Black & White Output from the M8, M9, & M240

ray . · March 23, 2015

I'm the proud new owner of a used M9, having had an M8 until a few years back. I love the image quality the M9 puts

out.... Resolution and color are great, but I'm a little underwhelmed by what I've been able to do with it converting to

black & white.

I still have my DNG files from the M8 and with one click in photoshop the color photos turn to what is usually stunning

black and white- Deep blacks and a nice nuanced tonal range. It's a distinct M8 b&w look. There's no question it's a heart thumper. But no matter

what I do with the M9 files conversion there just seems to be something missing. I keep amping up the contrast and

trying all kinds of approaches, but while the result is passable and maybe even respectable, it doesn't grab me by the

throat like black and white should. It's good that I like shooting color these days, because the M9 does that very well.

For those with experience with digital M's, what's your take? Have you noticed the same thing? Does the M240 get the mojo back with black and white? I've seen nice black and white with the M9, but they seem to be images with very high

contrast, like a Moriyama photo.

No, I'm not going to buy a Monochrom, so don't mention it... :)

Brian1664876441 · March 23, 2015

There was a discussion of late on the Leica forum regarding the use of Yellow filters with the M9 and M8 for monochrome work. I, and a couple of others, thought it of value- others are all post-processing, did not.

This image is with the M8 and a medium Yellow filter, conversion done with my own software that does the demosaic using simplest "nearest neighbor" interpolation then adds the channels. One Photoshop "curve" to calibrate the RAW file, used on all the conversions.

The Blue channel sensitivity extends well past "traditional Blue".

If these shots look good to you, Try a Yellow filter with the M9.

Greg M · March 23, 2015

Lucky you, Ray! I've assembled my M lens outfit. The M-digital body's going to take a little while yet, so I'm still getting along with the M4 and Ilford films for my black & white fix. Getting the negatives digitized and managing the grain size seems to be as much a challenge as converting to black & white from digital. I've never liked my B&W conversions from digital bodies, and starting to use film again has been a lot of fun.

M4 and a 1972 or so 135mm f4 Tele Elmar, with Ilford HP5..

rgerraty · March 23, 2015

I know this will be heresy, but one of the regular posters to the W/NW picture of the week agreed with me: the M9 black and white jpegs are very nice. I used these plus raw one evening and some grizzled grey hair of an older colleague at a dinner looked great and I just could not emulate it whatever I did with the raw file. In Lightroom I usually increase contrast a little, lower the black slider left to deepen the blacks, raise the shadow slightly, depending, and maybe push the highlight slider to the right too, depending on how I've exposed it. I sometimes fiddle with the curve. The colour sliders will sometimes make a big difference to certain images. There is a great thread on Rangefinderforum entitled something like show us your M9 black and white conversions: worth a look.

Wouter Willemse · March 23, 2015

I'm not a digital Leica shooter, but I do notice these changes between different cameras, different lenses and different software (i.e. probably every brand suffers from these inconsistencies). Have you tried with the different profiles for your DNG files in Adobe Camera RAW (assuming you use that to convert the raw files to start with) ? The response curve applied for nice, somewhat punchy and saturated looking colour images for me results too often in B&W with too harsh contrasts and lousy tonality, and a more flat and dull colour image actually makes a better starting point instead.

Maybe you've already explored these options, but if not, worth giving it a shot.

Ian Taylor · March 23, 2015

I haven't put a lot of time into different approaches, but I just use Nik Silver Efex. Seems to get decent blacks. I usually start with the preset High Structure (smooth) and take it from there. Playing with the 'Sensitivity' color sliders is key for me.

YMMV obv.

ray . · March 23, 2015

I'm wondering:

If anyone has an M240 who would be willing to send me a couple of files from it so I could see how they respoind to b&w conversion, I would greatly appreciate it!

Brian1664876441 · March 24, 2015

Comparing the M8 and the M9: three big differences.

1) The RED channel of the M9 is much more sensitive to light, ~50% more;

2) The M8 has compressed DNG only, not uncompressed. The peak-to-peak noise of the compression routine is much higher, but the overall noise is reduced. The compression routine introduces a lot of sharp edges, then smooths out everything in between them

3) The M8 has much higher IR response.

How are you using the M9, Compressed/Uncompressed, etc.

knut_schwinzer · March 24, 2015

Interesting, Brian. If it is not asking too much, could you elaborate 2) a bit? Maybe with a sample pic?

TIA,

Knut<div></div>

ray . · March 24, 2015

I've got the setting on uncompressed.

I was able to get to a better place and much closer to what I'm looking for with this file, with a b&w film photo to compare to during the process. Just looks like it might take a little more work to get there:

ray . · March 24, 2015

Here we go... Might take a little more playing around to get the preferred tonal arrangement, but contrast is pretty good; tiff converted to jpg:<div>

00dCMm-555850584.jpg.31e334b7b8ab92fb6fb4900f457ac3a6.jpg

</div>

Brian1664876441 · March 24, 2015

This came out of a discussion on LUF, I posted more about it on Leicaplace

http://www.leicaplace.com/threads/1124/#post-8451

This plot shows how the DNG-8 compression throws values into bins, or "bands them together",

<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/90768661@N02/16169382553" title="dataloss_vs_pixelvalue by fiftyonepointsix, on

Flickr"><img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8593/16169382553_719231020f_o.jpg" width="1021" height="614"

alt="dataloss_vs_pixelvalue"></a>

Brian1664876441 · March 24, 2015

This is an M8 image using uncompressed RAW, converted to DNG-16.

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8719/16805046712_e742af5cd5_o.jpg" width="682" height="1024"

alt="L1015636"></a>

This is what the DNG-8 compression routine throws away, magnified back to the scale of the original.

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8732/16806127595_5d97b44858_o.jpg" width="682" height="1024"

alt="L15636DF"></a>

And this is perhaps the most unique Monochrome Conversion of an M8 image ever done in FORTRAN...

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8675/16636025039_a154a1e8c7_b.jpg" width="683" height="1024"

alt="FRACTAL"></a>

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8632/16618772710_12cfe2b853_b.jpg" width="682" height="1024"

alt="L1015634"></a>

The color information mapped into the Mandelbrot set...

I found all of my old FORTRAN code from the 1980s.

anthony_brookes5 · March 24, 2015

It has taken a long time to find out why my B&W images from my M8 couldn't compare with my M6 film pictures. I now know that a digital B&W image cannot match a high resolution film scan because there just isn't enough information in the output of the sensor. I have passed my old negatives through my scanner at 9000+ dpi and my Leica Vario-Summicron digital image when converted to B&W does not compare. Of course there are medium format digital cameras that give as many mp but film appears to have many more grades of black. Am I right ?

Brian1664876441 · March 24, 2015

I miss Panatomic-X in Microdol.

The M Monochrom is as close to it as any digital that I've used personally. There are better, they make the Monochrom

look inexpensive.

I will be doing an M8 to Monochrom comparison. Will probably also do the M9, and look more at the conversion process.

I just got my first color->Monochrome DNG conversion working. The idea is to use a color filter, in this case a Y48, and

skip all the color balance stuff.

This is an M8 uncompressed DNG, converted to Linear-DNG Monochrome.

<img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8744/16299874603_bff9055dd5_b.jpg" width="682" height="1024"

alt="M1015737"></a>

Yellow Y48 filter, 28mm/2.8 Elmarit, the channels are interpolated and added together without regard for color balance. "DEBUGGING my CODE", it's like a HEX editor that you can write routines to test out. Now that I figured out HOW to do it, can start playing around. The DNG file is in a FORTRAN common block.

knut_schwinzer · March 25, 2015

Most impressive, Brian! Thanks! So in theory, you could reprogram an M8 to be a lot better (though slower)? Or is it all after the fact manipulation with the M8 in service mode with RAW+Jpeg fine enabled, defaulting after switching the camera off to DNG again? Please excuse my ignorance if I missed here something! Cheers, Knut

Brian1664876441 · March 26, 2015

The M8 in service mode is slower as it writes the 20MByte RAW file and JPEG to the card. The "RAW" file does not have the EXIF info and White Balance that are in the JPEG. Arvid cleverly merges information from the two files to create a new DNG. My code is "hardwired" to his DNG right now, but I will add a general DNG parser to it. I started doing stuff like this over 30 years ago. You can download free software to turn the service-mode Raw files into uncompressed DNG from here:

http://m8raw2dng.de/

Arvid is an M8 enthusiast. I wrote up a PDF "tutotial" for how I process my color images.PM an Email address to me if you want a copy. It is focused on Lightroom running on Win7

I am still learning the DNG process, and at this point still debugging/optimizing code. My code starts with the DNG file

created with Arvid's M8RAW2DNG.exe program It makes a new DNG file, starts with an "M", and is linear-

Monochrome. I am hoping Arvid would incorporate the process into his program, maybe if there is enough interest. If not,

I will put together something.

"FORTRAN output file"... I think in FORTRAN, have to translate to C...

<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/90768661@N02/16930964225" title="M1015769_S by fiftyonepointsix, on

Flickr"><img src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7626/16930964225_5bc046f518_b.jpg" width="682" height="1024"

alt="M1015769_S"></a>

This is with an O56 filter over the lens, the Blue and Green channels still collect enough light above 560nm to be useful.

I am going to add a set of calibration coefficients to the code for each grade of filter (Y48, Y52, O56, R60). I am going to

try equalizing green and blue- still experimenting.

Karim Ghantous · March 26, 2015

conversion done with my own software

</blockquote>

Just the man I want to speak with! This implies that you can take a DNG and not debayer at all, right? I've been looking for RAW conversion software that can give me the option to not debayer, just in case I wanted the sharpest possible b&w image from a colour file. I cannot find a single one.

I'm not going to ask you to post your source code, but are you aware of any RAW converters that can do what your custom code can do, including not debayering?

Brian1664876441 · March 27, 2015

I am one of those few programmers that will post Source Code like this, "Old School".

Photoshop will allow you to bypass the demosaic process using "Photoshop Raw". The trick: you need to know where the data begins, and the size of each row and column. you can get that information by reading the "Image File Descriptor" table. Turns out that many RAW formats, not just DNG, are based on Tiff. I have not tried Raw mode for .NEF files, but believe it will work. You must have an Uncompressed image to work from.

I used photoshop "RAW Mode" to look at the image before getting my DNG emitter to work. The file header in this case was "1702 bytes". You need to tell Photochop whether it is 8-bit or 16-bit pixels, and Byte order: this can be determined by looking at the first two bytes in a TIFF style image. "I I" is Intel format (IBM) and "M M" is Motorola format (MAC). You need the number of pixels per row, number of rows in the image, and size of the file header to skip to get to the data. All of this can be found with a "Raw Digger" or something that interprets the header info in the image file. I am writing my own.

I will be putting up lessons learned and tricks used on Leicaplace.com. This does follow the original topic here brought up here, but will veer off rapidly.... Unless the OP asks "and oh by the way, anyone have some FORTRAN code that I can use to make better conversions...

Brian1664876441 · March 28, 2015

I started an "Alternate Monochrome Conversion" thread on Leicaplace, will be posting some of the results of the

experiments and technical notes. I write in FORTRAN to figure things out. I'm having fun with this, reading and writing

RAW files is something I've done before, and have been on RFF and others regarding the benefit of a published standard.

http://www.leicaplace.com/threads/1145/

Brian1664876441 · March 28, 2015

Karim- I uploaded the subroutine that does the Raw conversion. What is unique(?) about it: is merges the blue and green

channel as one, then builds the Red channel. The rationale- the Orange filter cuts out everything below 560nm, and the

green and blue channel response just needs to be balanced. 3/4 pixels in the merged channel are not interpolated. I

uploaded full sized JPEGs of the converted DNG files. I also wrote a more general DNG parser.

john_r._fulton_jr. · March 29, 2015

I use Alien Skin Exposure 5 to convert to B&W. Whether it's M9, M8.2, D3200, 5D2 or what-have-you it works great for me. All my B&W's look the same. I usually use either the filter for Tri-X 400 or Tri-X 1-stop push to 800.

Karim Ghantous · March 30, 2015

Thank you very much, Brian. I don't use PS but now that I think about it, I suspect that Irfan View might have a RAW view mode. I'll have to dig out the HP computer and have a look (I use a Mac these days).

As for the code, it looks nice. I dislike languages such as C as they look too fussy. I don't know FORTRAN but if I had to learn it I don't think I'd have too much trouble. I used to program many years ago, and I used Blitz Basic 2 on the Amiga.

I thought about writing my own debayering code and as long as the maths isn't too complicated, it's actually quite easy really. The difficulty would come with understanding the very complicated algorithms that do exist.

I'm guessing that in your routines, you use the boundary pixels for colour information, but otherwise exclude them from the final output. Would that be the case, if that makes any sense?

Thanks for your trouble and old-school coding principles! :-) It seems that nobody has yet commented on your posts on Leicaplace. I'll keep an eye on that thread.

Brian1664876441 · March 30, 2015

The demosaic routine that I used is "SO OLD THAT" the person that described it to me over the phone worked with Bryce

Bayer, I had called Kodak to ask them to make an Infrared version of the DCS200, The DCS200c was the first color camera sold by Kodak to use the Bayer filter. I asked them to leave the IR cut filter off of the array. They did, I have the first DCS200ir sold. The DCS-100 used a mosaic filter, but it was not a Bayer pattern.

The routines that I am doing for use with the red and Orange filters rely on the fact that the blue and green channel of the

sensor are sensitive to light all the way out to Red. It boosts the channels instead of the normal interpolation, in the end

"about half" of the interpolation performed by most. I love FORTRAN, have used it for almost 40 years now.

clgriffin · April 1, 2015

I can't match what you guys are discussing. I've been satisfied by the choices available in the M (Type 240). I get good results using the film mode of Black and White with the subset of yellow filter and vintage tone. The edited version of this image with old burning and dodging techniques employed is on another thread here, but this is straight out of the camera, using a Voigtlander 40mm f1.4 Nokton Classic single-coated lens. ISO 800, 1/60s @ f5.6.<div>

00dDIP-556023784.JPG.d1eac00156caf2873c7afd0c3dce4174.JPG

</div>

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Black & White Output from the M8, M9, & M240

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