It's been nice ... but I think we're through!

[Prosaic]

Originally Posted by Keith

M8 (...) Dark noisy shadows at 640 ISO or blown out highlights from the screens (...) ... or maybe give digital a miss totally and use 800 or 1600 colour film

Wait a minute... You worry about noise with the M8 at ISO 640 and then consider switching to ISO 1600 color film? Actually it was the poor performance of faster color films that made me finally move to a digital camera.

Portra at ISO 400 is like ISO 25600 on my D700. Really a great camera. Get some older manual Nikkors and you have a state of the art - full frame - digital kit.

[bobkonos]

Keith,

Hold up your middle finger as if you were flipping someone the bird. At this point in my life at age 55, that is the only "digital" of interest or necessary. Scrap that M8, pick of a mechanical camera, and get on with it, mate. :-)

[cjm]

To the OP, not sure if you have seen this WANT TO TRADE ad but it might be what your looking for.

[Keith]

Originally Posted by CLE-RF

Using the technique listed earlier, I have come up with this:

Getting to the right colors is a bit tricky (near impossible) when starting out with an internet JPEG, but there certainly is more detail to be had with the Lightroom-Photoshop approach. Especially with the right hand picture, where there is even the portraits background recorded in the shot, using the appropriate technique brings it back out again.

Keith, you can send me a DNG if you like, I'll love to have a go at it!

CLE-RF... if you PM me your email I'll send you a challenging DNG when I get home tonight!

Cheers.

[P. Lynn Miller]

Many of you need to read Keith's original post... yes, he is complaining about ISO noise... but he is struggling because of the limited dynamic range of the M8... when he exposes for the screens... he has to deal excess noise in the shadows when he tries to push the shadows to open them up abit... if he tries to expose with an allowance for the shadows, then he has to deal with blown highlights... this is about dynamic range, not high ISO performance.

There is no question or doubt that the new generation full-frame sensors perform better at high-ISO than film, with the advent of the D3, film was convincingly relegated to second place. No one is disputing this fact.

But to be honest, while all the digital images posted this thread have been proof of the superiority of the D700/D3/5D at high ISO with clean and well-controlled noise, none of the images show a greater amount of dynamic range than my crappy old, over-pushed, badly scanned color negative film. And definitely not the latitude of fresh box-rated Portra 400NC. Can the D700/D3/5D match the dynamic range of color negative film... I don't know as I have not used any of these cameras enough to make a personal statement.

The crux of my argument for film has been that Keith stated he was only using his M8 to shoot 'dimly lit gallery openings occasionally' and was looking for an affordable alternate that would deliver a better image for this occasional task. Since Keith has a cupboard full of fast glass for both his Leica M's and OM system, then switching to color negative film is the clearly the most economical alternative.

Now if Keith is going to be doing this type of shooting on a regular basis and is willing to spend the money, then by all means head to the nearest Nikon/Canon dealer and purchase a D700/5D with appropriate lenses which will give him a working kit with more dynamic range than the M8 can deliver.

[Keith]

Thanks heaps for all the input and suggestions ... my head is spinning and I have to go to work here (morning).

I'll get back into this when I get home tonight and deal with and think about the options.

And thanks for the couple of PM's I've received regarding this.

I didn't think this thread would get as interesting as it has!!!

[Keith]

Originally Posted by P. Lynn Miller

Many of you need to read Keith's original post... yes, he is complaining about ISO noise... but he is struggling because of the limited dynamic range of the M8... when he exposes for the screens... he has to deal excess noise in the shadows when he tries to push the shadows to open them up abit... if he tries to expose with an allowance for the shadows, then he has to deal with blown highlights... this is about dynamic range, not high ISO performance.

There is no question or doubt that the new generation full-frame sensors perform better at high-ISO than film, with the advent of the D3, film was convincingly relegated to second place. No one is disputing this fact.

But to be honest, while all the digital images posted this thread have been proof of the superiority of the D700/D3/5D at high ISO with clean and well-controlled noise, none of the images show a greater amount of dynamic range than my crappy old, over-pushed, badly scanned color negative film. And definitely not the latitude of fresh box-rated Portra 400NC. Can the D700/D3/5D match the dynamic range of color negative film... I don't know as I have not used any of these cameras enough to make a personal statement.

The crux of my argument for film has been that Keith stated he was only using his M8 to shoot 'dimly lit gallery openings occasionally' and was looking for an affordable alternate that would deliver a better image for this occasional task. Since Keith has a cupboard full of fast glass for both his Leica M's and OM system, then switching to color negative film is the clearly the most economical alternative.

Now if Keith is going to be doing this type of shooting on a regular basis and is willing to spend the money, then by all means head to the nearest Nikon/Canon dealer and purchase a D700/5D with appropriate lenses which will give him a working kit with more dynamic range than the M8 can deliver.

Well summed up ... thanks P Lynn ... I indeed don't have the money to output for a new system to deal with a problem that is occasional at the moment.

[FrankS]

Maybe just decline those jobs and your problems go away.

[Brian Sweeney]

Keith,

Clearly you need a Canon 7 with 50/0.95.

Kodacolor 400, 1/15th wide-open.



The only other camera working without a flash in this room was a Thermal Imager.

Imagine what you get get pushing the film a little...

Economical, about 1/10th the cost of a Noctilux.

[ferider]

Hey Keith,

with your 35/1.2, M2 and Neopan 1600 you should be able to shoot in the dark. And make the grain part of your signature.

Really been impressed at the B+W pictures you have shown us recently, amazing processing quality (and photos, too, of course).

Cheers,

Roland.

[Keith]

Originally Posted by FrankS

Maybe just decline those jobs and your problems go away.

Can't do that Frank ... these are my only paid gigs as a photographer!

QUT tantalised me recently with a possible trip to China later in the year to photograph a repeat of the Computer Gaming Project I did for them recently here in Brisbane. Some sort of cutural art and tech exchange programm they have with an equivalent Chinese institution!

It's a remote chance depending on government funding but I have my fingers crossed and I need to show them that I can overcome the odd challenge!

[Leigh Youdale]

Keith,
I think Lyn's suggestion is worth following up. Can you go back to the gallery after the opening night but under the same lighting conditions and run the tests he suggests on film? That way you're not risking an assignment and you have a little time to try two or three lens/film combinations alongside the M8 at the same time and under the same conditions. That would at least tell you if you're heading in the right direction or down a blind alley.

[Trius]

With budget being the critical factor, Lynn's suggestion seems the best. Even with a good DSLR, significant processing (PS etc) will be necessary. For the savings from selling the M8, you can upgrade your scanner or software, maybe even hire some assistance with the post.

[gavinlg]

With the excellent high ISO noise performance of a 5d or a d700, you will be able to expose for the highlighted screens and lift the shadows just enough to get detail in them as well. Alternatively you could find a safe exposure where by the screens are just overexposed and the foreground/shadows are just underexposed. In post processing, you could then lift the shadows slightly and recover the highlights slightly. This is what I would do. Would be much harder with the M8 as the files tend to get flaky at high ISO, especially when you try and push them.

[ChrisN]

Don't forget that a scanner is also a digital capture device, and they often suffer the same dynamic range issues that digital camera sensors suffer from. The solution is bracketing - take a number of scans at different levels, one for the shadows, one for the middle tones, and one for the highlights, and combine them as layers in Photoshop. I think it was member JLW who illustrated this technique here a few years ago.

[Trius]

Originally Posted by ChrisN

Don't forget that a scanner is also a digital capture device, and they often suffer the same dynamic range issues that digital camera sensors suffer from. The solution is bracketing - take a number of scans at different levels, one for the shadows, one for the middle tones, and one for the highlights, and combine them as layers in Photoshop. I think it was member JLW who illustrated this technique here a few years ago.

Right ... I don't know about DSLR bracketing capabilities, but multipass scanning seems more logical. This is why I mentioned scanner and software upgrades as possibly beneficial.

[monochromejrnl]

http://www.brisbanecamerahire.com.au...?file=kop2.php

Weekend Rental price for a Canon 5D MkII is AUD165 + 7.5 for very capable 50/1.8

That's certainly affordable... considering you can expense the rental fee against your taxable income... for the price of the M8 body alone you can rent the kit 25+ times!!!

[willie_901]

Keth

1. rent 5D with lens: shoot an event

2. rent D700 with lens: shoot another event

Decide which camera system focuses best under your lighting conditions and buy that camera. (Both will have great IQ)

Regards

willie

[italy74]

Ciao Lynn,
you're right, and I had even read his and your comments but the truth is that - not having much more to say - I just wanted to give him one more reason to consider a DSLR for dimly lit environments in general, not necessarily with messed lightings as he was pointing.

[Keith]

I've been having a look at the files from the last one of these low light gigs I did and I've noticed I shot it all at 320 and not 640 like I just did with this one. At 320 I was using shutter speeds down to 1/15 but still getting reasonably sharp images ... I'm not quite sure why I did it at 640 this time but one thing I do know is the 320 files have a hell of a lot more usability shadow wise. Start trying to pull too much information from the 640 ISO shadows and they fall apart very quickly ... I'm also no photoshop expert unfortunately!

Leica really need to adress this situation in future digital M incarnations IMO as a rangefinder's strength is low light photography and to hamper such a fine camera by fitting it with a sensor with crappy high ISO peformance is crazy ... but that's all been said and argued about before!

I think I'll go back to the gallery one evening and try shooting some 800 or 400 colour film and see what sort of results I get. In some ways shooting these things with film would be far easier because it would allow me to use two cameras with different focal lengths ... my 35mm Nokton on my M2 maybe and my 50mm 1.2 Canon on my M3 or Ikon! I generally have to submit between fifty and eighty images to QUT from these gigs and if I can achieve this in say, five or so rolls of film, it doesn't become economically unviable. The scanning can be a little time consuming but then again so is sitting in front of a computer for several hours attempting to get usable images form poorly exposed noisy DNG's!

I also may get hold of a 5D and see how that goes!

I won't consign the M8 to the scrap bin yet ... ie sell it ... but it can definitely sit on the back burner while I sort this problem out and if film does turn out to be the way to go I may turn the M8 into a high end scanner with a roll feed!

[Sparrow]

If you can use black and white consider xp2, it copes well in high contrast environments



P.S. or fuji 1600 and overexpose it a bit to reduce the “grain”

[bobbyrab]

Sorry if I'm being stupid here, but why can't you just bracket with the M8, it seems to me like an awful lot of work to achieve the same thing with scanning and PSing all that film not to mention the colour balance issues, would you shoot tungsten balanced film or just go with the orange cast? As I say, maybe I've missed something that's been said, and sorry if I have, but going down a colour film route over digital seems a bit crazy to me.

[Sparrow]

Film has a bit more range

[Pickett Wilson]

You can get the range with digital. Expose for the highlights and pull the shadows out with software. But you have to start with a low noise sensor to get away with it. The 5D allows that. As do recent Nikons.

Keith, beg, borrow or steal a 5D and play with it. ACR can pull some amazing stuff out. And if even that is too much noise for you, Noiseware Professional will fix that, too.

[bobbyrab]

it does, but not enough to bridge the typical gap in exposure for a screen or projector and the audience at these events, I've never taken a spot meter reading, but it must be close to about 4 stops +, so the suggestion being made is to shoot film, and the bracket the scan, surely simpler to bracket the initial exposure, and if you're going to do that in a low light environment, then digital does it better and allows control of the WB. I love my film, but in these situations it's just not well suited.