[Leica] Re: 90/2 Summicron R

[Andrew Nemeth <azn@nemeng.com>]

Dave Rodgers <drodgers@nextlink.net> wrote:

[ Refering to one of the images hanging off <www.nemeng.com/photo> ]

>  Is that the same 90/2 you used to photograph 
>  the girl holding the violin.


Yes it is.  That shot was taken at f5.6 onto PJ100 C41 film.
In pshop I cheated a bit with the bokeh by doing a guassian
blur (rad 0.5) on the area surrounding the girl.  Smoothed
out the grain and made things easier for the JPEG applications
I use.

Depending on the image & how much of a hurry I am in, I use 
either of the following two:

"ProJPEG 3.1" (pshop plug-in) for mac + wintel <www.boxtopsoft.com>
"JPEG Optimizer 3" (app) for wintel only <www.xat.com>

JPEG Optimizer is mind-blowingly powerful & strongly recommend it.
It allows you to selectively compress different portions of 
an image - meaning you can really pack an image down and
yet keep all the fine detail you want.

ProJPEG as a pshop plug-in is easier to use and no slouch, but
lacks the fine control of JPEG Optimizer.

>> repairs done by Adeal?  Opinions?...  (Just sent them my
>> 90mm R Summicron.)<<

The problem I have with the 90mm R Summicron is a minor one, but 
irritating nevertheless.  Basically, the lens focus collar can be 
turned @ 10mm past infinity!  It has no effect on the image quality 
or focus, but it is a bit unnerving.  Thought I could have it fixed 
quickly & cheaply, but it turns out that this particular lens has to 
be completely disassembled to do it, and for that it would have to 
be sent back to Solms.

Too much time + money so I decided against it.  BTW, I bought the
lens cheap 2nd hand - now I know why it was such a bargain.

> I thought it looked nice on my monitor. Then I saw it on a MAC 
> monitor that belongs to one of our engineers.

I run two monitors off my PowerPC - one a Sony 17sf which I use
for image editing, another an el-cheapo LG Studioworks 77i which 
I use to simulate an 'average' users monitor.  I run both tuned at 
a hybrid mac/wintel gamma.

For critical work I dump images onto my server and then also look at
them using the computers in the local library (all wintel).  These
machines are beaten to death and have their monitor brightness &
colours all over the place.  So if an image looks okay on them,
then they'll look okay *anywhere*!

Hasn't always been thus though - my earlier online images were 
done on a fully calibrated mac gamma monitor, which meant they 
looked hopelessly dark on just about anything other than a graphic
designers mac.  :^(


Regds,

Andrew N.
www.nemeng.com