Not sure i will fix it.

[davidada]

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I for one can live with the IR filters, hopefully the streaking issue is a fix without affecting sensor quality.

What I do not want at any cost is a loss of sensor detail and sharpness, it is this that I love about the M8 over all other DSLR's.

This is an exceptional camera as is.

The only photographers that in my opinion would not want this camera in its present state are those who require in camera ready files with no post capture processing.

I think we tend to forget the methodology of wet photography.

The film processing and the rigours one had to apply to get clean well balanced negatives. Then into the darkroom to select the correct paper grade , dodge and burn, choose the correct filtration, make sure the developers and fix were at the correct temperature and freshness. All of this very enjoyable to those who love it, however, hardly a quick image making process.

So if I have to process my file through C1 and make a few photoshop adjustments to end up with a file that is clearly superior to any 35mm stock it is hardly a chore.

Love this camera!

[Guest guy_mancuso]

David you coming from a large format printer and photographer your point rides the same thoughts that i am having. i only shoot raw and work the files anyway, so this magenta cast part of the problems may not be such a bad thing if i can keep the crispness from the capture. This sucker is sharp as hell, i am amazed when i pull up a file. Frankly the micro detail in these images are something to behold

[chetccox]

Just a thought, and perhaps it has been addressed before. I took quite a few photos today as the sun was out here in Warsaw. I left the white balance on auto, and every picture, many even taken seconds apart in basically the same direction, had severe white balance issues. Some came out at 7500k, and others at 3600k. They were all correctable, but it seems that those that exhibited the most IR magenta problems also had the worst white balance. Has this proven true when using the IR filter? I have not yet been able to find a filter so I can't experiment, but it is my theory that the IR filter may aid in fixing the white balance issues. Guy would be able to answer this as he has taken many pictures outside and has the filters. This shift in the white balance due to IR also seems logical to me but I may be way off base here with my little experience in color balance issues.

[hestoft]

Guy and others,

 

Now that there seems to be two potential solutions to the IR issue (filters and the JHR profiles) have people found that there is a sharpness benefit to actually using the filters?

 

There had been talk that the filters seemed to allow the sensor to render more detail and sharpness but has this been verified with testing? I have filters on order, like everyone else, but am worried about the "eye of Mordor" problem and would prefer a software solution. That said, I would use filters all the time if there was a great sharpness benefit, since that is why I bought the camera in the first place.

 

Ralf-Finn Hestoft

HESTOFT | flash detection

[mwilliamsphotography]

I wonder what could be pulled out of DMR files if everyone obsessed about them also.

 

Can't chalk up all the differences to lenses. The R90AA is no slouch. And the long APO glass has no equal in M land.

 

If Jamie's C-1 profiles hold true for a majority of general shooting, then using a couple of IR filters for weddings is no sweat. I generally confine that to 2 or 3 focal lengths anyway.

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Just a thought, and perhaps it has been addressed before. I took quite a few photos today as the sun was out here in Warsaw. I left the white balance on auto, and every picture, many even taken seconds apart in basically the same direction, had severe white balance issues. Some came out at 7500k, and others at 3600k. They were all correctable, but it seems that those that exhibited the most IR magenta problems also had the worst white balance. Has this proven true when using the IR filter? I have not yet been able to find a filter so I can't experiment, but it is my theory that the IR filter may aid in fixing the white balance issues. Guy would be able to answer this as he has taken many pictures outside and has the filters. This shift in the white balance due to IR also seems logical to me but I may be way off base here with my little experience in color balance issues.

 

 

Chet I have not checked this but certainly can be very valid because IR transmission does change and even different times of the day and also what is reflecting off the subject, good point . Until the AWB is fixed though and really always set the camera for daylight because it will always render at a certain color temp or kelvin temp if you will , so regardless of the IR if you want to be consistent than go right for the color of light and set it. AWB is a crap shoot at best for all camera's some are better and some are worse , in this case the m8. But that is a test we need to look at with the IR filter.

[Guest guy_mancuso]

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I wonder what could be pulled out of DMR files if everyone obsessed about them also.

 

Can't chalk up all the differences to lenses. The R90AA is no slouch. And the long APO glass has no equal in M land.

 

If Jamie's C-1 profiles hold true for a majority of general shooting, then using a couple of IR filters for weddings is no sweat. I generally confine that to 2 or 3 focal lengths anyway.

 

 

Marc to me the DMR is the modern day Kodachrome. They just have that color and smoothness of tone. Reason I said profile the M8 right to the DMR color charts, It would make my day if we could do that. But there is something about the DMR that is sharp and smooth and more important has that leica look that we drool over. Marc as you know from MF it is a cleverly disquised MF camera with a lower pixel count.

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Guy and others,

 

Now that there seems to be two potential solutions to the IR issue (filters and the JHR profiles) have people found that there is a sharpness benefit to actually using the filters?

 

There had been talk that the filters seemed to allow the sensor to render more detail and sharpness but has this been verified with testing? I have filters on order, like everyone else, but am worried about the "eye of Mordor" problem and would prefer a software solution. That said, I would use filters all the time if there was a great sharpness benefit, since that is why I bought the camera in the first place.

 

Ralf-Finn Hestoft

HESTOFT | flash detection

 

 

I think there is a sharpness edge but I need to prove that to be certain of it. The M8 and the M lenses has tremendous sharpness and it maybe really hard to tell the difference but certainly worth testing

[PhilFarber]

Hi all... sorry this is my 1st post and I'm not sure if this is the right place to put this.

I was able to purchase slightly larger filters for my lenses and had them ground to the correct size by my optomotrist office. I purchased used uv filters to get the proper ring sizes (about $6 each) and put them in. The IR filters have certainly improved the color form both my M8 and my RD1. I also love the ability to remove them and put my IR (visible light blocking filter) on and have a great IR camera that is much more sensitive then my Fuji S3 IR camera. I would like to get the banding fixed, but not so sure I would give up the ability to have such a great double purpose camera.

I do have one problem though with the wider lenses (my 21mm) and hope the firmware update will fix the cyan corners and the magenta middle. What I get with that lens looks exactly like the files from my early Kodak 14n before they added the lens optimization to the camera. I hope Leica is able to do the same.

Today I will shoot my 1st event with the camera since I got all the filters. I am very confident since testing. The colors look better than my D2hs files without the filter. The filters did also help my D2hs when I tried them on it. Well time to take the plunge.

[jonoslack]

Hi Guy

I've been thinking along exactly the same lines.

For me, I do very little colour work indoors, and the results I've been getting out of doors are a serious revalation.

I also agree that this was a decision Leica understood, and didn't come to lightly - the banding/green spots/ and crazy white balance ought to be sorted, but the IR is a different issue.

One thing I'm sure of - I won't be sending mine off in the first rush - it does what I want of it already, and after 1000 shots I've only seen 2 with banding, and none with IR problems.

Not to deny the issues - simply a step backwards. I just hope that Leica aren't bumped into 'sorting' it by sacrificing the wonderful detail.

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Jono some of my rambling thoughts also are to use the IR filter indoors were the IR is strong and i always run into the blacks like the wedding shooters have to deal with i deal with suits also and black drop curtains and such but outdoors i may take them off and just go the software route there. I do like the camera outdoors without the IR also and with the IR from what i seen there is some strange color. So maybe this is a two fold issue. I think we all need more time with this. I also dais this early on this crap takes time and as new owners grab there M8 i need to remind them of this. It took awhile to get the handle of the DMR and the M8 is actually more complex with the IR filter so we need to get our systems down and try different things.

 

Actually guys this is pretty wild how we can chnage things to fit your needs

[bill vann]

I've played with a few of Jono's files and a few hastily shot poor frames from a leica day.

 

i am blown away with the files and fear anything they do. i've tried everywhere for a new one from the current batch but can't find one. won't but one used as with AMEX i get an extra year warranty that saved me ~$2000 for a repair on my kodak SLR/c.

 

i'm currently printing a 24x35 or one of Jono's beautiful shots using some of David's techniques. Thank you david alien blowup seems a great tool, much better than PS or fractals (when i last tried) or some of the other tools i've used.

 

while i've managed to poop my color setting fooling around with an epson i just set up with the MIS 7 ink B&W set , the M8 IQ is amazing.

 

I will reprint with the correct profile in a bit. fwiw 24x35 seems a no brainer for the M8 files from a typical viewing distance. peeping isn't bad either.

 

I am very impressed.

 

bill

 

Jono i can see every spill and spot on your table top!

[KM-25]

Love my career, have a great life, live in a little ski town, well known and loved, love them all back. I own an M6 and just two lenses, aspherics. It is beautiful out. I have a wonderful woman looking across the top of her imac ( designer ) at me and smiling. I am sitting here reading this wondering how you guys can do it....

 

Honestly...

 

How can you post thousands of posts on a little box of electronics when there are so many images to be made, so much fresh air to be breathed and loved ones to be loved?

 

The digital cameras will sit at home today. The M6 with Kodachrome will come with me and my girlfriend as we take in the day on this fine weekend....away from the digital world and embrace what is truly the real one.

 

If I had an M8 and I was as distracted away from the real world by it as much as you are, I would get rid of it, end of story.

 

....Life.....is real.

[drjon]

Well, life is what we make of it and, clearly, in your case, does consist in part of scanning thousands of posts prompting your entirely patronising and unecessary message. If you had sought perspective by contrasting magenta issues, the M8, and what real life consists of for many right now in places ranging from Iraq, to Lebanon to the Sudan and and and...I might have found such a comparison at least acceptable in principle. I suggest you count your blessings and embrace them - in private; I think the rest of us don't need lessons in perspective - photographic or othewise.

 

If you do condescend to rejoin us no-lifers here in the virtual world, maybe you can initiate a homilies thread and if we get time off debating the M8 we will join it.

[sean_reid]

As Guy mentioned, he and I speak almost daily about the M8. I've summarized my current feelings/understanding about the camera in Part Four of the review series (and in previous sections) but I'll recap them here, for what it's worth. Please note that the following is *not* necessarily based on official information from Leica but rather is my distillation/hypotheses based on what I know and upon my own experience. It took me some time to settle on some of the following and I, of course, accept the possibility that I may be wrong.

 

1) I believe that the light streaking issues will be resolved by Leica via firmware and/or hardware repairs. I most suspect a manufacturing or design mistake is the root of this and that it was not intentional or expected.

 

2) I suspect that it is not possible to have a strong IR filter mounted in front of the M8 sensor without degrading optical performance. I don't foresee any fixes for the M8 that would involved adding either another internal filter or coatings to the filter that is now in front of the sensor. I think Leica made a very conscious choice about the elements that would be included in the optical path from the lens to the sensor. What's not clear to me is how well they understood how broad a range of photography would be affected by this IR sensitivity. I also suspect that a number of people at Leica did not realize how sensitive to IR this camera would be. Again, this is my *conjecture* only.

 

I do believe that they should have known about the IR sensitivity and that it should have been explained to the public before the camera's release. I here agree with Erwin Puts that Leica should have explained that certain design compromises were needed to create the best possible digital M. I strongly suspect that, all things considered, the path of:

external IR filter > lens > .5 mm cover > microlenses > sensor

probably does yield better quality overall than the path of

lens > thicker filter that filters IR > microlenses > sensor

 

In other words, adding a strong IR filter in front of the sensor probably would be a mistake if one considers all factors. I'm not an engineer, however, so this is only my hypothesis for now.

 

Leica's mistake, I suspect, was either in not fully understanding the IR-based color problems or in not communicating them well to the public before the camera's release (or a bit of both). The design itself is probably not a mistake even though it does require external IR filters be used. They should have known that external filters would be needed and this aspect should have been part of all press materials, brochures, web site information, etc. They needed to explain this design to the public from the start. Again, though, I don't know who knew what when at Leica.

 

3) Lastly, I greatly admire the work that Jamie and others have done in trying to develop a profile to deal with the color cast. My hat is truly off the Jamie in particular. That said, and as I've said in Part Four, I agree with Thomas Knoll (as well as other color experts I've spoken to) that even the best profile in the world can't fully correct color casts that are created by IR. The reason for this is that IR reflectance varies so much from material to material. There's no way for a profile to know that a given part of the subject was made from cardboard, another part from wool, another from nylon, etc. I had hoped for a profile solution early on, was trying to tie one to white balance, etc. but I now believe that while an excellent profile can get us much closer to accurate color with the M8 (when no IR filter is used) it won't be able to bring us all the way there. The source of the problem is IR reflectance and the solution is itself IR reflectance. The subject reflects IR towards the lens, the 486 filter reflects it back so that it doesn't reach the sensor. It's an IR solution for an IR problem. Again, I am not an expert or an engineer by any stretch of the imagination but this is my understanding of what needs to happen. Once that IR is filtered, however, a good profile is very relevant.

 

It is relevant to consider that the R-D1 also records a noticeable amount of IR. What that suggest to me, beginning when I was first able to confirm it in testing, was that Epson also realized that there was only so much they could do to filter IR without compromising the optical path in that camera. The R-D1 filters more IR than the M8 but it does not perform nearly as well as the M8 with certain wide angle lenses, despite using a smaller sensor that uses less of the image circle. That's not a knock on the R-D1 (which I still own and love) it's just a fact. One member of the forum was very concerned that I discussed this issue with the R-D1 but the fact is that better understanding the R-D1 can, in some respects, help us to better understand the M8.

 

Cheers,

 

Sean

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Well said and summerized very well. You do write better than me any day of the week. ROTFLMAO

[sean_reid]

Well said and summerized very well. You do write better than me any day of the week. ROTFLMAO

 

My writing has a long way to go before it's really good but thanks anyway. I really enjoy the writing style in many of your posts....they're kind of like an explorer returning from a really good trip or a kid opening Christmas presents. He's so excited by what he's discovered that he can hardly get all his thoughts into words so they all spill out in this stream of energy and enthusiasm. It's a lot of fun because your passion for all of this often just bubbles over in your posts...

 

That's my take at least. As I said, I really enjoy it.

 

And now back to the M8.

 

Cheers,

 

Sean

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Thanks I do appreciate that, It's fun to explore and learn

[osera]

Sean- Nice assessment of the situation. Rings true to me.

 

So assuming that the filter does become one of the solutions for color imaging, how do we go about coming up with or obtaining improved "filter on" professionally constructed profiles? Do we wait for C1 to update theirs?

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[canlogic]

I agree if whatever the fix will be, if it means a negative impact in some other aspect of the image I will not have it done. So far none of the problems have affected me and the areas that i can see having some impact can be corrected with the filters. I very seldom do weddings or images where the magenta issue would really be a problem. I am hoping that the majority of problems can be fixed with a firmware update and filters. I think that Leica should provide the filters for free though. I shoot birds with a 1DMKII and 500mm combo and also use a 5D for everything else (until I got the M8) and find the image quality is outstanding from the M8. So far in the limited examples I have tried I think the M8 images are better than the 5D at large print sizes. I don't know how much of this is the quality of the lenses but I use only "L" lenses on my Canons. I read something once that the sensors on the 5D and the 1DSMKII could actually out resolve the lenses that Canon make. I don't know how much truth there is in that but maybe that is one of the reasons the M8 images are so good. Just a thought.