scho
Well-known member
Lee,Hi Carl
Thanks for the update. Most of your latest batch were taken at ISO 200 or 250 and not particularly long time exposures. So, what I gather from info on this camera is that for the very best results you need to use ISO 100 and the better the light the better the result? That, in itself is not a problem - after all, back in film days I often used to shoot slide film at ISO 50 (actually rated at 40), 64 etc and rarely went higher than 100! It wasn't that long ago that ISO 400 on digital would be considered noisy. I guess we have become spoilt in recent years by the apparent noiseless 'wonder sensors' such as those in the Pentax K5, Fuji X100 and X-Pro etc, though I wonder if that isn't often some sort of in-camera trickery that reduces noise and in the process just mushes detail, even in RAW. (As an aside, wouldn't it be good if cameras had an option 'best detail' versus 'least noise').
In some threads, it may even be this one, I have seen some advice to expose for the shadows and then recover the highlights in SPP, which is counter-intuitive - how far can you go with this approach?
Best wishes
Lee
UPDATE: Carl, I have clicked through to look at the many shots you have in your pbase gallery taken with the Merrill - fantastic stuff! Most of them are noise-free and also taken at ISO 50 or 100. So it does look like the lower ISOs bring out the true potential of the camera ...
I bought the Merrills with the intention of using them primarily for landscape work, basically shooting at ISO 100 on a tripod. The last series of shots was just a casual excursion, getting a feel for shooting handheld at higher ISO. I think with a bit more care with exposure and PP it would be fine in this mode as well. I used the accessory optical viewfinder and it was fine, as long as you don't need precise framing. The ISO 50 shots were taken with my old DP2S that I used about two years ago.
Best regards,
Carl