SL2-S Noise

[Sohail]

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I know this question has been asked to death but I'd really like to know how much cleaner noise-wise my images would be with the SL2-S. I took this image below with my SL2 and 50 'Lux SL at ISO 6400. The light was very challenging. I cleaned it up a little bit with Adobe Raw's AI feature. Without getting into a pixel-by-pixel comparison, how much shadow detail could I realistically have retrieved? If you could share similar images under similar light conditions, I'd be very grateful. 

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[helged]

My guess is 1.5 to 2 stop reduced shadow noise (or improved shadow image quality) in SL2-S compared to SL2. This is based on extensive use of SL2-S for 1.5 years; before that I used SL2. Personally, I am very happy with SL2-S.

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[Sohail]

Thanks. Yes, what I'm hearing. 

2 minutes ago, helged said:

My guess is 1.5 to 2 stop reduced shadow noise (or improved shadow image quality) in SL2-S compared to SL2. This is based on extensive use of SL2-S for 1.5 years; before that I used SL2. Personally, I am very happy with SL2-S.

Thanks. Yes, what I'm hearing. Do you have any real images? I've looked quite a bit at the SL2-S thread -- not many in really challenging light conditions.

[dpitt]

First of all, with F 1.4, I think that your shutter time has been quite short. Maybe shorter than necessary?

My tactic in challenging conditions is to set the camera to shutter priority or manual. Then set it to the minimum you need to get motion free images, like 1/15 or shorter depending on the camera and lens FL, or even the subject.

If you already are on ISO 6400, I am not sure how many stops you can still push the shadows. I do not own the SL2-S, but my TL2 would have a hard time with 1 - 2 stops. (2 stops would be ISO 25000). I think shooting it with longer shutter time will help more than cranking up the ISO value. (or shooting with the SL2-S)

If you want I can show you M8 images shot at F2.0, shot in a cave. I think I used ISO 160 and underexposed 4-5 stops. Best useable ISO with the M8 was around ISO400 and still they came out fine in PP.  Your SL2 should do much better than the M8 in these conditions.

[helged]

3 hours ago, Sohail said:

Thanks. Yes, what I'm hearing. 

Thanks. Yes, what I'm hearing. Do you have any real images? I've looked quite a bit at the SL2-S thread -- not many in really challenging light conditions.

Unfortunately, not. But @Chaemono has several examples (as far as I recall). 

[Sohail]

3 hours ago, dpitt said:

First of all, with F 1.4, I think that your shutter time has been quite short. Maybe shorter than necessary?

My tactic in challenging conditions is to set the camera to shutter priority or manual. Then set it to the minimum you need to get motion free images, like 1/15 or shorter depending on the camera and lens FL, or even the subject.

If you already are on ISO 6400, I am not sure how many stops you can still push the shadows. I do not own the SL2-S, but my TL2 would have a hard time with 1 - 2 stops. (2 stops would be ISO 25000). I think shooting it with longer shutter time will help more than cranking up the ISO value. (or shooting with the SL2-S)

If you want I can show you M8 images shot at F2.0, shot in a cave. I think I used ISO 160 and underexposed 4-5 stops. Best useable ISO with the M8 was around ISO400 and still they came out fine in PP.  Your SL2 should do much better than the M8 in these conditions.

That's interesting advice. I tend to set it at Aperture Priority. I suspect there's no movement in the cave, so that would make sense. But here it's a concert and there's some moment in the stringed instruments. I shot it 1/80 just enough. I'm shooting more tomorrow and might give it a go at 1/40.

[Sohail]

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3 hours ago, dpitt said:

If you want I can show you M8 images shot at F2.0, shot in a cave. I think I used ISO 160 and underexposed 4-5 stops. Best useable ISO with the M8 was around ISO400 and still they came out fine in PP.  Your SL2 should do much better than the M8 in these conditions.

Yes, I'm curious!

[Chaemono]

vor 4 Stunden schrieb Sohail:

Thanks. Yes, what I'm hearing. 

Thanks. Yes, what I'm hearing. Do you have any real images? I've looked quite a bit at the SL2-S thread -- not many in really challenging light conditions.

No direct comparisons with SL2 and SL2-S that I can post but S1 vs. S1R here where the files were manhandled truculently: https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-zZCDLz/

And high ISO SL2-S, S5, S1, α7 III here: https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-pFTMHP/

[dpitt]

@Sohail I found out that my cave pictures where shot in a more conventional way. I cranked up the ISO to 640 i.e. the maximum for in camera M8 color shots in DNG. Then I set my shutter time to 1/15 and shot this way. I disregarded the fact that most of these shots were almost completely dark on the back screen display, and just hoped for the best. Later, I discovered that setting the M8 at base ISO of 160 and add more in PP works even better.

The first shot is the DNG exported by C1P without changes.

M8 + Summicron 40 C at ISO 640 F2.0 and 1/15

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Edited October 6, 2023 by dpitt

[dpitt]

This is a quick edit of the shot above with just 2 changes in PP. I added +1 stop for the exposure overall. And then 'painted' in a bit of the shadows in a different layer with a +2 exposure setting. The picture can be improved and tweaked a bit more with denoise and such, when I take my time, but I think it is better to see the potential this way. I also brought up the public more than I would normally do, just to show what was hidden in the deep shadows.

M8 + Summicron 40 C at ISO 640 F2.0 and 1/15  edited

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[dpitt]

2 hours ago, Sohail said:

That's interesting advice. I tend to set it at Aperture Priority. I suspect there's no movement in the cave, so that would make sense. But here it's a concert and there's some moment in the stringed instruments. I shot it 1/80 just enough. I'm shooting more tomorrow and might give it a go at 1/40.

In normal lighting conditions, I use aperture priority too. I expose for the main subject and set the ISO (or use auto ISO) to make sure the exposure is good enough for handheld shooting (or the subjects movement)

I see why you wanted to use 1/80 to freeze any movement in this case. But because of that you had to crank up the ISO. In fact, I would not mind a little  bit of movement in the bow hands if that would give me a few extra stops.  Maybe 1/30 would have been the sweet spot, and that would give you almost 2 stops, so then it would have been the same result at ISO 1600 in stead of 6400. And with ISO 1600 you would have been able to push the shadows a bit more, because I think the SL2 at ISO 1600 is still very good.

With my M9 (or M8), I would have set this on ISO 160 and 1/30 in manual mode. With the SL 601,  on ISO 200 with 1/30 in shutter priority. This way I can shoot without movement blur when I am careful. And in PP I can see how much I really need to push. On the SL, I could shoot everything in ISO 1600 as well. But some scenes will require not as much pushing as others. In these scenes I would have wasted 1-2 stops of ISO values for nothing. So with my first method those images will look more like a ISO 400 shot, i.e. without noise, where a ISO 1600 shot might even have blown out highlights and heavy noise.

 

Edited October 6, 2023 by dpitt

[Photoworks]

11 hours ago, Sohail said:

I know this question has been asked to death but I'd really like to know how much cleaner noise-wise my images would be with the SL2-S. I took this image below with my SL2 and 50 'Lux SL at ISO 6400. The light was very challenging. I cleaned it up a little bit with Adobe Raw's AI feature. Without getting into a pixel-by-pixel comparison, how much shadow detail could I realistically have retrieved? If you could share similar images under similar light conditions, I'd be very grateful. 

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I think you got a great image here

For my taste I would have liked an image that has a little more luminosity, I think you may have pulled the recovery of the light to much.

SL2  does not like to be underexposed too much at 6400. it get noisy quickly, but I think it is better a noisy image than a blurry one.

In my test with SL2 at night, underexposing didn't result in clearer image, the contrary, shooting the same at 1600 and punching in post delivered more noise images.

SL2-s probably would be better on this occasion, but one you run it true Ai and resize it to 24MP I think you end up with the same image

 

[Sohail]

3 hours ago, Photoworks said:

I think you got a great image here

For my taste I would have liked an image that has a little more luminosity, I think you may have pulled the recovery of the light to much.

SL2  does not like to be underexposed too much at 6400. it get noisy quickly, but I think it is better a noisy image than a blurry one.

In my test with SL2 at night, underexposing didn't result in clearer image, the contrary, shooting the same at 1600 and punching in post delivered more noise images.

SL2-s probably would be better on this occasion, but one you run it true Ai and resize it to 24MP I think you end up with the same image

 

I'd like to have made the image brighter but I couldn't take it much further. Like you said, it gets very noisy. 

[Chaemono]

vor einer Stunde schrieb Sohail:

I'd like to have made the image brighter but I couldn't take it much further. Like you said, it gets very noisy. 

That’s where the SL2-S comes in. 

[Sohail]

Last night:

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SL2 +28/2 SL @6400 ISO 1/60 (after denoising in Adobe Raw)

SL2 +50/1.4 SL @6400 ISO 1/100 (after denoising in Adobe Raw)

SL2 +90/2 SL @6400 ISO 1/50 (after denoising in Adobe Raw)

I need to get my hands on an SL2-S.

Edited October 8, 2023 by Sohail

[Kim Dahl]

1 hour ago, Sohail said:

Last night:

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SL2 +28/2 SL @6400 ISO 1/60 (after denoising in Adobe Raw)

SL2 +50/1.4 SL @6400 ISO 1/100 (after denoising in Adobe Raw)

SL2 +90/2 SL @6400 ISO 1/50 (after denoising in Adobe Raw)

I need to get my hands on an SL2-S.

A piece of advice can also be to wait - perhaps a short time - for SL3. Maybe it has the same censor as M11 and Q3…. Q3 is better than the SL2 in the shadows and an improvement in noise at high iso. And probably more improvements.

Edited October 8, 2023 by Kim Dahl

[Sohail]

10 minutes ago, Kim Dahl said:

A piece of advice can also be to wait - perhaps a short time - for SL3. Maybe it has the same censor as M11 and Q3…. Q3 is better than the SL2 in the shadows and an improvement in noise at high iso. And probably more improvements.

Yes, but is the M11/Q3 better than the SL2-S? It's better than the SL2 for sure.

[Kim Dahl]

I have not tried the SL2-S. Maybe others know ? I don't think so, but it is also "only 24 MP. In return, there is a good offer right now on SL series

Edited October 8, 2023 by Kim Dahl

[Chaemono]

vor 23 Minuten schrieb Sohail:

Yes, but is the M11/Q3 better than the SL2-S? It's better than the SL2 for sure.

What I can I say is, that I kept the M10M after I got the M11M because I don‘t feel as comfortable with the pushed shadows noise of the M11M at ISO 12500/25000 as I do with the M10M and the latter doesn’t even have a BSI sensor. No M11M comparable picture here https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-hv4mvG/ I still need to test this hypothesis more carefully.

I disagree with Sean Reid‘s findings on the high ISO noise advantage of the M11M over the M10M BTW. 

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica L-Mount

[Sohail]

Black and white photography is a different ballgame though.