Question on Leica 240 EXIF Info

[plummerl]

Last weekend I attended a Leica store walkabout event. I used a M-P for a couple of hours, using four non-coded lenses that I use on my M3, M6 & MP film cameras. They consisted of a Voigtlander 12mm, Canon 50mm/f1.4, Leica 35mm ASPH and Leica 50mm Summicron. I used the manual lens selection in the menu to select the Leica lenses and those closest for the non-Leica lenses. Bringing the DNG files into Lightroom I was expecting the manual lens selections to carry through, some of the images are missing the manual selections. I'm not sure if this was due to user error (first-timer!) or a limitation of the camera. Can someone confirm that the manual selection should be tagged in the EXIF? Thanks!

 

[Mackinaw]

I just looked at a few pics I took sometime back with my M240 and a LTM Canon 50/1.4. I manually keyed in a Leica 50/1.4 lens and the EXIF data says I was using a 50/1.4 Summilux (this being the lens I keyed in).

Jim B.

 

[jim0266]

My memory is once you manually select the lens you have to hit the set button.

 

[ReeRay]

^ agreed that you need to hit the set button button to affix your selection.

 

[plummerl]

^ agreed that you need to hit the set button button to affix your selection.

This is probably my issue. The Voigtlander 12mm was supposedly set as a Leica 16mm, but the EXIF showed the lens before it.

My secondary question is, does the DNG file represent a raw image and only the JPG file reflects the lens selection? In Lightroom, I was able to specify the Voigt 12mm as the lens and there was an immediate reflection in the image.

Bottom line is that I appear to be hooked. I'll be waiting to see if September reveals a new offering from Leica before becoming a new owner. 😀

 

[Huss]

My secondary question is, does the DNG file represent a raw image and only the JPG file reflects the lens selection? In Lightroom, I was able to specify the Voigt 12mm as the lens and there was an immediate reflection in the image.

Yes the lens selection only effects the jpegs.

 

[rscheffler]

From my experience with the M9 and M240, the lens selection does affect DNG files. The edge color shift and vignetting correction that results when a lens profile is selected, is 'baked into' the DNG files. For example, I've accidentally shot a 90mm lens with a 21mm or 28mm profile enabled, which resulted in green/cyan image edges and over-correction of vignetting in the corresponding DNGs. However, distortion correction is not applied to DNGs, nor is CA correction (not sure if either are applied to Jpegs). Due to these 'baked in' corrections, there has been some criticism of Leica for not allowing edge color shift and vignetting corrections to instead be applied at the raw converter stage of the process...

In-camera settings such as B&W, sharpness, contrast, saturation, only affect Jpegs.

 

[Godfrey]

Yes the lens selection only effects the jpegs.

No: The selected lens profile injects EXIF data into both JPEG and DNG files, and massages the raw data on its way to either the JPEG engine or the DNG file output.

You can see this clearly if you set NO profile for a test shot and then a lens profile for another, identical test shot. Both the JPEGs and the DNGs will be different by more than just the EXIF data.

Of course, the effect can be rather subtle so it is best to do a test like this with a lens that is known to benefit in larger ways from the lens profile. For instance, the Elmar-M 24mm f/3.8 ASPH is a stunning performer when used with the code but doesn't provide much better performance (with respect to vignetting and color shading) than the Color Skopar 25mm f/4 when used without it.

G

 

[Godfrey]

This is probably my issue. The Voigtlander 12mm was supposedly set as a Leica 16mm, but the EXIF showed the lens before it.

My secondary question is, does the DNG file represent a raw image and only the JPG file reflects the lens selection? In Lightroom, I was able to specify the Voigt 12mm as the lens and there was an immediate reflection in the image.

Bottom line is that I appear to be hooked. I'll be waiting to see if September reveals a new offering from Leica before becoming a new owner. 😀

I've done that same error myself, with both the M9 and M-P typ 240. 🙂

The Lightroom lens profiles operate on top of the in-camera lens profiles. I find they often do a bit of geometric tweaking that is useful, where the in-camera lens profiles do the best job of minimizing color shifting and corner fall-off/edge effects.

G

 

[Huss]

I shoot RAW only with my M240. With coded Leica lenses. In LR it shows the name of the lens used in that preview data image in the top right corner. For distortion correction to be enabled, I need to go to lens profiles, select Leica M lenses and then it is applied.

 

[Godfrey]

I shoot RAW only with my M240. With coded Leica lenses. In LR it shows the name of the lens used in that preview data image in the top right corner. For distortion correction to be enabled, I need to go to lens profiles, select Leica M lenses and then it is applied.

That is the Lightroom lens profile that's being applied, not the correction provided by the Leica lens profile in-camera.

G