Rant on Firmware Updates

[Jamie Roberts]

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Jamie,

I would prefer it to be more logical for sure, without switching to Zeiss lenses that is, but given the physical architecture of the shutter speed dial, and the lenses I have (and have no intention of changing), then exposure comp is a compromise that seems easy to impliment. Maybe Leica will put 1/3rd stops on future lenses..?

Oh that reminds me, an IQ improvement via FW -> lens coding via menu

 

no need to be sorry, it really is ok to have your own opinion

 

Guy--thanks for being so generous: no-one has to give me more ground for being opinionated

 

In truth, I can completely understand why you might want finer grain exposure accuracy.

 

But the histogram doesn't give you that kind of accuracy anyway--if I understand correctly, it's reading the in-camera JPEG // preview and not the RAW file, so you're off by just about a third of a stop anyway when you're finessing the highlights to the right side of the curve.

 

FWIW, I find the auto-review issues on the M8 completely infuriating. Even though I don't chimp that often, when I do, I'd prefer to be looking at the shot I just took, not the previous shot Like others, though, I'd happily defer that fix for a stop better noise in the 1250 // 2500 range!

 

Let's hope Leica uses a faster, more reliable hardware buffer in the M9!

[guywalder]

Jamie, I appreciate that the histogram is not the be all and end all, however its still a pretty useful tool, and if its there I would prefer to be able to see it better.

The noise results from Dale look pretty damn good, I hope I see that sort of improvement with my RAW workflow.

I dont currently have too much of a problem with absolute levels, but the step from 320iso (good) to 640iso (not good) is too big, and give even A4 prints a very different look. I'd like intermediate steps, but an overall 1 stop improvement would be very welcome as well!

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[4season]

Seasonal moodiness strikes the northern hemisphere So join the Sigma DP1 owner's club instead: I haven't heard a single owner complaint yet.

[B&W]

M8 suffer from bad AWB

All reviews I have been reading concludes with this

 

I did not expect it would take more than 12 month for a decent fix

[ptomsu]

M8 suffer from bad AWB

All reviews I have been reading concludes with this

 

I did not expect it would take more than 12 month for a decent fix

 

YOU ARE SOOOO RIGHT

 

current M8 fW still suffers in AWB!!!

 

I would see this the most important fix of any new FW. Again, if they don't get it in the next weeks they loose credibility again. Man, the camera is out now for more than a year and still no stable FW ????

 

Will it be like the DMR that they will cancel the M8 (because a M9 is on the horizon) and then give us a final FW update, which is unsatisfying again? Like in the DMR????

[hankg]

M8 suffer from bad AWB

All reviews I have been reading concludes with this

 

I did not expect it would take more than 12 month for a decent fix

 

This is a non-issue if you shoot raw. I can't understand why anyone would shoot jpgs with a $5,000. camera. It pretty much turns it into an overpriced point & shoot.

 

There are things I would have implemented differently in the M8 if it was up to me but I could say that about any camera. I'd be happy to shoot the present firmware for the next 5 years so long as the camera continues to perform reliably which it has up until now (for me).

 

Of course if there are improvements in some future firmware release re: SD cards, IQ, noise or useability I'll be happy to take them but that's icing on the cake. I don't think there are to many photographers counting the days between software releases and whether the firmware is released this month or next will probably have 0 affect on Leica's credibility. Service and QC on products leaving the factory are the areas that will have the biggest impact on the issue of credibility. Firmware? not so much.

[Shootist]

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They're some of the best planes available today. This one is based on a Stanley Bedrock design manufactured about 100 years ago. I have some of these still in service and they're a real treat to use.

 

Larry

Your right they are one of a kind. I have 2 of the Stanley Bailey planes. A # 5, shown here, and a # 3 (I think, it's at my shop). The # 5 has seen 1000's of board feet of lumber. I've had the # 5 for over 30 years. It was given to me by the person I started in the carpentry business with.

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Shot with Chrome M8 & 75 Cron @ f/8

Now back to Leica.

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Ed come on over need a few doors planed down. LOL

[B&W]

This is a non-issue if you shoot raw. I can't understand why anyone would shoot jpgs with a $5,000. camera. It pretty much turns it into an overpriced point & shoot.

 

 

 

I don’t agree with you - it does matter!!

I do shoot RAW, but it helps, and takes less time in postproduction, if the WB is pretty much correct in the first place. And we should expect that Leica had figured it out by now.

[hankg]

I don’t agree with you - it does matter!!

I do shoot RAW, but it helps, and takes less time in postproduction, if the WB is pretty much correct in the first place. And we should expect that Leica had figured it out by now.

 

Although the M8 is worse then my Canon IDs in AWB I don't trust any camera when it comes to WB. Shoot a grey card which you can click on in C1 and apply to everything shot in a few seconds. If you have one or 2 frames that are off you can see them in the thumbnails and just apply the WB from a good frame. The amount of time is really trivial.

 

Now if I was an event photographer who shot thousands of frames jpeg which I would want to deliver to the client without processing I wouldn't be using an M8.

[B&W]

Although the M8 is worse then my Canon IDs in AWB I don't trust any camera when it comes to WB. Shoot a grey card which you can click on in C1 and apply to everything shot in a few seconds. If you have one or 2 frames that are off you can see them in the thumbnails and just apply the WB from a good frame. The amount of time is really trivial.

 

Now if I was an event photographer who shot thousands of frames jpeg which I would want to deliver to the client without processing I wouldn't be using an M8.

 

Hank, you never give up - do you?

I know the routine, and I use it. But I trust my 1d MkII more than my M8 in the matter of AWB - which is a shame.

[hankg]

Hank, you never give up - do you?

I know the routine, and I use it. But I trust my 1d MkII more than my M8 in the matter of AWB - which is a shame.

 

Yes the Canon does some things better then the M8 and the M8 does some things better then the Canon. It's not a shame it's pretty much what you would expect between various camera models. All things considered I'd rather have the M8 files to work with in post then the files from any of the Canon 1 series I have worked with ( not because there is anything wrong with the Canon files).

 

I just think all the hyperbole about Leica loosing credibility over this firmware update is overblown and over the top and while the AWB reliability is an issue it's frankly not that big a deal.

[barjohn]

Other than starting the thread, I have resisted responding to some of the comments, many of them oblique to the issue I have raised or personal attacks.

 

For me, it isn't a matter of whether the camera is capable of taking good or even excellent pictures under the right conditions and in the right hands. It never was. It is an issue of a company providing me what I paid for. I did not go through the long list of issues with the camera because they are documented in numerous posts; however, since this seems to be an issue I will enumerate a few in no particular order.

1. AWB

2. Venetian Blinds

3. Jumpy scroll wheel or showing prior shot rather than current

4. 8 bits vs 16 bits

5. Lens selection menu

6. Much better high ISO performance

7. Easier exposure compensation adjustment

8. SDHC support

9. Better flash performance and support

10. Recording of estimated f stop (optional for those that don't care)

 

To this list, I would add better reliability (we are still seeing posts of camera freeze and other gremlins), faster turn around on repairs/replacements and greater responsiveness of CS.

 

My $500 cameras and their manufacturers seem to have far fewer issues than the premier manufacturer that Leica is supposed to be when they are charging $5000. I think Leica has been able to do this because they are the only RF game in town. I certainly wouldn't tolerate this level of service on any of my luxury or high performance cars that I own or have owned. But there, I have numerous other options, in digital RF there is only one. Maybe the rumored Nikon RF will see the light of day and there will be healthy competition. I think it would change Leica's operations for the better.

 

I have seen some post that they manage software development and that it is hard and that Leica is doing the best that it can. I can't help but wonder if they manage their own shops that way. I never have and I don't now. If they actually run their shops that way, I hope their employers don't know as I wouldn't have them working for me very long no matter how talented they happen to be.

 

Finally, I have to wonder why they can release Ver 1.1.1 to some people and not to the rest of us when the people released to are not beta testers. What does this say about the way Leica feels about us? If it has caveats, so be it, no one has to load it though I didn't see any mentioned in the thread.

[okram]

I think Leica owes us fw that makes this camera to work impeccably- Leica legacy.

If I press a button on a camera, it should respond.

Thats why I agree that working with this camera for last 12 000 shots (btw I truly love my M8) was with a feeling that this camera doesnt work as it should.

 

I would also add to your list:

Green blob (reference pixels....)

Shorter wakeup time.

Play or menu button also should wake up camera from sleep.

 

For me the AWB is least of problems.

[nryn]

John, we're not dumb. The content of your post(s) is pretty clear. You feel that the money you paid for the camera hasn't provided the return you thought you were purchasing, either in the performance of the camera or the responsiveness of the company. OK. You feel that your cheaper cameras have fewer issues than your expensive camera. OK. You have high performance luxury sports cars and run a tight ship at work and you'd probably fire those "slackers" at Leica. Fine. You feel like Leica is exploiting a monopoly they have in a niche market. OK. You feel as if Leica doesn't like us by giving some people at an event access to firmware before the rest of us.

 

I just don't get the point of such posts, yours or others. Sure, I think you have every right to rant, but really, what do you get out of it? A sense of satisfaction that others know you're not happy? The hope that someone from Leica will read your posts and change the company's operational strategy? I mean, going over your posts, you discuss potential lawsuits, how the D3, Canon, and Nikon, may make Leica change their ways, and that both Leica and the M8 are counter to everything you've learned in your copious business, legal, and technical experience. So much of the time you've spent on this board seems to center around criticism. Seriously, John, why do you put up with it? As you're more than keen to reiterate, you've clearly done well for yourself in life; the time you've spent complaining on this board has to be worth many times over whatever investment you have in your camera gear.

 

As I mentioned before, I generally don't even dive into these threads, but we've seen these posts in such quantities that I thought I'd follow one to its death. I think I'll bail on that experiment now...the incessant whines have caused a slight tinnitus and it has made me irritable.

 

The best thing to come out of this thread was those photos of Stanley #5s

 

Anyway, hope 1.1whatever comes out this week. I give it 5 minutes before someone starts another the next round of "ways which Leica has hurt me". As a wise someone said earlier in the thread, we're our own worst enemies.

 

Ciao.

[SJP]

My view for what it's worth:

 

1. AWB - if it did not AWB at all that would not be an issue for me, I prefer to shoot raw with neutral i.e. daylight WB and post process the WB. Film never had AWB anyway & pre-set WB is fine as it is. I do not write jpg's at all as it slows everything down (including C repetition rate) and just uses surplus memory. Even the time to read the card gets longer - I really do not understand why you would want to make jpg's in one go.

2. Venetian Blinds - if you are checking all the time on the screen you are missing a lot of action. This minor bug was irritating but by now I know that the images are fine.

3. Jumpy scroll wheel or showing prior shot rather than current - ok that is irritating, I usually use the arrow keys which is more ergonomic anyway.

4. 8 bits vs 16 bits - non issue fo me IQ is good enough for me as it stands.

5. Lens selection menu - agree a generic focal length selector would be nice, menu option: select generic focal length and/or lens type manually on mounting non-6B coded lens. That would deal with the objection of Leica that you run the risk of using the wrong coding.

6. Much better high ISO performance - that looks to be getting better soon & current performance is outstanding already using C1.

7. Easier exposure compensation adjustment - non issue for me, Use A and lock on required exposure level works easily enough.

8. SDHC support - OK

9. Better flash performance and support - I do not intend using a flash anytime/anywhere so I can't comment.

10. Recording of estimated f stop (optional for those that don't care) - if possible OK

 

regards

Stephen

[Olsen]

Other than starting the thread, I have resisted responding to some of the comments, many of them oblique to the issue I have raised or personal attacks.

 

For me, it isn't a matter of whether the camera is capable of taking good or even excellent pictures under the right conditions and in the right hands. It never was. It is an issue of a company providing me what I paid for. I did not go through the long list of issues with the camera because they are documented in numerous posts; however, since this seems to be an issue I will enumerate a few in no particular order.

1. AWB

2. Venetian Blinds

3. Jumpy scroll wheel or showing prior shot rather than current

4. 8 bits vs 16 bits

5. Lens selection menu

6. Much better high ISO performance

7. Easier exposure compensation adjustment

8. SDHC support

9. Better flash performance and support

10. Recording of estimated f stop (optional for those that don't care)

 

To this list, I would add better reliability (we are still seeing posts of camera freeze and other gremlins), faster turn around on repairs/replacements and greater responsiveness of CS.

 

My $500 cameras and their manufacturers seem to have far fewer issues than the premier manufacturer that Leica is supposed to be when they are charging $5000. I think Leica has been able to do this because they are the only RF game in town. I certainly wouldn't tolerate this level of service on any of my luxury or high performance cars that I own or have owned. But there, I have numerous other options, in digital RF there is only one. Maybe the rumored Nikon RF will see the light of day and there will be healthy competition. I think it would change Leica's operations for the better.

 

I have seen some post that they manage software development and that it is hard and that Leica is doing the best that it can. I can't help but wonder if they manage their own shops that way. I never have and I don't now. If they actually run their shops that way, I hope their employers don't know as I wouldn't have them working for me very long no matter how talented they happen to be.

 

Finally, I have to wonder why they can release Ver 1.1.1 to some people and not to the rest of us when the people released to are not beta testers. What does this say about the way Leica feels about us? If it has caveats, so be it, no one has to load it though I didn't see any mentioned in the thread.

 

First of all; if you really have owned both 'high performance luxury cars' you would have experienced the low product quality & service and arrogant customer follow up is typical of them. So much for unfitting car alegories.

 

Going through your list I would put up as first priority;

 

1a. - 'higher reliability'. This is the first issue that scares people from even buying M8s. Leica must get to the bottom of this 'sudden death' problem. It has never happened to me, but I am scared of it.

 

1b - more reliable AWB. I am not at all sure that this is obtainable with a simple 'software upgrade'. We just might have to wait for the M9. Shoot RAW in the mean time.

 

2.Venetian blinds: Cut out the jpg files and shoot only RAW and make jpgs of them in Phase One. Then the jpg looks much better too. The problem is that the computer of the M8 is not large enough to handle both files 'flawlessly' at the same time. To get rid of it altogether; we need a M9 with a larger computer.

 

3. Jumpy scroll wheels. Is this such a big deal? Most digital cameras we have here in the house have such snags - not exactly as this, but my 1Ds II sometimes pick the wrong picture and so on. Again; I think it is caused by - indirectly - of a marginal computer capacity.

 

4. A 16 bit camera!? You are talking M9.

 

5. Lense selection menue. If you mean that Leica should do this to make it easier for their customers to use cheap Voigtländer optics you must be joking. You want Porsche turbo's on your Ferrari? I can almost hear the roar of laughter....

 

6. Much better high ISO performance. Agree. But here you are talking 'a better sensor'. M9.

 

7. Easier exposure compensation adjustment... -It is already damned easy! I have my M8 set so it is a 200ASA camera all the time. Still I can either override this by going manual or tip the camera up or down to manipulate the exposure setting. How better?

 

8. SDHC support. Could be fixed with an up date and it should be delivered to us 'right away'.

 

9.Better flash support etc. Agree! It suprises me that so many of the Leica shooters don't use flash more often.

 

10. Recording of estimated f stop. it is a good idea, but is it possible? If so, it is a 'new model feature'. M9

 

I would add:

 

11. Far better jpg files right out of the box which makes it faster to work with the camera in certain situations. But I reckon that this too is a feature that is difficult to fix by a software update. The root to the problem is the small computer.

 

You compare to 500$ cameras. Look up the new Canon G9. It is awful (now real wide angle, poor high ISO performance, soft corners, slow exposure and unpresise AF, jpgs with jagged lines and artifacts etc. etc) . That the price step up to M8 is gigantic, I can admit. But that is how things are in the photo world. You pay ten fold for an f stop and a small fortune for a range of obvious technical advantages.

[stunsworth]

Without SDHC support I can get just under 400 shots on a card. How many people really, really need more, and how did they ever manage with film cameras that only catered for a tenth of that?

[Jamie Roberts]

{snipped}

I did not go through the long list of issues with the camera because they are documented in numerous posts; however, since this seems to be an issue I will enumerate a few in no particular order.

1. AWB

2. Venetian Blinds

3. Jumpy scroll wheel or showing prior shot rather than current

4. 8 bits vs 16 bits

5. Lens selection menu

6. Much better high ISO performance

7. Easier exposure compensation adjustment

8. SDHC support

9. Better flash performance and support

10. Recording of estimated f stop (optional for those that don't care)

 

To this list, I would add better reliability (we are still seeing posts of camera freeze and other gremlins), faster turn around on repairs/replacements and greater responsiveness of CS.

 

My $500 cameras and their manufacturers seem to have far fewer issues than the premier manufacturer that Leica is supposed to be when they are charging $5000.{snipped}.

 

Your $500 camera is nothing like an M8 in terms of complexity or image quality. That is the point, actually: you don't get complexity and image quality without some engineering trouble.

 

I really don't know where you got the idea Leica owed you anything but a "working" camera that had a rangefinder and took M lenses. Let's take your "issues" one by one:

 

1. AWB

Yeah this is broken, though I'm with Hank on the usefulness of this anyway. If they never ever fix this I won't care. If I could tell them "stop work on something" this would be it. No camera gets white balance right automatically, though it's true the Canons are the best of breed here.

BTW--those of you who want better WB in your RAW files, just set the freaking thing before you shoot. It's still easier than shooting film

 

2. Venetian Blinds

A bug I'm sure will be fixed. Since it only happens very occasionally, it hasn't bothered me too much.

 

3. Jumpy scroll wheel or showing prior shot rather than current

Yep--the lack of buffer speed (hardware, I think) is really annoying. The scrolly-thing doesn't bother me since it only happens rarely.

 

4. 8 bits vs 16 bits

Arguably Leica is delivering this. The fact that you don't like how they're delivering it is your tough luck (and perhaps mine too; I wouldn't want the M8 to go "only uncompressed" thanks

 

5. Lens selection menu

Never promised nice-to-have. Has nothing to do with camera design or operation. Sorry.

 

6. Much better high ISO performance

Never promised. Sorry. Should have checked the DMR or a Nikon CCD first; buy a Canon if you want ISO 6400.

 

7. Easier exposure compensation adjustment

Huh? Working as designed. Sorry.

 

8. SDHC support

Never promised. Sorry.

 

9. Better flash performance and support

Working as designed. Go buy a Canon if you want ETTL.

 

10. Recording of estimated f stop (optional for those that don't care)

Ridiculous: almost impossible on non-coupled lenses and never promised by Leica.

 

So John, out of your 10 issues, there are actually three that Leica should or could or might be working on. The rest are "nice-to-haves" and I don't know what sense of entitlement makes you think you're going to get them.

 

The sudden death thing and lockups are the number one problems with the camera; I see you didn't list them because they're even more rare. They're also probably not a firmware thing.

 

And neither is lens focusing. So you're left with three things for Leica to get right, and they're all pretty minor to me, though I understand how a JPEG only shooter would need AWB.

 

But if you shoot JPEGs only, why the heck are you using any M8?

 

So there it is. As far as firmware goes, there really isn't a lot for them to fix, though I'd love lower noise (thank-you Leica if that is true!!) and SDHC support, though I don't expect it automatically.

 

I really do think you'd enjoy a 5d a tremendous amount more than an M8 (but not, of course, the 1d3 in the middle of a <gasp> hardware recall). I'm not saying that out of any meanness either. I just think you wanted a different camera than the one Leica promised and (mostly) delivered.

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[Jamie Roberts]

Without SDHC support I can get just under 400 shots on a card. How many people really, really need more, and how did they ever manage with film cameras that only catered for a tenth of that?

 

As a nice to have, I want it more for speed than capacity...