edwardkaraa wrote:
By the way, the new M9 body I bought today turned out to have a small problem in the VF LED, so back to the shop and got it exchanged. Crazy!
Edward, as a fellow GXR user I'm looking forward to reading your observations on using the M9.
And, if you are flush with time, could you humour me with a perspective comparison, if you happen to have the ZM25 and one of the ZM35s?
I've been wondering what the ZM25 on GXR looks like compared to the ZM35 (either one) on a M9, mostly for the perspective and depth of field differences between the two sensor formats.
It'll also be interesting to see how you find rangefinder focussing with a digital M as compared to EVF focusing on the GXR.
As you may know, I have been shooting rangefinders for a year now, and much prefer them to the EVF or LCD focusing of the GXR. One thing I realised today: the rangefinder of the M9 is incredibly accurate. I was expecting some focusing difficulties, but in fact I am surprised of the accuracy. Now regarding IQ, of course nothing beats using a FF lens on a FF camera. Today I used mostly the 35/2 and I just rediscovered the 3D and drawing style of this lens, that were lost on the GXR. But on the pixel level, I thing the M9 is on the same level as my old Canon 1Ds2, while the GXR is imho 2011 standards. I much prefer the IQ of the GXR (at 100% magnification) and the colors are even more pleasing, but this I might have to improve my PP skills for the M9.
Also I should mention that I'm using PSE 8 with ACR 6.2. I downloaded LR 4 that comes free with the camera, and I find it horrible. I hate invasive programs that want to make catalogs and collections. Maybe the IQ is better because it has the latest ACR version, but I think I will delete it.
I will make some comparisons for sure, hopefully when I have time in the weekend.
douglasf13 wrote:
I don't know, Edward, I'd be surprised if the M8's IR issue only cropped up in 3% of photos that had deep black materials. Heck, even the M9 isn't totally safe from IR issues, compared to most DSLRs. The M9 was majorly improved, but it can still show purplish blacks.
I've occasionally get purple blacks with my a900's, but only at very high iso...
If you're going to use Lightroom, it's worthwhile to spend a few minutes figuring out some basics, such as whether or not you want it to copy files over to a new location. I didn't want that and turned it off because I have hard drives organized by various subject types, date ranges, etc., and wanted to keep that style of organization.
I'd at least give it a try for a few days to see if the newer adjustment features are complementary to your needs. One in particular that will be useful with the M9 is the moire brush.
One suggestion: always save the metadata to the DNG after you're happy with the adjustments you've made. This allows you to move the actual DNG file, copy it, etc., an the adjustments will be contained in it. If you don't, and this applies to all RAW files in Lightroom, though for some XMP sidecar files are created instead, then the adjustments only reside in the catalog and will be lost if you delete a given image from the catalog (but not the actual DNG file from the drive).
edwardkaraa wrote:
Thank you Robert! I really loved that frame line lever on my M6 and Ikons. I could select which lens would be appropriate without swiping lenses. Well, maybe in the future the frames will be electronic
I'm also a little sad this has been eliminated, at least from the new M. While it's not a heavily used feature, I definitely use it to preview lens coverage differences.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
I guess that's a major advantage to buying locally. Otherwise, you would be dealing with a lengthy exchange and all the hassle that goes with that.
Yes, I'm so glad that I decided to give my money to this local shop. The fault was very minor actually, one LED lamp that displays one segment of the last shutter speed digit in the VF was not lighting. In fact I played with the camera a few hours and didn't even notice the problem. It only took me a 15 minutes drive to the shop and the camera was exchanged with many apologies from the owner
ricardovaste wrote:
Ed, what sold you on the M9 over the M?
The waiting period and the uncertainty about a new product. I think I will be able to use the M9 comfortably for a year before the M is widely available without shortages and people killing eachother to get one. Then we'll see. I'll either sell the M9 or keep it as a back up body.
ricardovaste wrote:
I've occasionally get purple blacks with my a900's, but only at very high iso...
It was a notable problem with Nikon's D2H and was one of a number of reasons that caused a fairly significant exodus from the system at the time, which I guess they reversed eventually with the excellent D3 series.
rscheffler wrote:
If you're going to use Lightroom, it's worthwhile to spend a few minutes figuring out some basics, such as whether or not you want it to copy files over to a new location. I didn't want that and turned it off because I have hard drives organized by various subject types, date ranges, etc., and wanted to keep that style of organization.
I'd at least give it a try for a few days to see if the newer adjustment features are complementary to your needs. One in particular that will be useful with the M9 is the moire brush.
One suggestion: always save the metadata to the DNG after you're happy with the adjustments you've made. This allows you to move the actual DNG file, copy it, etc., an the adjustments will be contained in it. If you don't, and this applies to all RAW files in Lightroom, though for some XMP sidecar files are created instead, then the adjustments only reside in the catalog and will be lost if you delete a given image from the catalog (but not the actual DNG file from the drive).
I'm also a little sad this has been eliminated, at least from the new M. While it's not a heavily used feature, I definitely use it to preview lens coverage differences....Show more →
Thank you for the advice Ron. I really dislike LR, but I will see if I can figure it out to work just for image processing without wanting to catalogue my photos and create new collections each time. I love the simplicity of PSE.
As for the lever, I use it all the time, a bit like a movie director's angle finder.
What's the best M9 raw converter for windows in terms of color and rendering in your opinion?
edwardkaraa wrote:
Thank you for the advice Ron. I really dislike LR, but I will see if I can figure it out to work just for image processing without wanting to catalogue my photos and create new collections each time. I love the simplicity of PSE.
As for the lever, I use it all the time, a bit like a movie director's angle finder.
What's the best M9 raw converter for windows in terms of color and rendering in your opinion?
Not sure. I've only used LR with the M9's files, primarily due to the conveniences of all the adjustment parameters. And I'm Mac based...
LR will automatically create catalogs, as it's a core feature of the app. But you can pretty much ignore those if you want to, just that over time the previews will eat up some storage space. If you really dislike that aspect, you can easily delete a set of images once you've processed them, just be sure to only delete their existence in LR and not from your drive. If you save the metadata to the files, you can re-import them at a later time and the adjustments will be retained, however the history of those adjustments will be lost. Also, if you make any virtual copies, those will be lost. For example, if I find I like a given image in both B&W and colour, after I've made a virtual copy and tweaked it to what I prefer, I import a duplicate of that DNG with a unique name (LR may also try to avoid importing duplicates, but that also can be disabled) and copy the adjustments to it.
I would suggest you fiddle around with LR for a few weeks at least. I recall when I first got the M9 and started using LR, having up until then only used Canon's DPP converter in conjunction with PS, it took me some time to get comfortable with it.
BTW, looking forward to your contributions to the M8/M9 image thread, now that you've finally got a 'proper' camera with which to contribute.
