Visible clicks

[MRohlfing]

Yesterday I started a highly sophisticated scientific research project

Visible clicks - shuttersound made visible! I mounted a microphone on top of my cameras (mostly in the flash shoe, where available), set the shutter to 1/60 (where possible) and recorded the sound.

The most amazing and unexpected result: some are louder than others

Enjoy! Some more to come (5 per day)

Agfa Optima:


Voigtländer Bessa R3A:


Bronica ETR:


Leica IIf:


Leica M2:

[loquax ludens]

Cool. I'd like to see what a Minolta Autocord sounds like. And a Minox III.

[daveleo]

Wicked interesting !
Keep them coming.

I have a few Nikons that will easily peg you dB meter

[KoNickon]

Very neat! Yes, keep them coming. (The Optima is a leaf shutter, right? This may help put to rest the notion that the Leica shutters are "whisper quiet." Perhaps a stage whisper....)

[oftheherd]

Interesting. Thanks!

If you were in the USA I would send you a Yashica TL Super to test. My first SLR and I loved it. But especially with the back open, that thing would wake the dead.

[MRohlfing]

Originally Posted by loquax ludens

Cool. I'd like to see what a Minolta Autocord sounds like. And a Minox III.

I don't have those - will Rolleiflex and Olympus XA be OK?

Originally Posted by daveleo

I have a few Nikons that will easily peg you dB meter

Some Nikons in the next few days (2 with motor, 3 without) - stay tuned!

Originally Posted by KoNickon

The Optima is a leaf shutter, right? This may help put to rest the notion that the Leica shutters are "whisper quiet."

Yes, leaf shutter! You will like the Rollei, too!

Originally Posted by oftheherd

If you were in the USA I would send you a Yashica TL Super to test. My first SLR and I loved it. But especially with the back open, that thing would wake the dead.

I don't think it could beat my Bronica ETR

[loquax ludens]

Originally Posted by MRohlfing

I don't have those - will Rolleiflex and Olympus XA be OK?

Sure! You're the one putting in the effort, after all.

But the Olympus XA is nothing like the MInox III. That's the 8x11mm very tiny camera that Walter Zapp invented, not the 35mm compact. That little Minox III has a surprisingly noisy shutter for its size. Or so it seems to me, anyway, which is why I think it'd be nice to see how loud it is.

[MRohlfing]

Now come the Nikons!

Nikon F without motor:


Nikon F2 without motor:


Nikon F3 without motor:


Nikon F5:


Nikon F100:

[daveleo]

I'm thinking that this should be a standard chart issued with the camera specs.

Is this correct ? : the total sound energy is the area (red area) under these curves. In other words, peak dB is one thing, but total noise energy is even more important ?

[dct]

Originally Posted by MRohlfing

Now come the Nikons!
[...]
Nikon F100:

This looks more like a "concerto grosso" !

Is a microphone + some software enough to do the same tests like you did? It would be nice having a thread with the most RFF related cameras in.

[MRohlfing]

Originally Posted by daveleo

I'm thinking that this should be a standard chart issued with the camera specs.

Is this correct ? : the total sound energy is the area (red area) under these curves. In other words, peak dB is one thing, but total noise energy is even more important ?

Would be interesting, if the camera manufacturers included a chart like that. But then the test should be done in a better controlled environment and with calibrated hardware. And anyway - before buying a camera, just try to get it in your greedy hands in a shop and listen wether you like the sound.

I did this with a rather cheap and primitive microphone and with the sound recorder that was installed on my PC anyway ("WavePurity" - which is software to remove noise when recording old analogue records). So I do not know about the total sound energy. Also, the microphone was mounted on top of the camera, so it gets all the vibrations of the camera, too (which was intended, but might change the quality of the sound).

Maybe I should do another test with the microphone a little (say, 1 meter or so) away from the camera?

Also, a comparison with / without mirror lockup might be interesting?

[loquax ludens]

Interesting. What about the subjective perception of sound?

To pick a couple of examples, the Nikon 100 has a low average amplitude, but a long duration, relative to the Nikon F2 without motor. The latter is of shorter duration, but greater amplitude. Which one sounds lounder to your ear?

[MRohlfing]

Originally Posted by dct

This looks more like a "concerto grosso" !

Is a microphone + some software enough to do the same tests like you did? It would be nice having a thread with the most RFF related cameras in.

[DISCLAIMER] This test is just for fun, it is not a scientific test! See the smilies in the original post! [\DISCLAIMER]

Also, these are my cameras (and some are quite old) - your camera might sound different!

But anyway, some results are quite interesting - the F100, though more or less a "sister" of the F5, has quite a different sound.

RFF related cameras: Some are still to come - for alphabetical reasons some rangefinders tend to come last

Oh, and you will see no digital camera - simply because I do not have one in the moment!

[MRohlfing]

Originally Posted by loquax ludens

Interesting. What about the subjective perception of sound?

To pick a couple of examples, the Nikon 100 has a low average amplitude, but a long duration, relative to the Nikon F2 without motor. The latter is of shorter duration, but greater amplitude. Which one sounds lounder to your ear?

The F2 sounds louder to me, but the F100 sounds longer and softer (though there was no film in there, the motor moved).

The loudest to me is definitely the Bronica and the most quiet the Rolleiflex (still to come).

[MRohlfing]

Nikonos IV-A:


Olympus 35RC:


Olympus 35SP:


Olympus XA:


Voigtländer Vitomatic IIa:

[ChrisN]

Pitch and duration can be more important than outright volume in determining what seems to be noticably loud.

[back alley]

this would be more fun for me if i understood the charts...

[MRohlfing]

Originally Posted by back alley

this would be more fun for me if i understood the charts...

It's easy - simplified explanation:
Horizontally: Time (e.g. Nikon F100 - noise for more than 1/4 second, Vitomatic - only about 1/20 second)
Vertically: the more, the noisier!

[KoNickon]

I'm glad you did a Nikonos -- the amount of muffling that the stout body and seals provide is remarkable. And look at that Voigtlander. The leaf shutter cameras will put everything else to shame. (I hope you've got a Bronica S2 or the like and a Pentax 67 coming, for serious contrast.)

Regarding the charts -- I don't understand why they show both positive and negative decibels. But maybe I just don't understand what makes up sound.

[ColSebastianMoran]

Great stuff. Thanks!

[MRohlfing]

Olympus OM-1:


Olympus OM-2n:


Olympus OM-4:


Rolleiflex E:


Yashica Electro 35:

[ColSebastianMoran]

Hexar AF in silent mode??

[loquax ludens]

Whoa, look at that Rolleiflex! Puts 'em ALL to shame.

[krötenblender]

Originally Posted by KoNickon

Regarding the charts -- I don't understand why they show both positive and negative decibels.

They don't. At the top and at the bottom there is both -3db. Its a simple waveform-display over time with negative db on the y-axis.

If you have some experience with such standard displays of sound, you can get a pretty good idea about the loudness-distribution. To get also an idea, which is more "annoying", an overlayed display of the frequency-distribution would help very much, a.k.a. fourier-transformation.

Very nice idea for a thread, though.

[goodtimes]

Originally Posted by MRohlfing

Yesterday I started a highly sophisticated scientific research project

Visible clicks - shuttersound made visible! I mounted a microphone on top of my cameras (mostly in the flash shoe, where available), set the shutter to 1/60 (where possible) and recorded the sound.

The most amazing and unexpected result: some are louder than others

Enjoy! Some more to come (5 per day)

Agfa Optima:


Voigtländer Bessa R3A:


Bronica ETR:


Leica IIf:


Leica M2:

What software do you use ? I'd like to use it and see if I can measure the various actions performed by the shutter curtains.
Thanks