Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/06/28
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]My Nikon Coolpix 990 does a great job taking macro shots, especially when coupled with a reversed 35mm Summicron-M. But it can be very frustrating when taking "normal" pictures with any lighting contrast. Or when there's anything white in the picture. The old color-TV addage about never wearing a white shirt on the set seems apt. Based on suggestions here, I've turned off the auto white balance and set the autofocus and metering to lock when I half-press the shutter button. This has lowered shutter lag to a sometimes tolerable level if I can prefocus. I've also turned the in-camera sharpening off, which helps in minimizing artifacts. Howevah. . . The dynamic range of the camera is maddeningly small. I get blown highlights all the time. It seems worse than slide film. And I know how to shoot slide film--I've been doing it all my life. I'm tempted to set the exposure compensation to minus 1/3 or 2/3 stop all the time. There's also a contrast setting in the Coolpix menus. Maybe I shoud set it to "Low." Does anybody else do this kind of thing? Graham, Sonny and Tina are shooting a lot with the Digilux or its Panasonic incarnation. How do you folks deal with the dynamic range issue? For example, Graham, in your shot of the two white geese here: http://www.geebeephoto.com/html/irc4.html How did you expose, and do you have any customary settings you use to give you the best chance of capturing bright detail? I'm almost tempted to carry my spot meter and use manual exposure. But it seems ridiculous to use a camera with "conveniences" that you have to turn off in order to get a good shot, and where setting things manually is maddeningly awkward. Using a Leica or my OM-2 and an external meter is actually faster than all that fumbling :-) Another interesting property of the digicam is that if I convert to B&W in Picture Window, I can often find a color channel that isn't blown, and emphasize that. But again, it seems kinda ridiculous to have to do that. Any suggestions on improving things would be most welcome. Anyway, I'm not complaining *too* much. I know the Coolpix 990 is old and not really a professional-level camera. I bought it as a learning tool. And I'm learning. But I'm beginning to wonder whether I'll ever be satisfied with digital at its current state. A friend with a Nikon D100 tells me that his camera does the same thing, and he has to drastically underexpose and mess with Photoshop curves, and it still is inferior to film in many cases. And then there's the purple fringing of bright-to-dark transitions, which seems to be endemic unless lenses and sensors are perfectly matched. In the June National Geographic, there was an all-digital article about some "lake country." Some of the pictures had precisely the same problems that I'm talking about. It really was a demonstration of all that is both marvelous and maddening about digital. - --Peter - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html