roby17269 said:

I am on the Alps with an iPad so I’m not retyping all of that

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Oohhhh, that sounds great!!! Enjoy it and have some fun. And maybe, just maybe, post a nice wintery pic here

Fun on the lanai: Last week my wife complained that a caterpillar is eating her lemon again. Today I found two pupae of Papilio xuthus!
Edit: This should be our official Christmas tree !

Click said:

Very nice shots, ISv. Merry Christmas!

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Merry Christmas Click!

AlanF said:

They are ruddy well turning stones. (A British idiom). I'll be lucky to get even a crow where we are over Christmas, but you never know. Enjoy Hawaii's better weather! All the best for 2026!

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Merry Christmas!

AlanF said:

They are ruddy well turning stones. (A British idiom). I'll be lucky to get even a crow where we are over Christmas, but you never know. Enjoy Hawaii's better weather! All the best for 2026!

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Well, just some luck - a Robin on Christmas Day, the British favourite Christmas bird - or maybe second to the Turkey. (R7 + RF 100-400mm)

Richard CR said:

they don't bake the RAW file, correct. but it's a good idea unless there's a performance hit to turn it on for JPEG output.

DLO is more than what Adobe, etc can do. Canon boils the camera and lens down to their mathematical and data representation and then use deconvolution to reverse aberrations based on the camera and lens combination.

one of the rumors of the RF mount was that each lens could have its own unique DLO mathematical representation based upon its actual QC data testing.

However, I'm not sure they are actually doing that, since you still download the profiles from Canon.

I started to write an article on CanonNews about DLO way back when, and recently got Craig all excited about what DLO could do (I showed him one of the RF STM lenses before and after), and now he's a fan after it blew his mind. One of us is going to do a deep dive in the new year on it.

It's probably the most underrated thing that Canon gives us for free.

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I attempted some testing for the correction of diffraction using DLO and found limitations in lenses where it could be applied. It can be applied to the RF 200-800mm on the R5ii and with the 1.4xTC but it is not compatible with the 2x. It is compatible with the 2x on the RF 100-500mm. And it is not compatible with the RF 100-400mm on the R7. The DLO box was greyed out n those incompatible cases.

Kiton said:

Cocaine is cheap! Photography is an expensive habit!
The 70-200 Z is an absolutely beautiful lens that is superbly well balanced in the hand.

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That it is! LOL. I broke down (no will power) and bought it! I got it for 2900.00, so I convinced myself it was a deal that I couldn't refuse.

Richard CR said:

because that typo will haunt me until the end of days, or until the R5 Mark III comes out. 5D mark II vs R5 Mark II is another one, i think both Craig and I have made that one.

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We appreciate all you do! You're excused from a few typos. Happy Holidays.

Because of R1 up to R5 latest models/versions i am putting my hope on both, R6 Mark III and R7 Mark II, i don't think i have to go very high specs, i came from 1DX and 1 series so i am sure many mirrorless nowadays can match quality or even surpass for sure, and that is all what i need, i don't care much about body performance, i am planning to return back to sports photography, i won't think too much about high flagship body because i don't do anything professionally and not very serious or not getting paid, so i won't spend for R1/A1/Z9 or even Z8/R3/A9III level to justify it, i saw enough results from R5 and R6 and R7 and even R8 that showing me that quality is there, struggling with focus or settings is another story.

Why did you start a new thread when you already have one before?

Also, what equipment [camera+lens] do you use nowadays?

Click said:

Lovely series, Chig.

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Thank you

Richard CR said:

it's a good idea unless there's a performance hit to turn it on for JPEG output.

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That's what I'm currently doing. A few months ago I decided to quit using RAW for personal stuff, preferring final exposures in-camera. I'm shooting medium quality, max resolution jpegs with DLO and ALO.
It's not that I'm taking much advantage of DLO, as in fact I dial down sharpness a little but, I when I tested the 45mm, I noticed that DLO also cleared residual spherical aberrations, and that lead me to give it a try with all lenses.

David_B said:

Depends on the correction - does stretching qualify as correction?

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That's the thing, yes. Even if being done optically, it's still stretching. Some defend adding, for instance, an extra lens element to straighten the image.
Will that extra element lead to a softer image? Perhaps.
Will that optically corrected image be softer than cropping a few pixels and enlarging a little bit? Hmm maybe, we don't really know.

Two things are certain:
1. The uncorrected image is the sharpest.
2. Profile corrections can be improved with new algorithms, for the same existing lenses, via lens firmware, new DLO methods or updates to post-processing software, while optical corrections stay the same for the lens lifetime.

Intresting selection!
Suggestion: let's add a category for video cameras.
Comment: good discussion about RF 45 f1.2 (no personal opinion, no experience with it).
Personl opinion: I nominate Nikon Zf Silver for the best camera, not that I care that much about silver trim - I prefer that body and ergonomics over Z5/Z6 and it's technically a 2025 release!

Very nice shots, ISv. Merry Christmas!

David_B said:

Depends on the correction - does stretching qualify as correction?

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Not to stretch a point, yes.

I wouldn't consider myself a scientist, but I become a fanatic of ultra wide lenses. So I have made some observations. a major thing depends on the quality of the optics, the sensor, and the correction process. I've come to believe each will have some effect on the final image. So, ideally everything is best possible. That said, two out of three isn't bad, is it?

Markov said:

Thanks. Still I don't understand that for the R6 iii the difference is much smaller. It seems they primarily try to get extra money from the professionals.

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I'm guessing they decided based on analysis of how much the target consumers have been willing to pay for similar products and purchase rates in the past.

AlanF said:

I'm also a bit of a scientist, and I see no scientific objections to correcting via digital rather than by analogue methods.

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Depends on the correction - does stretching qualify as correction?

AlanF said:

Thanks for the link, which I have now read and the subsequent discussion. I get your point about the number of pixels in the corners etc when compressed. It remains moot until someone has done the necessary investigation to discover whether there is the same amount of image quality and information content in the periphery of an image that is stretched by an analogue lens method or a mathematical method of expansion of the compressed periphery. Information is lost on compression and the question is whether the analogue lens method manages to avoid that loss by prevention or is it simply expanding the compression similar to digital? I don't know the answer. Do you know as I would like to learn whether it does? It probably depends on how much effort and expenses they put in.

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Would love to see a definitive proof one way or the other… but I don’t have one.
What I wrote was based on my own reasoning that, essentially, the less data you interpolate and / or the more data you start from, the better.
So I will continue to believe that optical corrections, all else being equal, are better IQ-wise, and obviously worse size- and weight-wise. Maybe marginally, but better.

AlanF said:

First of all, thank you for writing that beautiful and informative book and distributing it free of charge - it is much appreciated. The problem with pricing is Canon Europe. They rip off the EU states and the the UK even more so by another 11% on average. Reliable grey importers are the answer if you can wait a few months after the initial release. In the UK, the list price of the R5ii is £3999, from HDew it is £2999, and Panamoz £2560. Those difference are ridiculous as the grey importers also provide good warranties.

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Thanks. Still I don't understand that for the R6 iii the difference is much smaller. It seems they primarily try to get extra money from the professionals.

Richard CR said:

they don't bake the RAW file, correct. but it's a good idea unless there's a performance hit to turn it on for JPEG output.

DLO is more than what Adobe, etc can do. Canon boils the camera and lens down to their mathematical and data representation and then use deconvolution to reverse aberrations based on the camera and lens combination.

one of the rumors of the RF mount was that each lens could have its own unique DLO mathematical representation based upon its actual QC data testing.

However, I'm not sure they are actually doing that, since you still download the profiles from Canon.

I started to write an article on CanonNews about DLO way back when, and recently got Craig all excited about what DLO could do (I showed him one of the RF STM lenses before and after), and now he's a fan after it blew his mind. One of us is going to do a deep dive in the new year on it.

It's probably the most underrated thing that Canon gives us for free.

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There is some good stuff in DLO, and showed me the impressive RF work so looking forward to the write-up. A few years ago before RF, I tested its claim to restore the effects of diffraction, but I couldn't detect it on an EF. I found it hard to believe it did a Lucy-Richardson type algorithm and suspected it was just sharpening. I'll give it a try now on some of my shots with extenders on the narrow aperture telephotos. It will have to be in bright light as my favourite DxO is a titan to compete with for noise reduction.

ISv said:

I'm trying to squeeze as much as I can from my days off...
Par of Ruddy Turnstones doing what they do best...
And a grain of color: Saffron Finch.

View attachment 227217View attachment 227218View attachment 227219

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They are ruddy well turning stones. (A British idiom). I'll be lucky to get even a crow where we are over Christmas, but you never know. Enjoy Hawaii's better weather! All the best for 2026!

m4ndr4ke said:

I’ll say again, DLO does nothing to RAW files
(in-camera, that is, of course)

Digital Lens Optimizer: Taking Image Quality to Greater Heights

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they don't bake the RAW file, correct. but it's a good idea unless there's a performance hit to turn it on for JPEG output.

DLO is more than what Adobe, etc can do. Canon boils the camera and lens down to their mathematical and data representation and then use deconvolution to reverse aberrations based on the camera and lens combination.

one of the rumors of the RF mount was that each lens could have its own unique DLO mathematical representation based upon its actual QC data testing.

However, I'm not sure they are actually doing that, since you still download the profiles from Canon.

I started to write an article on CanonNews about DLO way back when, and recently got Craig all excited about what DLO could do (I showed him one of the RF STM lenses before and after), and now he's a fan after it blew his mind. One of us is going to do a deep dive in the new year on it.

It's probably the most underrated thing that Canon gives us for free.

I'm trying to squeeze as much as I can from my days off...
Par of Ruddy Turnstones doing what they do best...
And a grain of color: Saffron Finch.