Short introduction

[jschweigl]

Hello all,

 

my name is Johann Schweigl. I'm, living in Austria, Europe. I've been

reading this Forum for quite a while now, and it was at least one of

the reasons to get myself some Leica gear. Another reason was that I

felt that some Leica lenses, especially the Noctilux can do things

others can't. Like taking images on slow film without a tripod. I'm

into hybrid photography, taking pictures the conventional way but

scanning and printing them digitally afterwards because I believe

that on both ends there are possibilities the respective other

technology can't deliver. Attached is an image that I would like to

show as an example. While it might not be very interesting from a

photographic point of view, the technical specs might be: it was

taken freehanded with a M7 and Noctilux at f1, auto exposure, on

Kodak Technical Pan @ 50 ASA, developed in SPUR Dokuspeed. The

deveoper would allow for 80 ASA, although I didn't try that yet.

Scanned on a Nikon LS4000 @ 4000dpi there is still next to no grain

but rich tonality. Applied some unsharp masking in Photoshop and some

really small tweaking in curves. I'm really enthusiastic about what

the camera/lens/film/developer/scanner combination can do. Apart from

that, it's a joy to use the M7, has a completely different feeling

that my F100.<div></div>

[ray_moth]

Welcome, Johann. I hope you have many happy experiences with your M7 and Noctilux. Considering that your excellent picture was taken at f/1, I'm surprised at the depth of field. The background details are quite distinct.

[eliot]

Johann. It sure looks like a lot more depth of field than would be expected at F/1, unless you are showing a portion of the original negative significantly enlarged.

[jschweigl]

Would be embarrassing if I made an error in the first post. The whole roll was shot between f/1 and f/2 and I would have expected more unsharpness on every picture on the roll that I see. Unsharpness there is alot because of camera shake, but it doesn't increase that much in the background as I thought it would. This was the only one that was useable. Distance to the subject was around 10 to 15 meters which is approximately the same distance as from the subject to the house in the background. I'll go back in the next few days and shoot the same one from a tripod at different f/stops to see what it really was. I apologize if it was f1.4 or f2, but even then ... and it definitively was not more than that.

 

Unsharp masking and decreasing the image size also improves the impression of sharpness, but I have to agree that it is still too much. I'll come back as soon as I have some shots to compare.

 

I still have to get some experience to how much the dof translates visually at f/1 when taking pictures from a distance.

[Rob F.]

Johann:

 

First of all, this is a very nice picture, with wonderful dramatic tonality.

 

I think, though, that Tech Pan is not ideally suited for the shot. I think that by using a faster film, like Delta Pro 400, or Tri-X, or HP-5, the higher shutter speed would preserve more detail than the increased graininess would sacrifice. The amount of DOF you have here seems reasonable for the shot. There's a little softness here and there, but as you pointed out, some of that could be camera shake.

 

I would be tempted to experiment with a faster film. Today's films really do hold up well technically, in terms of shapness and grain. Even Delta 100 would giv you a one-stop advantage, enough to double the shutter speed. With 400, you could shoot two stops faster, and stop down one more stop on the lens, as well, compared to ISO 50.

 

It looks like you are off to a good start with your Leica!