M50, improved

RLight wrote:

m100 wrote:

RLight wrote:

Larry Rexley wrote:

thunder storm wrote:

Larry Rexley wrote:

R2D2 wrote:

RLight wrote:

If AF is a concern, you should have a hard look at the M6 Mark II

+1 Using Spot AF with Servo (doing the tracking myself), I’m confident that I could shoot anything on the planet with an M6ii. The (Spot) AF is lightning fast to acquire, and sticks like glue. Here’s a previous thread that details some of what it’s capable of…

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/64108171

IMHO RLight’s evaluation is right on the money.

R2

I've found a case where the spot focus isn't as effective as the 'Tracking' focus mode - Amtrak trains moving at 70 mph, especially in lighting close to sunset. They really fly and you have just a fraction of a second to the get the best shot as they whiz by in a roar of sound and dust, using either slow or high speed drive mode.

Both the M6ii and the M50ii can't track the train using spot focus --- the shutter won't even fire and I've lost the whole shot for that day several times, as you only get one chance.

Setting to 'Tracking mode' works just fine, except the tendency for both cameras to focus on blades of grass or tree branches that might happen to be in the frame closer than the train. 'Zone AF' focusing seems to work the best and I still use spot focus on the slower moving freights, so I can pick the spot with optimal focus with my thumb on the screen as I shoot in single-shot or low-speed drive mode.

I'd guess that the problem is that the details of the train are both moving laterally, at the same time the features are scaling 'larger' very rapidly -- and the AF can't deal with that. When in tracking mode it must use some sort of optimization algorithm that can find an 'edge' or contrasty feature in a larger area it can lock onto, and its best guess is good enough.

Amtrak 17 & 513 (vintage Dash-8 loco), Canon M50ii, EF-M 11-22mm IS STM, 21mm, f5.6, 1/1000s, ISO 160, high-speed continuous tracking mode, Tracking AF

Nice shot. To be very honest with you, for trains I don't use AF at all. I use a tripod to make the composition at forehand, set the aperture wide open, switch the AF off, focus manually using 10x magnification, stop down, keep AF switched off, and just use burst mode.

Using this method I get good pictures with the M100 + Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 Art, as without AF even the M100 gives you 8 frames per second (which is better than the 70D). The M50 (mark 1) goes up to 10 frames per second without AF.

Interesting --- I can see how that approach works for some types of shots. There are some bridge shots where the composition is well-defined when the train hits a certain spot, and I also frame those in advance.

At night I use several manual-focus lenses a lot: a very sharp adapted Nikon DX 35mm f1.8 I got for $50, any of several good fast fifties, and a sharp Minolta MC Celtic 135mm f2.8. For those manual pre-focus is the only option --- focus peaking works but 10x magnifier is far, far better.

My problem with the M50 Mark ii's drive modes are that even the slower mode fills up the buffer too fast leaving me with no camera for much of the rest of the time the train passes. For that reason I default to the M6 Mark ii which has a much bigger buffer for the part of the sequence I need more shots for. When I do shoot with the M50ii in drive mode I tend to shoot short bursts of 2-3 shots, then pause, then shoot another burst --- sometimes even that fills the buffer.

My favorite train lens is the EF-M 18-150 ---- great range allowing me to get shots of the train a little more distant but still filling the frame --- in the telephoto shots the engineers are much more likely to be visible. But some of the nicest looking whole-train photos are like the image above with a wide-angle lens, when the locomotive looms large close to the camera.

What works very well is to use two bodies --- usually the 18-150 on the first one, then as the train gets close I pick up the other one with the EF-M 11-22 also hanging around my neck, already on and ready to go.

We're still on topic --- as I'll show now how I use my second body M50 Mark II effectively

This is shot after sunset so very challenging low-conditions. Since it was not long after sunset there was still mostly full-spectrum, high-quality light on the scene allowing me to push the first shot to an amazing ISO 25,600 in post! I never shoot higher than ISO 6400 in-camera, since the M6ii & m50ii both are ISO invariant at & above ISO 5000 --- better to push in PP. If you expose at higher ISOs than 6400 in camera all you are doing is throwing away dynamic range and reducing what you have to work with in the image later.

First shot with the M6ii using the vintage Minolta 135mm f2.8 lens -- second shot I used the other body with the wonderful EF-M 22mm f2 to get the 'rear' (really the front) of the trailing locomotive on the train.

Canon M6ii, vintage Minolta MC Celtic 135mm f2.8 lens at f4, 1/250s, exposed at ISO 6400 pushed to ISO 25,600 in PL4

Canon M50ii, EF-M 22mm f2 at f2.8, 1/125s, exposed at ISO 2000 pushed to ISO 4000 in DxO PL4

For that ISO 25,600 shot I used a new technique to get good results: I first processed in DxO; using Deep prime (strength 80), sharpened, applied CA, pushed exposure 2 stops, brought shadows up a further +32, increased contrast +29, increased saturation and vibrancy, and saved as 16-bit full-resolution TIFF file.

This produced a very good low-noise image which still looked somewhat flat. Then I bumped it up even more in contrast, saturation, vibrancy --- and applied more noise reduction (HQ + 30), and downsized to 2160 pixels high using bicubic downsample sharpening, resulting in the final image.

I've found this two stage processing to work very effectively --- especially when areas need to be masked and then dodged or burned using DxO's control points. If you try to mask the original image you get very grainy masks with very undesirable results.

But masking the second low-grain image is like masking a low-ISO shot --- you get really clean, well-defined masks and great results.

Like many enhanced DXO shots, the foreground/center is impressive, but, the background and edges, smear and loose detail or have odd artifact presence. Not trying to pick on it, simply saying for such wonderful shots, something you want to print REALLY big, you just can't.

I know there's lots of folks here loving DXO, don't let me stop you, the center and foreground are VERY impressive, enough to make you look at the details where things start to be less impressive. It's not a magic button, but it's definitely a capable tool.

Larry will still have the raw files when PL8 comes out.

There's a new version coming out? Was oddly thinking it's a matter of time before they fix my complaints. Ironic your mentioning it.

PL5 has already updated ! The advances in PP software are impressive. Good thing I shot with the raw setting  turned on.