brianpe Posted September 9, 2009 Share #1  Posted September 9, 2009 Advertisement (gone after registration) I dropped by my Leica dealer this afteroon to take a peek at the M9. My impression is that it is a more polished M8. The controls felt a bit smoother than on my M8, and the new firmware has many improvements. But my decision point hinges on the M9's noise levels at high ISO. I shoot a lot at night, often in smokey bars where my 35lux struggles to penetrate the gloom. On my M8, I never go past 640 because beyond that the noise and color is bad for all but the most perfect exposures.  I tested my M8 side-by-side with the M9, exposed in RAW, at ISO 1250, 1600, 2000 and 2500. I used the same 35lux wide open, with my IR filter on the lux when shooting on the M8. I didn't realize that the M9 was configured for manual lens selection (a 90 f/2), so the M9 images could exibit some vignetting. M8 was set for DNG, M9 for uncompressed DNG. Lighting is typical camera-store terrible: overhead florsecent. Composition is typical camera-store terrible: the Leica rep.  Here are links to the DNG files for M8/M9 (warning: M9 is a 37mb dng): drop.io m8m9dng drop.io m8m9dng2  Here are 100% crops of the M8 and M9 at ISO 2500. The M9 is much cleaner, although the white balance varied quite a bit from shot to shot. I chose a part of his shirt since shadow detail tends to show the most noise.  M8: Flickr Link  M9: Flickr Link Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted September 9, 2009 Posted September 9, 2009 Hi brianpe, Take a look here M9 - sample DNG files at high ISO. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
padraigm Posted September 9, 2009 Share #2 Â Posted September 9, 2009 Hmmm but detail seems to suffer in the M9. Is it really just more aggressive noise reduction in camera? It would be interesting to see if you can get the M8 file to look like the M9 by usind difine, noise ninja or the such. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
lct Posted September 10, 2009 Share #3  Posted September 10, 2009 Hmmm but detail seems to suffer in the M9. Is it really just more aggressive noise reduction in camera?... No noise reduction in raws normally. Comes from the raw converter probably. Here the 2500 iso pic, Capture One v. 4.1, default settings, red saturation -20, no more noise reduction. Decent results indeed, the red cast comes perhaps from C1 i don't know but it's not the first time i notice it on M9 pics. Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! Link to post Share on other sites Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! ' data-webShareUrl='https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/96084-m9-sample-dng-files-at-high-iso/?do=findComment&comment=1027514'>More sharing options...
Jamie Roberts Posted September 10, 2009 Share #4 Â Posted September 10, 2009 No noise reduction in raws normally. Comes from the raw converter probably. Here the 2500 iso pic, Capture One v. 4.1, default settings, red saturation -20, no more noise reduction. Decent results indeed, the red cast comes perhaps from C1 i don't know but it's not the first time i notice it on M9 pics. Â Um, since there is no profile or announced compatibility for the M9 yet in C1, it's amazing this works at all Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
charlesphoto99 Posted September 10, 2009 Share #5  Posted September 10, 2009 Okay, same subjects (Brad Weeks in Seattle) but maybe a bit better processing (using my custom M8 profile in LR). M8/9 files really need a bit of punch to make them sing.  This is at iso 2000 with 35 cron. Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! Link to post Share on other sites Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! ' data-webShareUrl='https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/96084-m9-sample-dng-files-at-high-iso/?do=findComment&comment=1027545'>More sharing options...
lct Posted September 10, 2009 Share #6 Â Posted September 10, 2009 Um, since there is no profile or announced compatibility for the M9 yet in C1, it's amazing this works at all It's the beauty of DNG files i guess. I used the "DNG File Neutral" profile in C1 4.1. Both C1's M8 profiles (w & w/o IR-cut filter) give ugly reddish results. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie Roberts Posted September 10, 2009 Share #7 Â Posted September 10, 2009 Advertisement (gone after registration) It's the beauty of DNG files i guess. I used the "DNG File Neutral" profile in C1 4.1. Both C1's M8 profiles (w & w/o IR-cut filter) give ugly reddish results. Â Right, some won't open at all in C1 Pro--it's pretty impressive for non-supported results. It shows how much you can tweak things with the converter. Â Can't wait to see the results with a supported C1 conversion... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie Roberts Posted September 11, 2009 Share #8  Posted September 11, 2009 So here's the same shot with a M9 profile in C1, downloaded from uncompressed RAW...  1) Standard M8 corrections for me. There's no resulting red cast (though I assume there's mixed light here. Is that correct? was there a window somewhere close by?)  2) No blotchiness, more importantly...  3) Lots of detail for ISO 2500!  Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! Link to post Share on other sites Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! ' data-webShareUrl='https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/96084-m9-sample-dng-files-at-high-iso/?do=findComment&comment=1029755'>More sharing options...
adan Posted September 11, 2009 Share #9 Â Posted September 11, 2009 Actually, it is perfectly possible to have some processing applied to the image before saving it as raw - that's what recent CMOS sensors do - a little processing right on the pixel before dumping the data. Both Canon and Nikon noise-reduce their RAW formats, and Canon also has sharpened RAWs over the years. Â I do think Leica is noise-reducing the higher ISOs a bit in the M9. Fairly well - it has little effect on edge sharpness, but textures that are already broken up by noise are refined away. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
microview Posted September 11, 2009 Share #10  Posted September 11, 2009 Three more: CS3 DNG open, no adjustment Capture 1 M9 generic no adjustment RAW Developer, curves to achieve more natural skin colour (?) in face + noise reduction. Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! Link to post Share on other sites Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! ' data-webShareUrl='https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/96084-m9-sample-dng-files-at-high-iso/?do=findComment&comment=1030079'>More sharing options...
andrewrossphotographs Posted September 11, 2009 Share #11 Â Posted September 11, 2009 "Here are 100% crops of the M8 and M9 at ISO 2500. The M9 is much cleaner, although the white balance varied quite a bit from shot to shot. I chose a part of his shirt since shadow detail tends to show the most noise." Â You mentioned the white balance varied from shot to shot on the M9 - do you mean this is varying shot to shot with the same image?. If so, has this not been resolved from the M8 days? Hopefully it's between different shots and its just a fluorescent issue here.....? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianpe Posted September 11, 2009 Author Share #12 Â Posted September 11, 2009 Andrew -- Actually, 1600 and 2000 were pretty consistent but ISO 2500 had a slightly different white balance: I did not take enough exposures to gauge if the white blance was consistent at a given ISO. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
andrewrossphotographs Posted September 11, 2009 Share #13 Â Posted September 11, 2009 Andrew -- Actually, 1600 and 2000 were pretty consistent but ISO 2500 had a slightly different white balance: I did not take enough exposures to gauge if the white blance was consistent at a given ISO. Â Thanks for the clarification - I presume you were also shooting in auto white balance mode, this more sounds like an issue with fluorescent lighting if that's the case. Â As for the noise, that looks a lot better than I had previously thought and as posted in a similar thread, I'm wondering if there is very little auto noise reduction going on with the sensor/camera processing as compared to what Canon/Nikon do at automatically in camera at higher ISO/short exposure pix. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianpe Posted September 12, 2009 Author Share #14 Â Posted September 12, 2009 Yes, I had AWB set. The noise doesn't look bad to me. I white balanced on the background cabinets and printed 8x10s of both images and there is no comparison. The ISO 2500 images from my M8 show obvious color blotchiness in Brad's shirt and I would only consider them suitable for printing in monochrome. The 8x10 from the M9 is much cleaner and the noise blends into the texture of his shirt. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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