Leica M8: Poor mans M Monochrome?

[jmanivelle]

Summitar 1949 + M8:


no caçadão by careca2013, on Flickr

[Snowbuzz]

Originally Posted by jmanivelle

Summitar 1949 + M8:


no caçadão by careca2013, on Flickr

^ That is awesome. I'm convinced: my M8 arrives in a week.

[jmanivelle]

Originally Posted by Snowbuzz

^ That is awesome. I'm convinced: my M8 arrives in a week.

Thanks, enjoy your new camera !

[dude163]

I love the B+Ws that come out of my M8 , this one is a JPG using a 1950 Summaron 35 3,5





and this one is taken with a 1964 Summicron 50 ( RAW file converted to BW)

[jmanivelle]

Summitar on M8:


Pipoca ! by careca2013, on Flickr

[Snowbuzz]

Very nice shots, guys!

[iamarobotman]

Summicron on M8.

[Timmyjoe]

I would say the Leica M8.2 (and M8) is the "Everyman's M Monochrom". I lusted for a new Monochrom until a friend showed me how to get beautiful B&W with my M8.2.

Leica M8.2 w/90 cron pre-asph

No way I'm selling this camera now.

Best,
-Tim

[jmanivelle]

M8 + Elmarit 21 pre asph


No Jardim Botanico by careca2013, on Flickr

[Ron (Netherlands)]

Shot with the Biogon 25mm

[Snowbuzz]

^ Wow!

I just bought the Zeiss Biogon 21mm f4.5 by accident instead of the f2.8 version on eBay. What a bummer. I hope it works okay on the M8.

[kitok]

Tim,
Beautiful portraits with great B&W conversions! I would love to be able to do better B&W conversions with my M8. Could you please share some of the secrets you learned from your friend?
Thank you,
Kitok

Originally Posted by Timmyjoe

I would say the Leica M8.2 (and M8) is the "Everyman's M Monochrom". I lusted for a new Monochrom until a friend showed me how to get beautiful B&W with my M8.2.

Leica M8.2 w/90 cron pre-asph

No way I'm selling this camera now.

Best,
-Tim

[Kingsfan]

M8 + 28mm elmarit


L1004274 by Qmüngous, on Flickr

[Roel]

Originally Posted by kitok

Tim,
Beautiful portraits with great B&W conversions! I would love to be able to do better B&W conversions with my M8. Could you please share some of the secrets you learned from your friend?
Thank you,
Kitok

+1
Please share cause your images are beautifull

[1joel1]

Are you shooting B&W color space in the M8 or are you doing the color conversion during raw adjustments?

TIA,

Joel

[cer_ou_nao_cer]

I do agree with those who said M8 (.2) is amazing b&w tool.


L1020976.jpg

Converted from DNG in Aperture, no contrast burst or sharpening applied, just 2/3 plus expo.

Ps.: Does anybody know how do I post a bigger picture?

[ray*j*gun]

I have a 3 part question about using my M8u in B&W.

So far I have shot RAW and converted to B&W in Lightroom. The results have been excellent. Question one is would I get the same or better results from the in camera B&W conversion?

Does the IR/Cut filter impact the B&W images....it appears to wipe out some of the detail but I would like some input here.

Last does anyone use B&W film filters shooting B&W in the M8 and if so I would assume the shooter would be doing B&W right out of the camera?

Thanks!

[jaapv]

It depends on your LR skills whether the camera jpgs or your conversion is better. It is possible to outperform the camera, especially if you tweak thetonal response in the color channels, but the M8 does a pretty good job by itself.
Images without IR cut filter will be marginally less sharp, but slightly more prone to block the shadows. IR light overlays an unsharp image about four stops underexposed.

[cer_ou_nao_cer]

Raymond, I believe it's better to shoot DNG because you may benefit from software future development.
About filters: I don't know if sensor response is alike film, guess not due to different color management, but I think it's possible to use them shooting color and then coveting in LR; also it is possible to apply digital filters in post processing (try PictureWindowPro - it has a Filter adjustment that provide a vast variety of color filters alongside a its powerful and complete set of tools).

Regards.

[jaapv]

Basically using optical filters is the better choice - yes you can emulate them in postprocessing, but doing that will be introducing noise and loss of dynamic range in one or two color channels.

[cer_ou_nao_cer]

I've ran a test converting to BW using PWP conversion with nº 12 filter (yellow):


L1020998-bw.jpg

L1020998-c.jpg

[Ron (Netherlands)]

shot with a late black J-3

[ray*j*gun]

Thank you all for your responses. I will experiment with the alternatives to what I have been doing which is when shooting B&W I don't use any filters and shoot in raw for later conversion. If I feel the results are telling I will post them.

[jaapv]

@JSU.
You are right about the shadows, they are more open without filter due to IR contamination. I meant to write that.

About the plane of focus for IR light, Leica gave this advice years ago:

Leica advises as an approximation that an elongation factor of 1/300 (1/200 to 1/400) of the focal length is necessary, but tests are advised to find the exact position. This is done by pointing the camera to an object at infity, but focusing at a distance that represents 300 focal length of the used lens. For a 50 mm lens, for example, this would be 15 m. The results can be examined afterwards and fine tuning can take place accordingly...

It must be modified to take the lens into account. Modestly chromatic corrected lenses will exhibit more focus shift under IR. APO corrected lenses virtually none. (Leica APO correction runs deep into infrared)

[Ruhayat]

I'm in the process of buying an M8 exclusively for B&W digital photography when I came across this thread. I went through the first 90 or so posts and man, what a waste of bandwidth.

All the angst could have easily been fixed if the original poster had simply posted that 27" or whatever sized M8 exhibition print he said he made that he also said had so many people cooing over. And then posted another image which he would/could/should take with the Monochrom which obviously he must have spent enough time with to pass judgment on it so decisively.

Did the original poster show that superior M8 exhibition print in the end? Anyone? After post #100 I just abandoned the whole thing and jumped to the end where there were some lovely SAMPLE IMAGES. What a refreshing concept: presenting actual images to support an argument.