 Velvia - finer-grained, but lost the neutral, open colors I loved. Darker/contrastier, and more purple. Adapted to it.

Worked as AME/Graphics setting up another newspaper's new desktop-based color-separation and production system - Mac II color computers, Leaf film scanners (s-l-o-w! 7 minutes per 35mm color frame), Agfa/Hyphen imagesetters, Unix RIP (****Crash(BANG!)****). Bought my first personal color Mac and Photoshop (2.5). Got to handle the first color digital news camera developed by the Associated Press/Nikon/Kodak - the DCS100 (Nikon F3 with cropped digital back, 1.3 Mpixels, over-the-shoulder processing/storage unit (hard drive, no cards). $25000 - if one was an AP client newspaper. Or available for rental.

https://www.nikonweb.com/dcs100/

Ended the year going to the NPPA Technology Conference and seeing the brand-new Nikon Coolscan LS-10 "in person."

I'll leave the story there - 30 years ago. But let's just say that this cowboy has been to the "color-science rodeo" many times.

Edited June 4, 2022 by adan