Leica M11 -purplish tint ???

[jhonzatkl]

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9 hours ago, don daniel said:

I appreciate those who report having had a good experience with color recalibration in Wetzlar. However, please excuse me—I’m still a bit skeptical and would like to see some photos, preferably taken in natural daylight. This could be under blue or gray skies, but they should include either skin tones, street scenes, or cityscapes with concrete buildings. The magenta bias of the M11 is not a matter of the RAW converter, as the JPGs straight out of the camera also suffer from it. This issue is not limited to the automatic white balance but also affects the relevant fixed settings.

Since the problem occurred mostly in these conditions, it was the first thing I tested after returning the camera from Wetzlar. And the difference in color rendering was significant. As these were only test photos, I have already deleted them, but if the conditions are right, I will gladly take some photos again and make them available.
I understand some skepticism, but at the same time I think there is no reason to believe that the users made up their "positive" experience or that it was some kind of "placebo" effect.

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[jaapv]

11 hours ago, don daniel said:

I appreciate those who report having had a good experience with color recalibration in Wetzlar. However, please excuse me—I’m still a bit skeptical and would like to see some photos, preferably taken in natural daylight. This could be under blue or gray skies, but they should include either skin tones, street scenes, or cityscapes with concrete buildings. The magenta bias of the M11 is not a matter of the RAW converter, as the JPGs straight out of the camera also suffer from it. This issue is not limited to the automatic white balance but also affects the relevant fixed settings.

Default raw conversion adjustment is not treating the cause (the parameters set in the firmware) but a viable and simple way of treating the symptoms. 

[hdmesa]

12 hours ago, don daniel said:

I appreciate those who report having had a good experience with color recalibration in Wetzlar. However, please excuse me—I’m still a bit skeptical and would like to see some photos, preferably taken in natural daylight. This could be under blue or gray skies, but they should include either skin tones, street scenes, or cityscapes with concrete buildings. The magenta bias of the M11 is not a matter of the RAW converter, as the JPGs straight out of the camera also suffer from it. This issue is not limited to the automatic white balance but also affects the relevant fixed settings.

A reasonable request, especially judging by the M11 images thread, where it's obvious some folks can't see it. Makes me cringe to see purple clouds in midday light.

An M11 I bought last year and the current M11-D that I have did not have a magenta bias in Auto WB. You can't really judge by the fixed Daylight setting in many environments and times of day, because Daylight can produce completely wrong results (sunrise/sunset for example). With the early production M11 copies I owned, I did have to use Daylight because Auto WB was so bad. Not any more.

Here's an example of decent Auto WB from my M11-D. It's not perfect, but it's as good as any camera's Auto WB gets in tricky light. Shifting tint slightly in either direction from what you see below results in an obviously green or purple tint, so this isn't a bad result, IMO. This same scene would have been saturated with magenta tint with some of my earlier copies of the M11 that I had. My M11-D Auto WB is one of the best I've ever used, perhaps falling slightly short of the Nikon Zf.

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Here's another one, which actually looks more true to life with more magenta (+2 tint) instead of the more green (-1 tint) that Auto WB used. Sunset is incredibly difficult for any camera's Auto WB to accurately measure, but so far, I've been very impressed by my M11-D. The result below is more like what I used to get with my M10-R than what I got with my earlier M11 copies.

 

Here is about as "off" as the Auto WB gets for me, which pales in comparison to how magenta the sky and road and gravel would have been with some of my previous M11 copies. Top image is Auto WB, bottom is my correction. Some of the magenta here could also be from the 28 Summaron at the edges versus the Auto WB. Midday light with grey concrete and large tan-colored areas is where the M11 Auto WB struggles the most – I call this poor lighting and would never shoot at this time of day, but street shooters and other genres do have to deal with it. 

 

Something else to keep in mind:

Edited November 20, 2024 by hdmesa

[don daniel]

vor 1 Stunde schrieb hdmesa:

 

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Thanks for sharing! This shot shows the problem very clearly. You can put as much magenta as you want in a sunset shot. But here it is as awful as in many of the latest examples in the M11 examples thread. The shot with the cloudy sky and snow seems okay to me.

[hdmesa]

3 minutes ago, don daniel said:

Thanks for sharing! This shot shows the problem very clearly. ...here it is as awful as in many of the latest examples in the M11 examples thread...

It's not near as bad as previous M11s I've had. All my Fujifilm cameras have that slight magenta bias in midday light as well. It's really no different than intentionally fooling the meter by shooting snow or large areas of shadow. Auto WB from any camera can be fooled by large areas of the same color in the frame.

3 minutes ago, don daniel said:

You can put as much magenta as you want in a sunset shot.

I disagree. Auto WB is very easily fooled by sunset light, giving extremely wrong interpretations that may vary wildly not only in tint but in temperature. My copy of the M11-D's Auto WB gives a very true to life rendition for me at sunset. Sure, some people try to falsely enhance their sunsets by adding magenta tint, but to me those are as glaringly bad as a midday shot with too much magenta.

[hdmesa]

One more to show blue sky in midday light per the request. 

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Edited November 20, 2024 by hdmesa

[hdmesa]

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Also like to post a sample from the Nikon Zf, one of the best Auto WB cameras I've ever used. Even it can get fooled into a slight magenta bias. I hate to post non-Leica photos here, but I feel like some fairness is due to the M11.

Top images of each set are Auto WB on the Zf, bottom images are corrected to what look neutral to me. Still, neither looks exactly right. My cat is grey, not magenta or green, lol.

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Auto WB can be useful, but it's not a perfect tool on any platform – just like auto exposure modes. The end responsibly lies with the user.

Edited November 20, 2024 by hdmesa
Added second example

[don daniel]

vor 12 Stunden schrieb hdmesa:

One more to show blue sky in midday light per the request. 

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This looks very good. I only get such a result after setting white balance with a grey card before I shoot. Can you confirm that this was made with AWB or with an fixed wb setting in the camera and not after setting wb manually?

[jhonzatkl]

I took a couple of sample photos this morning, hopefully they will be enough for some idea how the output looks like after calibration. They are all on AWB, full DNG files. Unfortunately I didn't manage to take more, because the weather is not so good (winter in central Europe is not a very photogenic thing).

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[CDodkin]

At the end of the day, AWB will always be a guesstimate of the correct WB, based on the image data available to the firmware in-camera at that time. Some cameras are better than others - but it doesn't change the facts - it's still a best guess WB.

You will get some AWB shots that look better than others, and you'll get some AWB shots that look way off - all depending on location, time of day, weather conditions, subject etc - many variables. It will change by latitude, which is really angle of the sun, so will also change seasonally as the sun progresses north or south.

If you want to keep guessing your WB in post - keep using AWB or any of the fixed WB settings, and trying to 'fix' it after the fact.

If you want to absolutely nail your WB every time, and get the most from your Leica's color, set custom WB in camera using a suitable target - I prefer Expodisc over a reflective WB target. This will get you as accurate a WB, per shot, as is possible. No guessing.

It's a similar argument to relying on a camera's built-in metering system, vs using a dedicated spot meter and your brain, to select your optimum exposure for any given shot.

You can use the 'auto' tech as a crutch, and get close - or you can nail it ever time by using your knowledge and experience and suitable techniques/equipment.

Horses for courses - I think it depends whether you're a casual shooter, or someone who strives for the best out of each shot. It takes a personal investment in time and process, vs just powering-on and pressing the shutter.

 

[CDodkin]

16 hours ago, hdmesa said:

One more to show blue sky in midday light per the request. 

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The grass and pathway really highlight the magenta cast on this image - No such issues using Expodisc and custom WB in Sedona last week

[hdmesa]

1 hour ago, CDodkin said:

The grass and pathway really highlight the magenta cast on this image - No such issues using Expodisc and custom WB in Sedona last week

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True, but for Auto WB with a lot of blue sky at around 6K' elevation, that was a pretty good result I got. It only needed to be changed from a tint of +0.2 to -0.5. And some might argue that change makes it look a bit "dead" with too much green. Sometimes accurate is not always the most attractive result.

Your Sedona shot looks spot-on. That's how my Zf shoots with Auto WB in midday light – perfectly neutral and without any extra tools or effort required.

 

[hdmesa]

5 hours ago, don daniel said:

This looks very good. I only get such a result after setting white balance with a grey card before I shoot. Can you confirm that this was made with AWB or with an fixed wb setting in the camera and not after setting wb manually?

So far I've only been using Auto WB with the M11-D. EXIF data below. This might be a long shot, but have you tried moving from evaluative metering modes like Multi Field or Highlight Weighted to more traditional metering modes like Center Weighted to see if it gives you better Auto WB results? 

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[don daniel]

vor 8 Stunden schrieb jhonzatkl:

I took a couple of sample photos this morning, hopefully they will be enough for some idea how the output looks like after calibration. They are all on AWB, full DNG files. Unfortunately I didn't manage to take more, because the weather is not so good (winter in central Europe is not a very photogenic thing).

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Thank you very much for these examples. Excellent! I wouldn’t have thought that this was possible with the M11 and that it could be so optimized simply through factory calibration. When I import these files into Lightroom, I get tint values between 10 and 13. Perfect! With my M11, in similar situations with natural light, I always get tint values over 20, often 23–25, with AWB and also with the fixed WB settings. And that’s just far too much magenta. But here, the result is fantastic!

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[hdmesa]

Something else to note. Seems that LRC is way more neutral than C1 with the M11-D files. On these, I changed both to Daylight. I may move back over to LRC just for this reason.

LRC Daylight:

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C1 Daylight:

[Smogg]

Leica should release a Purple Edition to match the output😀

[don daniel]

vor 9 Stunden schrieb hdmesa:

Something else to note. Seems that LRC is way more neutral than C1 with the M11-D files. On these, I changed both to Daylight. I may move back over to LRC just for this reason.

LRC Daylight:

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Now it's getting even more interesting. You're not showing us a neutral setting in Lightroom (LR) here, but rather a corrected daylight setting. In LR, this is always set to 5500K temperature and +10 tint. This doesn't help me, because it always adjusts the temperature as well – which is often too warm (yellowish cast) for sunny weather and too cool (bluish cast) for cloudy weather. If you're feeling bold, show us a screenshot of the truly uncorrected "As Shot" setting. 😁 I'd be curious to see the tint value there.

[Velo-city]

If WB was the only issue with my M11, I'd probably just learn to live with it and use the workarounds - which as long as you're using RAW and happy to process every image (often manually/visually) then it's fine even though it's unacceptable at any price level in 2024.

But when I combine all the other faults/flaws with the M11 design and implementation (even ignoring the cost), I think I'm reaching the conclusion that I won't have mine in 2025.  I think long-term Leica users have kindly called these many issues 'quirks' of owning an M (or perhaps other Leica cameras too) but for me there's just something 'wrong' feeling about the M11.  Two unreadable files in as many weeks is also just such a red flag. The Q3 43 that arrived at the same time has a couple of flaws (slow startup time for one) but just somehow feels more robust and better implemented, certainly the WB seems OK.

Glad I tried it, and will probably try again on the M12 if this one goes, but the M11..... beautiful RAW files, and lovely to look at as an object, but too many other 'quirks' for me.

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[pedaes]

1 hour ago, Velo-city said:

beautiful RAW files,

OK, so it achieves its main purpose in life, to take excellent images. I do not understand what faults/flaws you are seeing in November 2024. There are none in my experience with the camera. Coming from the M10 it is different and does take a while to get used to the different sounds and features. but it can equally be set up and used as a simple M camera. Sorry it hasn't worked for you.

[Smogg]

At the moment, the M11 firmware is quite functional. Yes, it is not perfect, it feels like the processor does not fully cope with the load, but unfortunately, there are no better alternatives on the market. In my opinion, after eliminating the freezes, the number of advantages in the M11 outweighs its disadvantages (magenta cast, glitches in the burst mode)