Looks like canon went ... BACK TO THE FUTURE 1940s

When Fuji does it it's fun and quirky and when Canon does it it is suddenly worrisome and uneasy. Just laughed at all the PetaPixel article comments on the protos from all the folx without a sense of humor and those worried Canon is spending too much money on what they personally don't want instead of the fantasy wish lists we see on photo websites.

ISO64 said:

This reminds me when, back in seventies, I was using my father's Exa Original. It was using a folding mirror as a shutter. During exposure, viewer would go dark. And you could replace the viewing prism/eyepiece with top open box looking at matt glass ended loup.

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On all of the "VX series Exakta bodies you could replace the eye-level viewfinder with a waist-level finder, the operation of which would be a lot like this. I still have a VX IIb and a VX IIa, and I know I still have a waist-level finder around too.

Old Man FL/FD said:

I still have some 135 size ‘analog memory cassettes’ hanging around.

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I have also quite a stock of 120 film, Portra 400, 800, HP5+, TX400 etc.

Hi guys,
I really hesitated to post this one, as the Barn Owl was surrounded by so many branches, but this was all he/she would allow me.

Great photo!

Click said:

Norman and CR,

Great shots, guys.

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Thanks. I shared it more to show some of the behavior of this species than to post a great photo (which it isn't). Collared Incas routinely back off after drinking from feeders, hover a bit, then flash their tails before departing. It's a good opportunity to get some in-flight photos away from the feeder itself. Here's another, more formal, portrait photo from the same encounter.

R5MkII RF200-800mm

Very nice shots. I especially like the 2nd and 3rd one. Well done, MSH411.

My B&H order for the 14/1.4 just changed to In Progress, and they charged my card. Based on past experience, that means the lens will ship out tonight.

This reminds me when, back in seventies, I was using my father's Exa Original. It was using a folding mirror as a shutter. During exposure, viewer would go dark. And you could replace the viewing prism/eyepiece with top open box looking at matt glass ended loup.

AlanF said:

DxO used to do its superb noise reduction by old-fashioned number crunching, and added ML only recently. I wonder how much AI they actually use?

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"Trained on a dataset ten times larger than its predecessor and leveraging over 100,000 DxO Modules, DeepPRIME 3 sets a new benchmark for RAW processing."

Well, nice but...ten times larger than what?

AlanF said:

By the way, I don't like those vertical purple fringes.

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Yeah, makes me really miss my first Canon prime, the EF 85/1.8.

Definitely not what I was imagining when I think “retro style”. It looks a bit like those cheap $59 knockoff digital cameras that say “Vintage 64mp Digital Camera High Quality!”

If they are going compact fixed lens, I was hoping for something more similar to a Canon Demi. Those are really neat looking, and would make a great sleek travel camera that can take some knocks.

neuroanatomist said:

Here's the same image, still in DxO but with all corrections turned off (so as close to RAW as you can get, more so than Canon because DPP will force the distortion correction and DxO does not), pushed 3 stops. No NR. Below it are the top left and bottom left corners at 100%.

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Thank you!

neuroanatomist said:

Very noisy, but the noise still looks even without any 'lattice, moire, etc.' artifacts.

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Yeah, wherever it might be an issue that context is not this context. Unless maybe someone just takes Canon's RAW and does their own thing.

neuroanatomist said:

I don't use Canon's software to convert RAW images, except on the few occasions when I have a camera that's too new for DxO to support (and in that case, I usually shoot RAW+JPG so I can have usable images immediately, then I go back and properly convert them later. I loathe DPP's workflow.

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I do use DPP. And what you said...

neuroanatomist said:

DxO is using AI for the noise reduction, but I have no idea what's going on under the hood (if anything) in terms of the interaction of NR algorithms with lens correction profiles.

I've certainly seen fixed pattern noise artifacts when pushing images from older Canon sensors (5DII, for example). Once Canon updated their lithography (at the time of the 5DIV, IIRC) the FPN issues pretty much went away (as did most of the internet complaints about Canon's poor low ISO DR). I can't say I've seen artifacts from perspective correction of architecture shots, but I usually do those with a TS-E lens and not software.

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The TS is the one lens series that I'd love to add to my collection. Yet to justify it past want, but I'm looking for excuses.

neuroanatomist said:

I use DxO PhotoLab, but they also have PureRAW that offers similar corrections more easily integrated into other workflows (e.g. with plugins for LR and PS).

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It wouldn't surprise me if DXO takes the time to do the math and refinement.

I use DPP to start with Canon's "math" applied and then I start my edits. No point in recreating their work, and since I bought into their ecosystem to start with... well, would be silly to avoid it on some principle. I think using something like DXO or other high quality purveyor of transformations is the same thing, just a more refined experience.

But in the context of this thread, for the examples given it seems that Canon's process has mitigated any issue that might have arisen from the stretching of the image circle to a rectangle. That should probably be quite comforting.

Unless it AI-slopped into existence the person obsessing with their smart phone in the corner. In which case, concerning... and truly funny.

DocInfoSci said:

I'm not sure where in the pipeline that noise is adjusted or refined (if refined, depending on the model), but I wouldn't be surprised if Canon uses their a) knowledge of the sensor, b) knowledge of the lens behaviour (DLO data), and C) a pipeline to make a final trained-AI adjustment to the noise in the image. That could be done as part of generating the RAW image (a phase 1 adjustment to the sensor read) and in generating a DLO-derived TIFF, HEIC, or JPEG (a phase 2 output image adjustment as part of the DLO system).

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This is what Canon’s neural network image processing tool does.
See: https://app.ssw.imaging-saas.canon/app/en/nnipt.html

Halfway down the page is a link to a whitepaper which describes the concepts.
See: https://app.ssw.imaging-saas.canon/...aper_Deep_Learning_Upscaling_Technology_E.pdf

neuroanatomist said:

DxO is using AI for the noise reduction, but I have no idea what's going on under the hood (if anything) in terms of the interaction of NR algorithms with lens correction profiles.

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DxO used to do its superb noise reduction by old-fashioned number crunching, and added ML only recently. I wonder how much AI they actually use?

By the way, I don't like those vertical purple fringes.

DocInfoSci said:

I have to agree that your samples are very uniform. I see nothing wrong with that noise, and if preserved in that way after "reasonable" edits then I'd be happy to hand if off as final work.

But, you mentioned the use of DXO and it has a reputation for achieving nice outcomes. What about pre-DXO? What about RAW?

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Here's the same image, still in DxO but with all corrections turned off (so as close to RAW as you can get, more so than Canon because DPP will force the distortion correction and DxO does not), pushed 3 stops. No NR. Below it are the top left and bottom left corners at 100%.



Very noisy, but the noise still looks even without any 'lattice, moire, etc.' artifacts.

DocInfoSci said:

In general Canon has been continuously working to improve their noise, which is why in part the higher ISO values become more usable. I'm not sure where in the pipeline that noise is adjusted or refined (if refined, depending on the model), but I wouldn't be surprised if Canon uses their a) knowledge of the sensor, b) knowledge of the lens behaviour (DLO data), and C) a pipeline to make a final trained-AI adjustment to the noise in the image. That could be done as part of generating the RAW image (a phase 1 adjustment to the sensor read) and in generating a DLO-derived TIFF, HEIC, or JPEG (a phase 2 output image adjustment as part of the DLO system). If any part of that is, in fact, true then that would go a long way to explaining the stellar VCM performance in the example image graciously provided by @neuroanatomist.

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I don't use Canon's software to convert RAW images, except on the few occasions when I have a camera that's too new for DxO to support (and in that case, I usually shoot RAW+JPG so I can have usable images immediately, then I go back and properly convert them later. I loathe DPP's workflow.

DxO is using AI for the noise reduction, but I have no idea what's going on under the hood (if anything) in terms of the interaction of NR algorithms with lens correction profiles.

DocInfoSci said:

To @zardoz's point, I have witnessed myself bad artifact generation / deterioration when boosting aspects of an image and making other nudges (like correcting a building perspective). So I know it happens in scenarios, and when I first saw @zardoz's post it made sense to me that the noise might be presented in a manner that would lend itself as described. But, I don't own an image circle compromised lens (in the physical sense) so without driving to my local store and grabbing some test photos I can't see it for myself (and I don't generally trust Internet posts on these topics these days).

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I've certainly seen fixed pattern noise artifacts when pushing images from older Canon sensors (5DII, for example). Once Canon updated their lithography (at the time of the 5DIV, IIRC) the FPN issues pretty much went away (as did most of the internet complaints about Canon's poor low ISO DR). I can't say I've seen artifacts from perspective correction of architecture shots, but I usually do those with a TS-E lens and not software.

DocInfoSci said:

But if it would otherwise happen in the VCM world then Canon or DXO is doing a bang-up job of creating a final image that hides the issue to some reasonable degree. If that same process would generate a TIFF or DNG for use in other apps, either via Canon's software or a direct import by, say, Photoshop then bravo to Canon for going the extra step!

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I use DxO PhotoLab, but they also have PureRAW that offers similar corrections more easily integrated into other workflows (e.g. with plugins for LR and PS).

Del Paso said:

Shall I confess that I loved my Pentax MX?
Edit: I forgot my ME...

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Pentax, Leica, Sony, it has been a long and rough journey until you saw the light and bought a Canon.

neuroanatomist said:

Or point out the problem in the examples that I posted above, because I don’t see it.

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I have to agree that your samples are very uniform. I see nothing wrong with that noise, and if preserved in that way after "reasonable" edits then I'd be happy to hand if off as final work.

But, you mentioned the use of DXO and it has a reputation for achieving nice outcomes. What about pre-DXO? What about RAW?

In general Canon has been continuously working to improve their noise, which is why in part the higher ISO values become more usable. I'm not sure where in the pipeline that noise is adjusted or refined (if refined, depending on the model), but I wouldn't be surprised if Canon uses their a) knowledge of the sensor, b) knowledge of the lens behaviour (DLO data), and C) a pipeline to make a final trained-AI adjustment to the noise in the image. That could be done as part of generating the RAW image (a phase 1 adjustment to the sensor read) and in generating a DLO-derived TIFF, HEIC, or JPEG (a phase 2 output image adjustment as part of the DLO system). If any part of that is, in fact, true then that would go a long way to explaining the stellar VCM performance in the example image graciously provided by @neuroanatomist.

To @zardoz's point, I have witnessed myself bad artifact generation / deterioration when boosting aspects of an image and making other nudges (like correcting a building perspective). So I know it happens in scenarios, and when I first saw @zardoz's post it made sense to me that the noise might be presented in a manner that would lend itself as described. But, I don't own an image circle compromised lens (in the physical sense) so without driving to my local store and grabbing some test photos I can't see it for myself (and I don't generally trust Internet posts on these topics these days).

But if it would otherwise happen in the VCM world then Canon or DXO is doing a bang-up job of creating a final image that hides the issue to some reasonable degree. If that same process would generate a TIFF or DNG for use in other apps, either via Canon's software or a direct import by, say, Photoshop then bravo to Canon for going the extra step!

PhotonShark said:

I wish there was a way for manufactures to share their lens correction data properly.

Possible an open source file format?

This way Lightroom etc. can benefit from the exact correction data to use in their lens profiles. Also, this would work in other ways. It would allow third party lens manufacturers to give their lens correction data to Canon, Nikon, etc. for use with in camera correction.

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I suspect that gives away too much of the secret sauce. An interesting point, big pharma companies often will give away their source code as part of articles and general demonstrations of research thrust, but they seldom give away in-house data — because the in-house data would communicate a lot of trade secrets, hard-won insights, tiny little things that will add up to big competitive differences in drugs, etc. Ditto here for Canon's DLO corrections, which would probably communicate very interesting things about material behaviour, light behaviour between and through lenses, etc. Canon is simply making everyone else do the reverse engineering and math that Canon achieved during the design, manufacturing, and test processes themselves.

Provide an RF mount and a FF sensor and I'd consider grabbing one

R5II 200-800; Hello!

neuroanatomist said:

Oh, I absolutely agree! In fact, here's one of those discerning elites (or obtuse plebeian, take your pick):

View attachment 228088

...none other than 15 year old me on Christmas morning, holding my first SLR fresh from the box – a Pentax A3000.

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I remember selling the A3000 back when!
Well, I remember showing it to customers anyway.
I had to have sold a few. I just had to.

Looks like something for medical photography.

Concept cameras are fun. We never did get the Wonder Camera, though.

chrysoberyl said:

What I want is a 16mm or 17mm f/1.4 lens for Milky Way Core images. Options:

Canon 14mm 1.4. It seems overly compromised. It is also too wide, but cropping is not an issue. It does not take light pollution filters. I have the Canon 20mm 1.4 and I like it, BTW.

Sigma 14mm 1.4 plus a Sony or Sigma camera. It is too wide, but cropping is not an issue. It does not take light pollution filters.

Sigma 12mm 1.4. Clearly, I would have to crop. Someone kindly pointed out Dustin Abbott’s review and images. Lenstip also reviewed this lens. It appears I could crop to ~15mm FOV, using a 4:3 aspect ratio. It takes light pollution filters.

Please critique the above.

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I have limited experience with Milky Way shooting, but I will mention that regarding light pollution filters, several manufacturers (Kolari, Kase, Astronomik, perhaps others) make light pollution filters that 'clip in' (or magnetically attach) inside the camera body and thus will work with any lens including those without front filter threads. I have a set of Kolari magnetic in-body ND filters (3-, 6- and 10-stop) and they work very well.

I'd also suggest reserving judgement on the 14/1.4. From the available reviews its performance overall seems similar to the 20/1.4 (which I also have and like), and looking at Canon's MTFs it appears that the 14mm lens has better resolution (blue lines) and a bit more contrast (black lines) than the 20mm lens, especially away from the center of the frame.