Very Low Light Stuff

[yanidel]

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I like the mood yet technically there is too much banding on the top part of the pictures

[AlanG]

All of these people are in the witness protection program, right?

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[farnz]

All of these people are in the witness protection program, right?

:D

[ChrisC]

.... from a recent wedding. Taken in a VERY dark room......I like the end result using 2500 mostly but I would like other views....

 

Guy - I find the pictures heavy handed; far too dark in the low tones, and badly blown in the brightest highlights. They remind me of the TV film trick of underexposing shots in good light to express sunset, and I don't believe the guests were in the near darkness the image tones suggest. Despite your desire for available light shooting I think these samples demonstrate that fill-in flash was needed [it should be subtle], or maybe a better low-light camera. Horses for courses, right tool for the job etc etc.

 

................... Chris

[marknorton]

This place was the hot bed (in more ways than one) of a political sex scandal in the 1960s when a UK Government Defence Minister, John Profumo, had an affair with Christine Keeler who was also sharing pillow talk with a Russian spy, Yevgeny Ivanov...

 

These pictures look more like a funeral wake than a wedding, though the DR challenges of the bright light and dark shadows are always going to be a problem. Sorry, but the noise is obtrusive and the M8 is out of its depth here. At least if you'd had an M8.2, the guests might not have heard you proving the fact.

 

Compared to shooting with a 24mm f2.8 at a noisy ISO 2500, the "plasticky" images from the Nikon D3 and 28mm f1.4 have a full 5 stops noise advantage and it shoots a bit wider as well. True, that lens is not in the 24mm Elmarit league but the noise seems to be contributing as much to the perceived sharpness as the lens does.

 

The new 24mm Summilux would give you a two stops advantage and so offer some improvement but what we all hope for in a future camera is a lower noise, larger format sensor.

[epand56]

Here are a couple of them with some NeatImage and a bit of shadow opening. I found the original versions distractingly dark and contrasty.

 

This grainy they seem way too much pictures badly scanned from an old magazine IMO. Maybe in this case i prefer the german-expressionist-movie look of the originals. However, they do not definitely look or have the mood of wedding pictures. I'm sure that even it that dim light there are lenses capable of a far cheerful result on an M8.

[plasticman]

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A wedding is such a precious and (hopefully) unique occasion in a family's life: a day that can't be repeated, with joyful and special memories that are captured not only for all the participants, but even for the generations to come. Images that the couple, their parents and even their children should be able to pore over with pleasure in years to come.

A few times I've been asked by friends or family to document their day, and when I do, I consider the undertaking both an honor and an extremely onerous responsibility. Even though this is something I'll do without any payment, I always make sure I have at least one backup camera, and I'm extremely relieved when I see others taking photographs or filming the proceedings - just in case something should go wrong with my images.

 

Coincidentally, this weekend I was doing my best at a small family wedding, where the reception was also in a dark room - the first image shows how dark the room was when I photographed from outside, and the second image was captured in the same light, and then brightened considerably in PS. Most of the light in the room came from the candles, with some spillover from the lamps in the other rooms on either side. Looking at the brightness of the lamps in the OP's images, and the harsh illumination on the participant's faces, I wouldn't say that that room was so much darker than in these images below. I used the RD1s at ISO 400 and with it my 'travel-Nocti' the Canon 50 1,2.

 

I would say that the responsibility of a professional photographer that is *entrusted* by a family to capture and preserve their very, very precious day is one of the most important that a pro photographer can have. The implicit disrespect of the terminology (the 'punters'), and the gross misplacement of the role that a photographer should have on such occasion ('educating' them to appreciate one-eyed gargoyles and funereal effects more appropriate to an illustration of Dante's Ninth Circle of Hell than a joyful wedding), borders in my opinion not only on the disgraceful, but on the actionable.

 

(As a number of participants think my contributions are mostly negative I tend not to post here any longer - seeing these images made me too angry to restrain myself, but I'll try to refrain from contributing again until I can find something positive to say. For good (or even great) use of the M8 for weddings see Sean Reid, Riccis, Jamie Roberts and many others. These gentlemen do not feel the need to 'educate the punters' when they are given the immense and onerous trust to capture a unique and beautiful event).

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[akiralx]

Being critical , but meaning no offense, I find nothing to like about the photos. They are under-exposed, very grainy, and several of the highlights( like the lamp ) are completely blown. Perhaps this is intentional, and perhaps the grain adds mood, but not for me. Regards. DR

 

Agreed. Plus I assume he converted them to black and white because in colour the noise would have made them unusable.

 

I hope the client has never seen the output in similar conditions from a Nikon D3...

[jaapv]

A wedding is such a precious and (hopefully) unique occasion in a family's life: a day that can't be repeated, with joyful and special memories that are captured not only for all the participants, but even for the generations to come. Images that the couple, their parents and even their children should be able to pore over with pleasure in years to come.

A few times I've been asked by friends or family to document their day, and when I do, I consider the undertaking both an honor and an extremely onerous responsibility. Even though this is something I'll do without any payment, I always make sure I have at least one backup camera, and I'm extremely relieved when I see others taking photographs or filming the proceedings - just in case something should go wrong with my images.

 

Coincidentally, this weekend I was doing my best at a small family wedding, where the reception was also in a dark room - the first image shows how dark the room was when I photographed from outside, and the second image was captured in the same light, and then brightened considerably in PS. Most of the light in the room came from the candles, with some spillover from the lamps in the other rooms on either side. Looking at the brightness of the lamps in the OP's images, and the harsh illumination on the participant's faces, I wouldn't say that that room was so much darker than in these images below. I used the RD1s at ISO 400 and with it my 'travel-Nocti' the Canon 50 1,2.

 

I would say that the responsibility of a professional photographer that is *entrusted* by a family to capture and preserve their very, very precious day is one of the most important that a pro photographer can have. The implicit disrespect of the terminology (the 'punters'), and the gross misplacement of the role that a photographer should have on such occasion ('educating' them to appreciate one-eyed gargoyles and funereal effects more appropriate to an illustration of Dante's Ninth Circle of Hell than a joyful wedding), borders in my opinion not only on the disgraceful, but on the actionable.

 

(As a number of participants think my contributions are mostly negative I tend not to post here any longer - seeing these images made me too angry to restrain myself, but I'll try to refrain from contributing again until I can find something positive to say. For good (or even great) use of the M8 for weddings see Sean Reid, Riccis, Jamie Roberts and many others. These gentlemen do not feel the need to 'educate the punters' when they are given the immense and onerous trust to capture a unique and beautiful event).

 

 

There is negative and negative, Mani. I would call this one positive-negative;) as it is supported by evidence of your conviction. Btw, if the RD-1 did this at ISO 400, the M8 would have been perfectly all right at ISO 640 - and with more appealing colour and contrast to boot. These have some magenta shift. An IR cut filter would have helped.

 

I agree about your remark about clients. I did a 80 year birthday party some time ago, using a Digilux2 for colour and M6TTL for B&W (FP5 back then). Guess what the guests preferred - Only the colour stuff, but I thought the B&W was "better".

[Guest stnami]

How do we educate the punters out there that these are better than plasticky over worked files from Nikon and Canon?

.... I would say that you are in dire need of an education in social skills, maybe you should consider tempering your arrogance to others' needs and opinions. Educating yourself in some of the aspects the finer art of PP wouldn't go astray

[plasticman]

Jaap - contrast and color can naturally be adjusted in post. I didn't want to manipulate the initially uploaded images other than to lighten the image of the girls drawing (which I did to show that the shadow information was there, and survived brightening) because the point I was trying to make did not concern testing photoshop skills, but was to do with the responsible choice of tools for a professional photographer, and an hubristic attitude to equipment which I felt bordered on reprehensible.

 

In any case, I beg to differ on your comparison of high-ISO performance between the Epson and the M8 - but I do understand your attempt to derail the thread into a discussion that distracts from the original horrible performance of the M8 when used inappropriately.

 

PS: a fifteen-second curves change:

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[jaapv]

Mani, key word - inappropriately - I am quite capable of getting horrible results by doing that with any camera at all. In your image you can see how the RD1 turns the native noise of the CCD into aquarel-like drawing, an effect that can be quite nice, but is better done at will in PP imo, and not without user choice in the camera..

 

 

 

As it happens, I just posted a deliberate 1250 shot in the Photo-forum. I would not have liked to take it with a camera with in-camera noise reduction...

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[Gentleman Villain]

Here are a few from a recent wedding. Taken in a VERY dark room at Cliveden House the other day.

 

I like the end result using 2500 mostly but I would like other views, please.

 

How do we educate the punters out there that these are better than plasticky over worked files from Nikon and Canon?

 

Thank you.

 

Guy

 

Thanks for posting the pictures. It's interesting to see what the Leica + lens can do at 2500. Also, I agree with you about the plastic look to noiseware files. I hate that look too

[SJP]

What I have seen on Craig's website his wedding photo's look impressive enough. I agree that 2500 iso is pretty tough going to get anything close to acceptable. But the pictures he posted could work in the framework of a whole reportage.

 

As an example of my experiences see 2500 iso - a set on Flickr or slideshow taken at this place Ancien Cinema

 

This is what I managed to squeeze out at 2500 iso (yes it was pitch dark) after considerable tweaking with C1LE. A few pics are OK-ish the rest is more for memory's sake rather than anything else. Also operator error was involved - after too many glasses of beer I forgot to set EV to zero (I had it at -2/3, before FW 2.00) so they also suffer from being underexposed. 2500 ISO does not like underexposure one bit. B/W or sepia helps to some extent if the banding & noise gets too horrible, also setting low color saturation can work.

[wattsy]

I would say that the responsibility of a professional photographer that is *entrusted* by a family to capture and preserve their very, very precious day is one of the most important that a pro photographer can have.

 

borders in my opinion not only on the disgraceful, but on the actionable.

 

Before you get too carried away it's worth pointing out that you have no idea what the OP's clients were expecting for their wedding photography. It's also fair to assume that Guy may have taken other more mainstream shots that the client is happy with. I think he was posting these here just to get an opinion or two - not get anyone in a lather about the injustice of it all. The horror! the horror!..

[geoffreyg]

Back to the original images - there is a difference among them. The first image shows well the darkened haracter of the room, and seems (to my eye) to work well with it. The other images make the room look more normally lit, but just grainy and underexposed.

 

I prefer th efirst image for capturing the character of the moment. Somehow, it makes one feel as if that place is familiar and we've been there...albeit darkly lit.

 

The other images flatten out that impression, and lose it (for me). Still, a worthwhile discussion.

[geoffreyg]

Back to the original images - there is a difference among them. The first image shows well the darkened character of the room, and seems (to my eye) to work well with it. The other images give the impression of a room more normally lit, just grainy and underexposed.

 

I prefer the first image a great deal more for capturing the character of the moment. Somehow, it makes one feel as if that place is familiar and we've been there...albeit darkly. It conveys mood well.

 

The other images flatten out that impression, and lose it (for me). Still, a worthwhile discussion.

[plasticman]

Jaap - as I said, this thread isn't a competition between the RD1s and the M8. You happen to be wrong about the 'watercolor' effect of the Epson, as the files tend to be very fine-grained even at higher ISOs, but in this case the blurriness at low-light is as much to do with camera shake as with the extreme softness of the Canon lens (which I happen to like at the moment - preferring the flattering effect for portraits even over the Noctilux.

 

Your portrait is very good incidentally - lovely grain accentuating the character of the subject - and totally appropriate use of the camera (not exactly a low-light shot though).

 

As for the (anticipated) personal jibes at what I said from others - I genuinely doubt that the family in question requested gargoyle portraits to remember their special day. I'm sorry if you think my indignation is feigned. I guess you also think the 'punters' need 'educating'.

 

And now it's time as usual to bow out again, as I see that the personal insults have begun to fly...

[Guest stnami]

It is like pulling teeth with the trench warfare mob around here.....................

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[Photoskeptic]

I like the mood of the first image. The others are overdone and demonstrate the worst of the high ISO, low light (and probably post processing) problems some complain about. I've never used anything higher than 640 except once just to see what happened. OTOH, I don't shoot high ISO with film or digital because it's not my style. I think blaming the lens is the least of the problems exhibited in these photos.