FZ18 theater photos ISO800-1600 1.7xTele

Our local high school theater recently presented a performance of Wilder's (Thornton, not Gene) "The Skin of Our Teeth" which gave me my first opportunity to check out the FZ18 in a real theater. My preference here is to find a seat which has an unobstructed view of the stage, doesn't annoy other viewers, reasonably close to center, and fairly far back (front row center is unobstructed but tends to yield a surfeit of nostril).

In our theater, row 15 on the aisle is about the best compromise. The first three shots are from row 15. Four and five are from row 6 later in the performance.

All of the ones below are taken handheld while seated, at full zoom. Three (marked 850mm) use the Olympus tele-extender. Program mode. First picture is at iso 1600, rest at 800. Contrast typically -1 or -2; Saturation +1, sharpness and NR zero.

Post processing where done was limited to sharpening (USM?) and relighting in Picasa.

Handling was excellent - Using a totally silent camera was a welcome change. The teleextender was easy to use (I keep it attached to the LA3 adapter and add/remove the combined unit ). Slowest step was setting the camera to tele-extender mode. High-quality burst mode helped a lot in getting the "best" poses. RAW was much too slow to be practical here.

I thought the images were of the expected quite decent quality but clearly not as clean as the DSLR shots my wife took at the same time (with K/M 7D, her images at ISO 3200 were definitely sharper than mine at 800). No real surprise.

Sherm

Row 15 ISO 1600 500mm unmodified



Row 15 ISO 800 850mm unmodified



Row 15 ISO 800 850mm USM+levels



Row 6 ISO 800 500mm USM+levels 1/6 sec exposure



Row 6 ISO 800 850mm USM+levels

Dare you post some of your wife's taken with the KM dslr? Or would there be too many tears upon witnessing the comparison?

There is a whole lotta noise in these from the Panny. But, you knew that. Thanks for posting. It sure feels like a roller coaster looking at shots from the FZ18. It performs well for what it is intended for, which is not low light, high ISO shooting.

I think to have a small camera capable of these shots is a great idea and great memory... Surely wit a DSLR and with a few extra projectors and with a few thousand dollar of lenses you can come up with something similar but you would need a truck full of extra equipment... YES, there is some noise, but at this zoom and theater lighting you got yourself nice memory shots !

I think the FZ18 is a great camera and a little noice ninja can take care of the rest in a few seconds ! Thank you Sherman !!!!
--
Grazie,Thank you, Sal .. -

Vandu,

I don't think any of these were post processed. All from row 4, with 70-210 f2.8 zoom (100-330 35mm equivalent, I guess)

BTW, her timing is much better than mine. Doesn't use (or need) burst mode

Sherm

Vandyu,

Don't think there will be tears

Don't think there's even argument about data.

Mostly, the disagreements depend on differences of opinion about what's important. My wife gets better quality pictures than I do, but she also has 20-30 lbs of cameras, lenses, flash equipment, tripod, etc to carry around.

I have a tiny camera and a monopod.

Sherm

Vandyu said:

Dare you post some of your wife's taken with the KM dslr? Or would
there be too many tears upon witnessing the comparison?

There is a whole lotta noise in these from the Panny. But, you knew
that. Thanks for posting. It sure feels like a roller coaster looking
at shots from the FZ18. It performs well for what it is intended for,
which is not low light, high ISO shooting.

Click to expand...

Hi Sherm,
Looks like you & your wife had an enjoyable evening watching the show,

remember even when some shots might not come out due to lighting conditions or slow shutter speeds "The show must go on!" D

Thanks for posting yours & your wife's photos for a compare, I've taken your third photo and run it through Noise Ninja to remove the chroma noise, what do you think?
(I didn't remove and other noise as didn't want to smear things)

Areas to compare, the ladies hair also the dark window (what would be glass in real life)



Cheers,
Dcuk

Your wife's shots look somewhat soft to me, and a little darker in general than your FZ18 exposures. Only my own eyeball judging of course. I think you got useable photos, and like the other poster said, nothing that a little whiff of Noise Ninja couldn't clean up pretty well. Thanks for posting.
By the way, did you use "Face Detect" for your photos?
--
Just cruisin' ...



EffZeeThirty (Got the Gull), EffZeeEighteen, TeeZeeThree

I put these two shots into a My Pictures (actually your pictures) folder and flipped back and forth looking at them. I don't see a whole lot of difference in the actress, but I do notice that the Fortune Teller sign is clearer with the KM.

Nonetheless, the FZ shots do preserve the moment and that is what counts. If anything, I would have expected the KM with a 2.8 aperture lens to have been sharper. What are your thoughts on this?

Row 6 ISO 800 500mm USM+levels 1/6 sec exposure
Fortune Teller shot with FZ18

Row 4, with 70-210 f2.8 zoom
Fortune Teller shot with KM7D. ISO unknown.

These shots are so much better than the FZ7 will do, actually won't do, don't bother.

So the change year over year in image quality from small sensors is impressive. Where will we be next year?
--
Gallery - http://www.flickr.com/photos/cosmicsailors/

I know that most have reported that the adaptor for mounting the 1.7 tele-extender is not available in the US. Where did you order yours?

Thanks for your posting.

Here is my daughter's concert from a few weeks ago. I was in the balcony.

iso400 1/15 sec



iso 400 1/20 sec

Marty,

Those are nice balcony shots. After my first ebay order for the LA3 was cancelled, I searched ebay at intervals and eventually one popped up and I grabbed it. I asked the seller about available quantity at that time and he told me it was out of stock in Japan.

Rumor was that US availability is end of November.

No question that the LA3/teleconverter combination works, but I'm not sure how useful I'll find it for general shooting, since the overlap with the standard configuration is quite limited (9x to 18x is equivalent to 425-850mm 35equivalent)

Might almost be easier to work with the stock lens and crop (particularly if final photo size is small. That's what the extended optical zoom and the 5mpx mode do anyway

Sherm

Marty Too said:

I know that most have reported that the adaptor for mounting the 1.7
tele-extender is not available in the US. Where did you order yours?

Click to expand...

John_Reed said:

Your wife's shots look somewhat soft to me, and a little darker in
general than your FZ18 exposures.

Click to expand...

She wasn't terribly pleased with hers - Some of the pictures were even softer than the ones I posted. She wasn't sure if that was a focus issue, or a problem with the lens (Sigma 70-210 2.8 zoom) which was never apparent when she last used it with grainy ASA 800-1000-1600 film.

Only my own eyeball judging of

John_Reed said:

course. I think you got useable photos, and like the other poster
said, nothing that a little whiff of Noise Ninja couldn't clean up
pretty well. Thanks for posting.

Click to expand...

Totally agree. I wasn't trying to "dis" the FZ18 at all - I was very pleased with the pictures and with the ease of using the camera.

John_Reed said:

By the way, did you use "Face Detect" for your photos?

Click to expand...

Yes - Does a decent job - you can see it tracking eyes as it works, and it defaults to a standard autofocus if eyes aren't visible, which is great.

John_Reed said:

--

Click to expand...

John_Reed said:

Just cruisin' ...



EffZeeThirty (Got the Gull), EffZeeEighteen, TeeZeeThree

Click to expand...

For sure - Here's what we used up to about 8 years ago - The standard 35mm body size / 70-210 F2.8 zoom which was needed to get decent shutter speed, even with ISO 800-1000-1600 films, compared with FZ18 and 500mm zoom.

Life is much simpler now

Sherm

cosmicsailor said:

These shots are so much better than the FZ7 will do, actually won't
do, don't bother.

So the change year over year in image quality from small sensors is
impressive. Where will we be next year?
--
Gallery - http://www.flickr.com/photos/cosmicsailors/

Click to expand...

That's a very impressive improvement, particularly because you only had the 1024-768 downsized image to work with.

Thanks

Sherm

Dcuk said:

Hi Sherm,
Looks like you & your wife had an enjoyable evening watching the show,

remember even when some shots might not come out due to lighting
conditions or slow shutter speeds "The show must go on!" D

Thanks for posting yours & your wife's photos for a compare, I've
taken your third photo and run it through Noise Ninja to remove the
chroma noise, what do you think?
(I didn't remove and other noise as didn't want to smear things)

Areas to compare, the ladies hair also the dark window (what would be
glass in real life)
Cheers,
Dcuk

Click to expand...

sherman_levine said:

I thought the images were of the expected quite decent quality but
clearly not as clean as the DSLR shots my wife took at the same time
(with K/M 7D, her images at ISO 3200 were definitely sharper than
mine at 800). No real surprise.

Click to expand...

Very good to see, Sherm. And a pass through Neat Image or equivalent would make them even better.

What's not to be "Highly Recommended"? Great results and lots of shooting flexibility.

Thanks for sharing!

--
Phil .. Panny FZ18, Canon S3 IS, SD700IS, 300D & EOS 20D; Fuji F20 & F31fd.
http://www.pbase.com/phil_wheeler
http://www.flickr.com/photos/phil_ox/

sherman_levine said:

For sure - Here's what we used up to about 8 years ago - The standard
35mm body size / 70-210 F2.8 zoom which was needed to get decent
shutter speed, even with ISO 800-1000-1600 films, compared with FZ18
and 500mm zoom.

Life is much simpler now

Sherm

Click to expand...

When you tire of that KM stuff..dont worry, I will happily take it off your hands ;-)
--



Clint is on holiday! Soon to return! ;-)

John_Reed said:

Your wife's shots look somewhat soft to me, and a little darker in
general than your FZ18 exposures. Only my own eyeball judging of
course. I think you got useable photos, and like the other poster
said, nothing that a little whiff of Noise Ninja couldn't clean up
pretty well. Thanks for posting.
By the way, did you use "Face Detect" for your photos?
--
Just cruisin' ...



EffZeeThirty (Got the Gull), EffZeeEighteen, TeeZeeThree

Click to expand...

That looks like the sigma 70-210mm lens. Not used that one myself.

The Minolta one is top drawer stuff, no question..not cheap though (even more nasty now sony have got hold of it)

--



Clint is on holiday! Soon to return! ;-)

Vandyu said:

I put these two shots into a My Pictures (actually your pictures)
folder and flipped back and forth looking at them. I don't see a
whole lot of difference in the actress, but I do notice that the
Fortune Teller sign is clearer with the KM.

Click to expand...

We looked at the two sets of originals overall on the same computer - No question there - her best were cleaner than my best - even though she was at higher ISO.

Vandyu said:

Nonetheless, the FZ shots do preserve the moment and that is what
counts.

Click to expand...

Not sure I emphasized how happy I was with my own - particularly given how easy it was to use the camera. Just fessing up about the differences between the two configurations.

Vandyu said:

If anything, I would have expected the KM with a 2.8 aperture
lens to have been sharper. What are your thoughts on this?

Click to expand...

You and John both noticed this. She wasn't terribly happy with her results (I blame the lens!) - however some (like the two people on the couch at ISO 1600) were lots clearer than anything I came up with

Vandyu said:

Row 6 ISO 800 500mm USM+levels 1/6 sec exposure
Fortune Teller shot with FZ18

Row 4, with 70-210 f2.8 zoom
Fortune Teller shot with KM7D. ISO unknown.

Click to expand...

Hers is at 1600, not PP.

The difference would be much more striking if you compared hers with my original.

Sherm

Barry Fitzgerald said:

When you tire of that KM stuff..dont worry, I will happily take it
off your hands ;-)
--

Click to expand...

LOL - That stuff is hers , and I'm only allowed to look at the pictures (and carry the backpack )

Sherm

I don't use the "TC" setting in the "record" menu, but with my Nikon, there seems to be a range without vignetting from 5X to 18X in 8MP mode. I didn't try the TCON-17, but I suspect it's not much different. What benefits, if any, derive from the "TC" setting?
--
Just cruisin' ...



EffZeeThirty (Got the Gull), EffZeeEighteen, TeeZeeThree