[Leica] IMGs: Beauty of M9 colors at night (Bangkok portfolio)

[mitcha at mac.com]

Richard - there is a long thread here:

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/leica-m9-forum/292708-m9-colors-night-best-way-shoot.html

…parts of which are worth reading if you are interested in trying this technique. In particular, read Jim Kasson’s posts and the links to his blog: he’s done a lot of work and explains and shows conclusively why it’s better with the M9 to shoot at ISO 640 and push in LR 4 or 5. (He answers your questions).

Also, I’ll post here the steps in shooting and processing that I suggested as a starting point:

Exposure
At ISO 640 start (with the Elmarit 21mm ASPH) by exposing at f/2.8 and a shutter speed of 1/60 or 1/90, and (with a Summicorn-28) by exposing at f/2.0 and a shutter speed of 1/120 or 1/180. The aim is not to blow out the highlights. On a dark night, I find that I don't need much depth of field because of the rapid drop-off in light intensity.

Lightroom 4/5 Post-Processing
1. Click Auto in the Exposure Panel and use this as the starting point.
2. Adjust the Exposure Slider to the point at which you like the look.
3. Press "J" and see whether any of the highlights are blown out.
4. If necessary (from Step 3), pull back on the Highlights Slider.
5. I like to pull back the Black Slider to negative numbers so that picture has a look that I like.
6. Click White Balance Eye Dropper in an area you want to be neutral grey, but I don't like to neutralize the colors completely because I want a "real" look from the lights in the picture.
7. Try moving the Clarity Slider between +10 – +30. (I find that increasing Clarity creates a good feeling of light in a high contrast scene, but sometimes this may not be necessary or even may not look good.
8. If you increased Clarity, you can probably pull back a bit on the Exposure.
9. In the Noise Reduction panel, after setting the View to 100%, move the Color Slider to the right until the color noise disappears.
10. Still at 100% View, move the Luminance Slider to the right if necessary to remove more noise, but be careful no to go too far. Some pictures will not need any Luminance Slide increase.

- - Mitch


Subject: [Leica] IMGs: Beauty of M9 colors at night (Bangkok portfolio)
From: richard at richardmanphoto.com (Richard Man)
Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2014 14:46:02 -0700
References: <54EB6482-CDDC-4F8B-852F-18D151AE3B4E at mac.com>
Very interesting. Thank you for sharing. So underexpose and then push it to
Lightroom is presumably better than just running up the ISO? Is it the
theory that with jacking up the ISO, you are increasing the signal at the
sensor end, whereas "push processing" just rely on the the sensor's ability
to capture the shadows?