Monochrom 246

[v3cron]

So I've been looking at RAW images from this camera over at dpreview, and all of the high iso shots are so underexposed, that shadow detail cannot be recovered without pronounced cross-hatching.

I haven't been to find any other real world RAW files at high iso, but I need to know if it possible to get dirty shots out of this camera. Almost everything online is super clean, and that's not for me (I'm a Tri-x in Rodinal person).

Does anyone have any links to RAW files that I can play with that have this potential? Also is the extreme cross-hatching in the dpreview RAWs normal, or was their camera broken?

 

[Dante_Stella]

Their camera was broken. You also have to use fast cards; slow ones seem to contribute to noise problems with digital Ms.

You will have a lot of trouble replicating heavy grain with an M246 because that takes an ISO of 12,500 or higher to get grain like Tri-X in Rodinal. It takes 6400 just to get Tri-X grain with a fine-grained developer.

Dante

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Here is some known by few odd site where people post, if I'm not mistaken, links to RAW files from all kind of cameras. Is OP aware of this site? I can't remember it, because if I want film like grainy images from digital camera, high ISO and in camera JPEG1 works better for me. Including digital M Leica camera.

Their camera was broken. You also have to use fast cards; slow ones seem to contribute to noise problems with digital Ms.

You will have a lot of trouble replicating heavy grain with an M246 because that takes an ISO of 12,500 or higher to get grain like Tri-X in Rodinal. It takes 6400 just to get Tri-X grain with a fine-grained developer.

Dante

Most likely as not regular user they were trying to use it as any other camera in thier reviews. But as not Leica fans club site and operation they are not aware of limited exposure metering capabilities of digital M.

 

[v3cron]

Their camera was broken. You also have to use fast cards; slow ones seem to contribute to noise problems with digital Ms.

You will have a lot of trouble replicating heavy grain with an M246 because that takes an ISO of 12,500 or higher to get grain like Tri-X in Rodinal. It takes 6400 just to get Tri-X grain with a fine-grained developer.

Dante

Thanks, Dante. I don't need to get extreme grain (I've got Ricoh for that), but that totally smooth look feels weird to me. I like the tonality otherwise, and don't want to give up my lenses as I try to make myself like digital. I'm happy that those samples are not representative.

 

[JohnWolf]

You might find this thread helpful: http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=172457&referrerid=76892

John

 

[35photo]

If you underexpose at high ISO on digital and then pull it back up.... Oh there will be plenty of grain! This is something you have to play with to get the desired effect put its certainly possible....

 

[v3cron]

If you underexpose at high ISO on digital and then pull it back up.... Oh there will be plenty of grain! This is something you have to play with to get the desired effect put its certainly possible....

I've tried that, but the lines (is that what they call banding?) can easily ruin a shot. That's why I brought up the Monochrom, since the online samples are unsalvageable. I think it is designed to be noiseless, which might make it a bad choice.

 

[v3cron]

You might find this thread helpful: http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=172457&referrerid=76892

John

Thanks. It seems people are relying a lot on fake grain effects, which I wouldn't do personally. I like to find the inherent beauty of the medium (as I did with film), but with digital, the camera and film are inseparable, making experimentation extremely expensive.

 

[Vince Lupo]

Here's ISO 1600:

Jay Hill by Vince Lupo, on Flickr

This is ISO 1000:

Jesse by Vince Lupo, on Flickr

Both of these were shot with my 35/2 goggled Summicron V1 at f/2.

I sold my 246 earlier this year, but it seems that 1600 is the tipping point for when things start to get 'dirty'. I didn't try to lift the shadows too much because, as you say, there's the danger of the horizontal lines starting to come into play. I think the shadows pretty much figured themselves out, at least in the case of these two shots.

 

[Godfrey]

Thanks, Dante. I don't need to get extreme grain (I've got Ricoh for that), but that totally smooth look feels weird to me. I like the tonality otherwise, and don't want to give up my lenses as I try to make myself like digital. I'm happy that those samples are not representative.

Bolded - That’s possibly the largest issue. Film and digital capture are coming completely different capture mediums and will always have different workflow and feel. Best to accept that and then learn how to see in the medium, bend it to get what you want.

 

[v3cron]

Best to accept that and then learn how to see in the medium, bend it to get what you want.

That's exactly what I'm doing here, but preferably without buying 10 different cameras to bend 🙂. Leicas are tricky because of the price of admission and known issues like sensor corrosion, etc. I can't abandon my Leica lenses, though, and don't want a crop sensor for them. Limits options a bit.

 

[Godfrey]

That's exactly what I'm doing here, but preferably without buying 10 different cameras to bend 🙂. Leicas are tricky because of the price of admission and known issues like sensor corrosion, etc. I can't abandon my Leica lenses, though, and don't want a crop sensor for them. Limits options a bit.

Just to be clear: The ONLY FF Leica Ms that had sensor corrosion issues was the M9 series (M9, M9-P, M-E, M Monochrom). All the other digital Ms have had no sensor problems at all. Buy any subsequent M camera (typ 240, 246, 262, or M10 series) and they are not "tricky" in that way at all. And they all render to within a few degrees of latitude the same one to the next, barring the Monochrom models.

Personally, unless smooth ultra-high ISO capability and B&W only were all that was important to me, I'd rather get a standard M240, M262, or M10 model to render B&W photos with. With a Monochrom model, to do what you do with B&W film to adjust the contrasts of different colors in the B&W space, you must use filters at the time of capture. With any RGB sensor, you can do all your B&W filtering in software at raw conversion/rendering time.

Plus there the fact that the Monochrom models are almost exactly the opposite of what you seem to want ... You wish to obtain more noise (grain) where the Monochroms are particularly good at rendering nearly grainless ultra-high ISO capability. A standard typ 240 model is, these days, much less expensive and you can get some 'dirty' results at ISO 3200, with a little bit of underexposure. With typ 262 it's much the same, with the M10 you need to push up to ISO 6400. With the 246 and M10-M, ISO 125000 is still smoother than the color cameras can be.

An M or M-P typ 240 seems to be findable for $2200-$3800 pretty easily. If you expose properly at ISO 3200 or 6400, you will get some pleasant noise without banding.

G

 

[v3cron]

Just to be clear: The ONLY FF Leica Ms that had sensor corrosion issues was the M9 series (M9, M9-P, M-E, M Monochrom). All the other digital Ms have had no sensor problems at all. Buy any subsequent M camera (typ 240, 246, 262, or M10 series) and they are not "tricky" in that way at all. And they all render to within a few degrees of latitude the same one to the next, barring the Monochrom models.

Personally, unless smooth ultra-high ISO capability and B&W only were all that was important to me, I'd rather get a standard M240, M262, or M10 model to render B&W photos with. With a Monochrom model, to do what you do with B&W film to adjust the contrasts of different colors in the B&W space, you must use filters at the time of capture. With any RGB sensor, you can do all your B&W filtering in software at raw conversion/rendering time.

Plus there the fact that the Monochrom models are almost exactly the opposite of what you seem to want ... You wish to obtain more noise (grain) where the Monochroms are particularly good at rendering nearly grainless ultra-high ISO capability. A standard typ 240 model is, these days, much less expensive and you can get some 'dirty' results at ISO 3200, with a little bit of underexposure. With typ 262 it's much the same, with the M10 you need to push up to ISO 6400. With the 246 and M10-M, ISO 125000 is still smoother than the color cameras can be.

An M or M-P typ 240 seems to be findable for $2200-$3800 pretty easily. If you expose properly at ISO 3200 or 6400, you will get some pleasant noise without banding.

G

I was thinking along those lines as well, since the Monochrom models seem to be optimized for low noise. On the other hand, the tonality is amazing. I mentioned the corrosion issue because I originally wanted an M9 or M9M, but that put me off a bit. I'm going to get my hands a few of these soon and see what happens.

 

[v3cron]

Their camera was broken. You also have to use fast cards; slow ones seem to contribute to noise problems with digital Ms.

You will have a lot of trouble replicating heavy grain with an M246 because that takes an ISO of 12,500 or higher to get grain like Tri-X in Rodinal. It takes 6400 just to get Tri-X grain with a fine-grained developer.

Dante

Which SD cards work best with this camera? I just bought a used M246 and the shadow banding at 12500 and even 6400 is atrocious. I mean, my small sensor Ricoh does a better job. I updated the firmware and tried a Sandisk Extreme something or other. I want to put it through its paces while I'm within the return policy.

 

[Vince Lupo]

Leica recommends an SD card with a minimum write speed of 95mb/s, so I think any of the current cards will easily meet that threshold. I used both Extreme and Ultra cards without issue.

Do you happen to have an example of one of your ISO 6400 images with the shadow banding that you can post? I'd be curious to see what it looks like -- I'm assuming the banding is happening in post-production as you try to recover shadow detail? Or is it SOOC banding? Are you shooting JPEGS or RAW?

 

[v3cron]

Leica recommends an SD card with a minimum write speed of 95mb/s, so I think any of the current cards will easily meet that threshold. I used both Extreme and Ultra cards without issue.

Do you happen to have an example of one of your ISO 6400 images with the shadow banding that you can post? I'd be curious to see what it looks like -- I'm assuming the banding is happening in post-production as you try to recover shadow detail? Or is it SOOC banding? Are you shooting JPEGS or RAW?

Thanks. The banding/cross-hatching occurs on uncompressed DNGs anytime you try to recover shadows (even a little) and raise contrast. It looks like a defective sensor, but since the camera I bought and the dpreview RAWs both exhibit this behavior, I'm starting to think it is normal.

I'm going to experiment some more. Flat light pictures look beautiful, but any high iso shots in contrasty light are hard to work with (I use Capture One v20). I've got 7 days to work it out and see if I want to keep it, but I'm glad the card situation is ok.

 

[v3cron]

Another question, as I get to know this whole new world of digital Leicas:

My lenses all work so far, including my 21 SA f3.4 (yessss!), but I was thinking of getting an old collapsible Summar. The manual says not to collapse lenses, but does anyone know if this lens in particular is deep/wide enough to cause a problem in the 246? I haven't found a definitive answer from googling, but some people have defied the manual and collapsed their Elmars, so maybe...

 

[ASA 32]

Curious as to what the OP ended up with.

 

[Derek Leath]

Which SD cards work best with this camera? I just bought a used M246 and the shadow banding at 12500 and even 6400 is atrocious. I mean, my small sensor Ricoh does a better job. I updated the firmware and tried a Sandisk Extreme something or other. I want to put it through its paces while I'm within the return policy.

I just picked up a ScanDisk 128GB Ultra SDXC for $19 on Amazon. works very well in my 246 MM

 

[Derek Leath]

BallsofSteel
by
Derek Leath,
on Flickr