i couldn't disagree more. i find aps-c viewfinders (even the nicer pentaprism ones) to be dark tunnels that are impossible to focus fast lenses through and poor to compose through. FF dslr viewfinders are at least usable though. evfs give me better focusing, better exposure (because i see actual exposure), and better composition because i have a real wysiwyg view. i miss a lot more shots with an ovf than i do with an evf. it's true i do generally compose before i ever bring a camera to my eye (or waist ), but i have always done that since long before evfs existed. i'd prefer to spend as little time as necessary with a camera pressed to my face.
as far as backlit situations go, i prefer your first picture to the second and would want to see that the image as exposed that way. if you need to see into the shadows it should just be a quick twist of your thumb on the rx-1 (though i can count the number of times i've actually needed to do that with my NEX-7 on my fingers)....Show more →
Actually, you do see in a sort of HDR way. The eyes automatically adjust for various light and dark areas of a scene so the DR is pretty much unbound, unlike a severely restricted video feed. So, the problem and failing of this idea that evf's are what you see is what you get is completely false. It's only one possible interpretation based on either what exposure is set OR a severely curtailed interpretation based on the technical restriction of the video feed. So, it's in no way accurate to say it's wysiwyg. Many more interpretations from a scene are possible. For less experienced users, this idea that what an evf shows is wysiwyg could really restrict the creative possibilities available from the image data. Of course, most of us will know many more interpretations are possible, far beyond the artificially restrictive view from an evf. This could be a real fundamental and in some ways philosophical issue with evf's for some though.
Evf's obviously offer some great capabilities, no doubt about that, and experienced users will know how to use them to their best utility. It's just too bad that their main primary function - to serve as a viewfinder - is so severely lacking.
As far as seeing into the shadows, there is no issue at all obviously with an optical finder in the ability to simultaneously see shadow detail and highlight detail - and again, the eye is amazing in it's ability to do so. That's really the point. From there, the photographer can decide how the scene is to be interpreted through pre-visualization. Pre-visualization though could certainly be more difficult if you are not presented with the FULL scene to begin with. Again though, for folks like you and me (and many others here), this is easy to work-a-round since most of us use viewfinders after we have figured out our shot beforehand. Tools that require work-a-rounds and bring attention to their deficiencies though their primary use are aggravating as hell for me though - probably moreso for a viewfinder.
A lot of the issues with DR and EVFs could be solved by having a customisable setting to lift the shadows in the processing pipeline in high-contrast situations. I believe SONY's DRO (dynamic range optimisation) does something like this, to take advantage of the full sensor DR in the same way we lift shadows in post when shooting RAW. I use a NEX but haven't played with DRO since I first got the camera so can't remember if the DR compression is reflected in live-view and EVF or just the output jpegs.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
Actually, you do see in a sort of HDR way. The eyes automatically adjust for various light and dark areas of a scene so the DR is pretty much unbound, unlike a severely restricted video feed. So, the problem and failing of this idea that evf's are what you see is what you get is completely false. It's only one possible interpretation based on either what exposure is set OR a severely curtailed interpretation based on the technical restriction of the video feed. So, it's in no way accurate to say it's wysiwyg. Many more interpretations from a scene are possible. For less experienced users, this idea that what an evf shows is wysiwyg could really restrict the creative possibilities available from the image data. Of course, most of us will know many more interpretations are possible, far beyond the artificially restrictive view from an evf. This could be a real fundamental and in some ways philosophical issue with evf's for some though.
Evf's obviously offer some great capabilities, no doubt about that, and experienced users will know how to use them to their best utility. It's just too bad that their main primary function - to serve as a viewfinder - is so severely lacking.
As far as seeing into the shadows, there is no issue at all obviously with an optical finder in the ability to simultaneously see shadow detail and highlight detail - and again, the eye is amazing in it's ability to do so. That's really the point. From there, the photographer can decide how the scene is to be interpreted through pre-visualization. Pre-visualization though could certainly be more difficult if you are not presented with the FULL scene to begin with. Again though, for folks like you and me (and many others here), this is easy to work-a-round since most of us use viewfinders after we have figured out our shot beforehand. Tools that require work-a-rounds and bring attention to their deficiencies though their primary use are aggravating as hell for me though - probably moreso for a viewfinder. ...Show more →
i guess we have a different idea of what a viewfinder should be/is for. i want a viewfinder to be something that tells me what my camera sensor will see when i click the shutter, for this purpose an evf is much more useful than an ovf. it sounds to me like your preferences for a viewfinder would be best served by rangefinder that corrects for parallax or even just a glass window that shows accurate framing.
regarding the eye – it works pretty much the way a standard camera does except it's only sees color and is sharp in the center and has higher sensitivity b&w "photosites" in the periphery. the image you see is basically a dynamically updated stitch composed of thousands of little stills taken at different exposures as your eyes move about the scene put together after dramatic software based correction of aberrations (optically our eyes kinda suck) by the computer sitting a bit behind your eyes. this means that you don't really get the full hdr effect, you can lift the shadows that are away from bright areas but not small dark areas directly next to bright areas (this is why we need sun shades in cars etc).
sebboh wrote:
i guess we have a different idea of what a viewfinder should be/is for. i want a viewfinder to be something that tells me what my camera sensor will see when i click the shutter, for this purpose an evf is much more useful than an ovf. it sounds to me like your preferences for a viewfinder would be best served by rangefinder that corrects for parallax or even just a glass window that shows accurate framing.
regarding the eye – it works pretty much the way a standard camera does except it's only sees color and is sharp in the center and has higher sensitivity b&w "photosites" in the periphery. the image you see is basically a dynamically updated stitch composed of thousands of little stills taken at different exposures as your eyes move about the scene put together after dramatic software based correction of aberrations (optically our eyes kinda suck) by the computer sitting a bit behind your eyes. this means that you don't really get the full hdr effect, you can lift the shadows that are away from bright areas but not small dark areas directly next to bright areas (this is why we need sun shades in cars etc)....Show more →
Yes, you are probably right about our different ideas about viewfinders. For me, a viewfinders number one attribute should be fidelity to reality. Fidelity to color, to DR, to contrast etc. I don't really want to see any artificial special effects applied to my viewfinder that supposedly mimic what I'm going to get with regard to the above. Even if I did want that, there is a lot more image information/ raw data being recorded from the sensor that is not being displayed by current EVF's. So, even if you are using an EVF that way - "to be something that tells me what my camera sensor will see when i click the shutter" - you are not actually seeing that, at least in higher DR scenes such as bright daylight. I guess if one shot high contrast jpegs, it might be close in certain situations. I do think evf's are getting better though - and much faster than I expected. I have no idea when that progress will hit (or if it has hit) a technological wall where they can't really get much better. I suspect the market will accept them even at their current state so perhaps it doesn't even matter. Heck, I'm using one and you see how much love I have for them.
With regard to the eye, all of that processing happens so quickly with the eye/ brain that the effect is huge DR, obviously greater than any EVF is capable of. That second image I posted was not an HDR image effect btw. Same single exposure as the first with just slider adj. in ACR - and it does relatively mimic what my eye/ brain sees in that situation.
_julian_ wrote:
A lot of the issues with DR and EVFs could be solved by having a customisable setting to lift the shadows in the processing pipeline in high-contrast situations. I believe SONY's DRO (dynamic range optimisation) does something like this, to take advantage of the full sensor DR in the same way we lift shadows in post when shooting RAW. I use a NEX but haven't played with DRO since I first got the camera so can't remember if the DR compression is reflected in live-view and EVF or just the output jpegs.
I have DRO set for my jpegs (when shooting raw+jpeg) - and I tested LV2 through LV5- but it does not have any effect with the EVF display on the RX1 as far as I can tell. I suspect Sony tries to get as much DR as possible from the EVF by default.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
Yes, you are probably right about our different ideas about viewfinders. For me, a viewfinders number one attribute should be fidelity to reality. Fidelity to color, to DR, to contrast etc. I don't really want to see any artificial special effects applied to my viewfinder that supposedly mimic what I'm going to get with regard to the above. Even if I did want that, there is a lot more image information/ raw data being recorded from the sensor that is not being displayed by current EVF's. So, even if you are using an EVF that way - "to be something that tells me what my camera sensor will see when i click the shutter" - you are not actually seeing that, at least in higher DR scenes such as bright daylight. I guess if one shot high contrast jpegs, it might be close in certain situations. I do think evf's are getting better though - and much faster than I expected. I have no idea when that progress will hit (or if it has hit) a technological wall where they can't really get much better. I suspect the market will accept them even at their current state so perhaps it doesn't even matter. Heck, I'm using one and you see how much love I have for them.
With regard to the eye, all of that processing happens so quickly with the eye/ brain that the effect is huge DR, obviously greater than any EVF is capable of. That second image I posted was not an HDR image effect btw. Same single exposure as the first with just slider adj. in ACR - and it does relatively mimic what my eye/ brain sees in that situation.
yeah, i figured it was just the same shot with the shadows pulled up. it's really the same thing – high dynamic range compressed to our low dynamic range viewing mediums. modern sensors with high dynamic range allow one to compress dynamic range from a single exposure to the point where it looks like unnatural hdr to me.
btw, i find shadow blocking/blown highlights in the evf useful because i can assess from them how deep the shadows are and whether i need to use more or less exposure compensation or actually shoot multiple exposures. with an ovf that would be much more of a guessing game and i would need to chimp to be sure. i don't think i've ever had to chimp to verify that i got a shot since switching to the NEX.
sebboh wrote:
btw, i find shadow blocking/blown highlights in the evf useful because i can assess from them how deep the shadows are from that and whether i need to use more or less exposure compensation or actually shoot multiple exposures. with an ovf that would be much more of a guessing game and i would need to chimp to be sure. i don't think i've ever had to chimp to verify that i got a shot since switching to the NEX.
I suspect I would rather go by the histogram but all that comes naturally with experience and is so easy today given the huge DR that a modern sensor is capable of. I'm sure there is an entire generation that never shot more sensitive slide/ chrome film on a regular basis. No chimping, no histograms and, after a while, you don't even need a meter to get a proper exposure. I used to be really good at doing that with chrome film. Now, I have gotten so lazy with all the crutches of modern digital, I doubt I could even get within a stop of a proper exposure on chrome without a meter.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
I suspect I would rather go by the histogram but all that comes naturally with experience and is so easy today given the huge DR that a modern sensor is capable of. I'm sure there is an entire generation that never shot more sensitive slide/ chrome film on a regular basis. No chimping, no histograms and, after a while, you don't even need a meter to get a proper exposure. I used to be really good at doing that with chrome film. Now, I have gotten so lazy with all the crutches of modern digital, I doubt I could even get within a stop of a proper exposure on chrome without a meter....Show more →
i find the histogram to be poor at telling me which part of the photo lies where. it was easier with slide film – you knew you couldn't capture everything so you just had to figure out proper exposure for the main subject. now you have to pay more attention to every little detail of the scene and adjust exposure of the subject in post. people can't handle real black or real white in a photo anymore.
sebboh wrote:
i find the histogram to be poor at telling me which part of the photo lies where. it was easier with slide film – you knew you couldn't capture everything so you just had to figure out proper exposure for the main subject. now you have to pay more attention to every little detail of the scene and adjust exposure of the subject in post. people can't handle real black or real white in a photo anymore.
Spyro P. wrote:
Dr is one thing - low res, noise, lag, jello and crap colour are a few more problems.
seems like most of those are behind us except for the crap color with the latest sony evfs (not sure about the others but i assume they're comparable or catching up quickly).
resolution is good enough for me to focus at f/1.2 without magnification or peaking more consistently than i ever could on a dslr.
lag is still there and varies depending on light, but again it's only limiting for me when it's dark enough that my dslr ovf would be useless.
i've never seen the jello effect (i did see tearing though in older evfs), it's entirely possible my brain just unconsciously filters it out. some people seem more sensitive to it than others.
color is probably never going to be able to match reality. that's one of those things that doesn't bother me at all. half the time i have the evf set to b&w so i can see in b&w. what i want from a viewfinder in order of priority is: the ability to nail focus, exposure, framing, and dof. basically to get the best idea of what the image will look like on my computer. if i want to see what reality looks like, well you know, i can use my eyes for that unimpeded by something stuck to my face.
I find I can actually achieve relatively decent color with the latest Sony EVF for the RX1 by setting a "Neutral" style for the jpeg setting. This, as well as the contrast setting (which can be set to a minimum) is reflected in the EVF view. The improvement in color is probably the biggest change I notice (along with better eye relief) in going from the evf in the NEX-7 to the RX1 EVF. I suspect there is also an improvement in DR.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
I find I can actually achieve relatively decent color with the latest Sony EVF for the RX1 by setting a "Neutral" style for the jpeg setting. This, as well as the contrast setting (which can be set to a minimum) is reflected in the EVF view. The improvement in color is probably the biggest change I notice (along with better eye relief) in going from the evf in the NEX-7 to the RX1 EVF. I suspect there is also an improvement in DR.
i think the biggest problem for color in evfs is auto white balance indoors, which i doubt will improve a lot anytime soon.
'i find the histogram to be poor at telling me which part of the photo lies where.'
Years of using a spot meter is remedial in this respect. I am surprised Adobe never got around to highlighting the pixels that were that tone level as one moused over the histo.
A small rangefinder with an APS-C sensor, M mount with built in EVF would be compelling. I really doubt that's what Leica is going to give us, since it would make too much sense.
40mm equivalent is my guess. Perhaps 2.4 like the original Leica Minilux (which was an awesome lens, I had it) but hopefully faster.
Considering Ricoh had a 40/1.9 (equiv) patent not too long ago for APS-C. I am hoping it is a joint venture and that Ricoh will release one too, for $500 less.
), but i