Overexposed images with M10M

[Photojournoguy]

Advertisement (gone after registration)

8 hours ago, overexposed said:

i also walk around with my M10M with 1-2 stops underexposed to be on the safe side, blown out highlights are too distracting and the shadow recovery ability of the M10M is remarkable

Same here. Sometimes .75 under and sometimes 2.5 under, but usually at least 1 or 1.25 under. In cloudy conditions where there’s even consistency, then might be fully balanced or just a hair under. I pull up shadows in every image I take, which is a piece of cake with the M10M.

When time permits, I usually do a quick check of LiveView for blinkies and scan around me to see if highlights anywhere are a problem. Then I keep it underexposed for the worst blinkie I see, and freely shoot around the scene without having to think or adjust shot by shot if the sunlight stays pretty constant.

[Advertisement]

The Leica Q3 is available for pre-order at B&H Photo Video and Adorama

[egrossman]

46 minutes ago, Bobby said:

But are you not going to lose shadows eventually (like -2 or 3 stops)?

The M10 Monochrom can recover up to 4 stops without any significant impact to shadow detail up to ISO of 50,000. Images are still very usable above that but with some impact to the shadows in terms of noise.

Read this article to find out more: https://www.reddotforum.com/content/2020/05/bw-iso-showdown-2020-leica-m10-monochrom-vs-m-monochrom-typ-246-vs-m10-p-vs-sl2/

Erik

[Jeff S]

8 hours ago, overexposed said:

i also walk around with my M10M with 1-2 stops underexposed to be on the safe side, blown out highlights are too distracting and the shadow recovery ability of the M10M is remarkable

Shouldn’t your name be ‘underexposed’?

Jeff

[overexposed]

1 minute ago, Jeff S said:

Shouldn’t your name be ‘underexposed’?

Jeff

its more complicated than that 😉

[digger1914]

On 7/26/2022 at 8:42 AM, Photojournoguy said:

Same here. Sometimes .75 under and sometimes 2.5 under, but usually at least 1 or 1.25 under. In cloudy conditions where there’s even consistency, then might be fully balanced or just a hair under. I pull up shadows in every image I take, which is a piece of cake with the M10M.

When time permits, I usually do a quick check of LiveView for blinkies and scan around me to see if highlights anywhere are a problem. Then I keep it underexposed for the worst blinkie I see, and freely shoot around the scene without having to think or adjust shot by shot if the sunlight stays pretty constant.

I am also a member of the sloppy club. I leave mine underexposed by 1 to 2 stops and easily extract all details in C1. I believe it is a case of better safe than sorry.

[kkochheiser]

On 7/25/2022 at 10:24 AM, charlesphoto99 said:

A 'highlight' with no color info will blow out if not properly exposed - and even still in some cases if properly exposed. So shoot a monochrome sensor with that in mind (and/or use color filters). Not sure why people want cameras - esp M's - to do everything for them now. PAS modes have been the scourge of photography imo. Also, without dipping into the atrocious HDR realm, sometimes/often one has to choose what one is going to 'let go' - will it be the shadows, or the highlights? So shoot with that in mind, that ambient light is there to create drama and emotion, not some sort of unrealizable perfection.

M10M, 135mm APO

 

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

Well said and what a beautiful example!

[goodbokeh]

Advertisement (gone after registration)

Outdoors with my M10M I always use either a yellow or orange filter, I like the sky-cloud contrast. With those filters absorbing some of the high energy blue light spectrum I find that setting the EV at either -0.3 or -0.7 protects the highlights for 90% of my photos. In addition I like the yellow filter for skin tones, so yellow for the OP's street photo scenario seems advisable.

This recent photo of the Washington State Capitol WWII memorial was with the harsh August sun just outside the frame above the two cedar trees. M10M with the 18mm Super Elmar, B&W orange filter, the EV was at -0.3. No highlights were blown, not even close. Adobe Camera Raw, I even juiced it with Silver Efex, More Silver.

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

[Chaemono]

Am 25.7.2022 um 02:00 schrieb pgh:

...

I'd be curious if anyone could comment about, say, how much range the M has compared to the original M10 and how it easy it is to blow M highlights compared to the M10 at IS0 200 (because 100 as we know is pretty bad on the M10.

It's easier to blow highlights at ISO 160 with the M than at ISO 200 with the M10. When walking around taking pictures of street scenes, I set EV to at least -1 on the M10-M and often even to -1 1/3. This one was with EV -1 1/3 with exposure corrected by +1.4 and highlights pulled back by -66 in LR. There's a tiny bit of blown detail of the medals on the chest of the right drummer in the back. It can be recovered with the highlights slider set to -100 but it ruins the look. BTW, who said Germans had no humour?

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

Edit - yellow filter used

Edited August 7, 2022 by Chaemono

[pgh]

1 hour ago, Chaemono said:

It's easier to blow highlights at ISO 160 with the M than at ISO 200 with the M10. When walking around taking pictures of street scenes, I set EV to at least -1 on the M10-M and often even to -1 1/3. This one was with EV -1 1/3 with exposure corrected by +1.4 and highlights pulled back by -66 in LR. There's a tiny bit of blown detail of the medals on the chest of the right drummer in the back. It can be recovered with the highlights slider set to -100 but it ruins the look. BTW, who said Germans had no humour?

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

Edit - yellow filter used

Thanks for this. In what I shoot, fast shutter speeds are no problem, and I prefer underexposure - or let's say I prefer grainy shadows to blown highlights if I have to pick. So this isn't often much of an issue for me but it's worth sorting out given the price of these tools. Would I be right to assume the M10M is a good bit friendlier to pulling up the shadows than the M10? Ie if I tend towards -1 1/3 then that will rarely result in shadows that look too bad? The wider dr of the sensor as measured makes me think it should be like this but curious how you find it in practice. 

[Chaemono]

vor 13 Minuten schrieb pgh:

Thanks for this. In what I shoot, fast shutter speeds are no problem, and I prefer underexposure - or let's say I prefer grainy shadows to blown highlights if I have to pick. So this isn't often much of an issue for me but it's worth sorting out given the price of these tools. Would I be right to assume the M10M is a good bit friendlier to pulling up the shadows than the M10? Ie if I tend towards -1 1/3 then that will rarely result in shadows that look too bad? The wider dr of the sensor as measured makes me think it should be like this but curious how you find it in practice. 

On P.5 of the thread below there are downloadable M10-M DNG files all the way up to ISO 100000 in high contrast scenes. Pulling up shadows in ISO 25000 files is no problem at all. ISO 50000 is useable. I suspect even the M11-M will be worse in this respect. The only advantage of an M11-M will be the ability to shoot at 1/8000 sec. in extremely sunny conditions to protect highlights. Personally, I would prefer the M10-M for better ‘push-ability’ of shadows. It will be interesting to see if an M11-M will have better highlight recovery than the M10-M, though. I suspect, it will. Still, the M10-M is as close to a perfect FF monochrome camera there can be.

To answer your question on the ‘push-ability’ of shadows of the M10, at ISO 200, it’s amazing when used in combination with Topaz DeNoise. Fourth and fifth pictures here https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-F6NRmF/

Even ISO 10000 on the M10 can look amazing with Topaz DeNoise (not high contrast scene, though) https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-cMqxXt/

 

[pgh]

Thanks @Chaemono - yea, those look pretty good. I never use noise reduction software and I don't really care about noise, per-se, I just don't like losing detail. Sometimes they're one in the same, but sometimes not so much. Of course when noise overwhelms an image it's an issue but that takes something substation. Even 100k looks pretty usable to a certain extent here, at least for my interests. At any rate, the shadows at high ISO are something - seems like it would be no issue to expose for the highlights in most dicier situations.

I've no interest in an M11-M, whether or not that's in the pipeline - I prefer the M10 bodies and if I received my 5 year old M10 brand new today I suspect I'd be pretty content with it for a long while yet. The only drawback of the M10 (other than the highlights issue) is the 24mp, and that's only a drawback on occasion for me. The 10M fixes the resolution and then some...and, well, I know how to work with a highlight issue at this point I think. 

[derleicaman]

I just happened to read this thread, having just purchased an M10 Monochrom Wetzlar Edition from a member here. I am anxiously awaiting my purchase to arrive. I have had a number of years experience with the original M9M, and am updating to the M10 Monochrom to have commonality of batteries, accessories, etc with my 2 other M10-P cameras.

It is very interesting to hear the opinions on the best way to make exposures in general to avoid blown highlights. I generally set my M10-P to expose for - 1/3. The general rule of - 2/3 to - 1 is good for the lazy. Having been brought up in the M system starting with the M3 at 12 years old over 50 years ago, and being a die hard Kodachrome user, precise exposures were the norm. I grew up with the MR-4 meter on the M, and then the M5 and M6 with internal metering. I got lazy too with the M9 and M10 auto metering.

I am surprized to not hear anyone talking about using an incident meter. That would give you the best and least biased meter reading. There are now phone apps that give incident metering as well. 

What say you?

[Erato]

1 hour ago, derleicaman said:

I just happened to read this thread, having just purchased an M10 Monochrom Wetzlar Edition from a member here. I am anxiously awaiting my purchase to arrive. I have had a number of years experience with the original M9M, and am updating to the M10 Monochrom to have commonality of batteries, accessories, etc with my 2 other M10-P cameras.

It is very interesting to hear the opinions on the best way to make exposures in general to avoid blown highlights. I generally set my M10-P to expose for - 1/3. The general rule of - 2/3 to - 1 is good for the lazy. Having been brought up in the M system starting with the M3 at 12 years old over 50 years ago, and being a die hard Kodachrome user, precise exposures were the norm. I grew up with the MR-4 meter on the M, and then the M5 and M6 with internal metering. I got lazy too with the M9 and M10 auto metering.

I am surprized to not hear anyone talking about using an incident meter. That would give you the best and least biased meter reading. There are now phone apps that give incident metering as well. 

What say you?

Congratulations to you for your "Wetzlar" limited edition Meßsucher10M. I only got the 35mm FLE "Wetzlar" limited with me due to the genuine M10M was the only thing that I can get back then, sigh.

In the meanwhile, just like you are, I am a long time happy user of Fujichrome(RAP/RDP III) and Ektarchrome(64) reversal films in the past decades. The Gossen Starlite and Starlite II brought me an incontrovertible result under the scenes of rapidly changing light.

According to my experience, M10M is reliable in most of the case under 1/3 stop(by internal light meter), and of cause, in the night scene, letting the Double A(uto) Mode dealing with the light is doable while you are lazy or unwilling to extract the lightmeter from the camera bag.

I am more than happy to hear you just reveal the core spirit of photography i.e. how to mastering with the light precisely. In other words, the best outcome always comes with meticulous shooting style. And sometimes, the M10M could even bring you a 120mm or even midum format appearance while all the things are luckly in place and handled precisely.

I doubt there's no such thing so-called lucky in the world of a mature photographer.

 

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

 

 

Edited August 13, 2022 by Erato

[Erato]

1 hour ago, Erato said:

Congratulations to you for your "Wetzlar" limited edition Meßsucher10M. I only got the 35mm FLE "Wetzlar" limited with me due to the genuine M10M was the only thing that I can get back then, sigh.

In the meanwhile, just like you are, I am a long time happy user of Fujichrome(RAP/RDP III) and Ektarchrome(64) reversal films in the past decades. The Gossen Starlite and Starlite II brought me an incontrovertible result under the scenes of rapidly changing light.

According to my experience, M10M is reliable in most of the case under 1/3 stop(by internal light meter), and of cause, in the night scene, letting the Double A(uto) Mode dealing with the light is doable while you are lazy or unwilling to extract the lightmeter from the camera bag.

I am more than happy to hear you just reveal the core spirit of photography i.e. how to mastering with the light precisely. In other words, the best outcome always comes with meticulous shooting style. And sometimes, the M10M could even bring you a 120mm or even rㄍ appearance while all the things are luckly in place and handled precisely.

I doubt there's no such thing so-called lucky in the world of a mature photographer.

 

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

 

 

Revise:

1. midum medium format
2. luckly lucky

 

Edited August 14, 2022 by Erato

[ramarren]

I have been working with the M10 Monochrom since about May. I've made about 2000 exposures into it, probably 85% of them using Aperture priority AE with the AutoISO range set to range from base to about ISO 8000. 

I have not found the M10-M metering to be very far off, and I have not found it to be necessary to consistently under- or over-expose. My exposures do not show excessive highlight burn, nor do the majority of them require much in way of post-processing. I tweak the exposure compensation on a scene by scene basis when I feel it necessary, relying upon my experience with both how scene types need to be exposed and how my testing of the M10-M camera's responses indicated it needs to be used. I probably use +EV just as often as -EV compensation settings ... 

The camera is a tool. You learn the camera, make the decisions, and set the camera accordingly. That's how I've always considered doing photography.

G

Edited August 31, 2022 by ramarren