GR IV Banding issue

[Verto]

Not good news for low light shooters. Just got my GR IV today, went out for some night shot tests and I was greeted with Major Banding. 8000ISO and +.80 exposure comp. I've very disappointed.

 

[BG_DPREVIEW]

You referring to the vertical lines in the dark upper part?

 

[dv9973]

Not good news for low light shooters. Just got my GR IV today, went out for some night shot tests and I was greeted with Major Banding. 8000ISO and +.80 exposure comp. I've very disappointed.

p

Why not +4 exposure comp?
It's not clear what you're showing. JPEG straight from the camera or processed.
Based on the size of the image I assume it's processed.

 

[Verto]

Yes the vertical lines.
its a raw image that was opened in camera raw with +.80 exposure and saved. I wouldn’t call that “processed”.

 

[Tungsten Nordstein]

Are the lines evident in the RAW? Any chance of uploading the RAW so we can all look at it, please?

 

[Atgett]

Not good news for low light shooters. Just got my GR IV today, went out for some night shot tests and I was greeted with Major Banding. 8000ISO and +.80 exposure comp. I've very disappointed.

p

Raw file would help diagnose. Looks like PDAF banding and likely resolvable with firmware update if so, assuming you haven't done anything extreme to the file to stress test it i.e. dehaze/texture/exp.

The GRIII had similar banding if you went mad with the sliders in LR/ACR.

 

[Verto]

Are the lines evident in the RAW? Any chance of uploading the RAW so we can all look at it, please?

 

[Tungsten Nordstein]

Are the lines evident in the RAW? Any chance of uploading the RAW so we can all look at it, please?

yes, it’s evident in the RAW. It’s a worse version of what I saw in the original Nikon Z6. I thought this issue was solved years ago. And since banding can’t be removed in post, it’s a major issue. Additionally you can’t use Denoise on the DNG in photoshop either, due to the baked in noise reduction. Another bummer. In good light the colors are very very good.

Reminds me that the very first GRD had banding at 1600 iso. Tended to show up large areas of near black. With the GR4 I think we’ll have to experiment. I’m not much a high ISO user these days, but clearly this is a problem for photographers like you who do use it.

 

[Atgett]

Are the lines evident in the RAW? Any chance of uploading the RAW so we can all look at it, please?

yes, it’s evident in the RAW. It’s a worse version of what I saw in the original Nikon Z6. I thought this issue was solved years ago. And since banding can’t be removed in post, it’s a major issue. Additionally you can’t use Denoise on the DNG in photoshop either, due to the baked in noise reduction. Another bummer. In good light the colors are very very good.

Would be great to see the raw.

 

[Alex Kravets]

may I ask what did you expect? Noise- and artifact-free image when the ISO is in 5 digits ballpark??

the equivalent ISO (including +0.8 EV) is ISOeqv = 8000 × 2^(0.8) = 13928.8 ≈ 14000.

That is a prohibitively high ISO for such sensor size, for example on my GRII I never increase over ISO 3200. With GRIV the maximal usable ISO might be 6400, in any case 10000 sounds like a stretch to me.

In other words - you just found the upper limit of dynamic range: at such high sensitivity artifacts compete with noise floor (and win).

The above analysis is actually good news for low-light shooters imho!

thanks, cheers, Alex

 

[dv9973]

I tried hard but I couldn't find any in my test.
It's probably a processing software problem.
As I said before, the OP image it's not original, it's a resized to 4,128 × 3,885 (16 MP)

 

[Tungsten Nordstein]

I've done an electric light-lit indoor shot with iso from to 3200, 8000, 10000, 12800, and 204800. No sign of banding in the blacks. And all very clean-looking until you get to 204800, which becomes a hard-core grain-fest – as indeed did the GR3, at the top isos.

--
Tungsten Nordstein, Frogtographer. 2145
https://www.flickr.com/photos/156257994@N08/

 

[Michel van Lint]

Not good news for low light shooters. Just got my GR IV today, went out for some night shot tests and I was greeted with Major Banding. 8000ISO and +.80 exposure comp. I've very disappointed.

Can you share the raw file?

The risk of banding might be higher if too much underexposed and ISO 8000 is a lot. Unless you need this frequently, I would not be too worried.

If it is dark, you will get a better result with longer shutter times.

I had the same issue with a shot from a GFX 50R recently and I attributed it to underexposure.

 

[Verto]

The image was cropped because my family was in the lower part of the image. That’s all. The idea that I’m hiding something or trying to mislead is ridiculous. If I take the camera out at night again and have similar results I will make sure I take an additional photo without people in it. I haven’t taken the camera out since that night. For the record I had the GR III and GRIIIx and I never had vertical line banding in any photos.

 

[Michel van Lint]

The image was cropped because my family was in the lower part of the image. That’s all. The idea that I’m hiding something or trying to mislead is ridiculous. If I take the camera out at night again and have similar results I will make sure I take an additional photo without people in it. I haven’t taken the camera out since that night. For the record I had the GR III and GRIIIx and I never had vertical line banding in any photos.

Nowhere in my response did I suggest you are trying to hide something or mislead. What makes you think that I do?

 

[Noddemix]

The image was cropped because my family was in the lower part of the image. That’s all. The idea that I’m hiding something or trying to mislead is ridiculous. If I take the camera out at night again and have similar results I will make sure I take an additional photo without people in it. I haven’t taken the camera out since that night. For the record I had the GR III and GRIIIx and I never had vertical line banding in any photos.

Nowhere in my response did I suggest you are trying to hide something or mislead. What makes you think that I do?

And now everyone quite reasonably thinks he is hiding something, because that was a super weird response.

 

[Michel van Lint]

The image was cropped because my family was in the lower part of the image. That’s all. The idea that I’m hiding something or trying to mislead is ridiculous. If I take the camera out at night again and have similar results I will make sure I take an additional photo without people in it. I haven’t taken the camera out since that night. For the record I had the GR III and GRIIIx and I never had vertical line banding in any photos.

Nowhere in my response did I suggest you are trying to hide something or mislead. What makes you think that I do?

And now everyone quite reasonably thinks he is hiding something, because that was a super weird response.

And there is nobody else suggesting this either. I do not understand.

 

[Noddemix]

The image was cropped because my family was in the lower part of the image. That’s all. The idea that I’m hiding something or trying to mislead is ridiculous. If I take the camera out at night again and have similar results I will make sure I take an additional photo without people in it. I haven’t taken the camera out since that night. For the record I had the GR III and GRIIIx and I never had vertical line banding in any photos.

Nowhere in my response did I suggest you are trying to hide something or mislead. What makes you think that I do?

And now everyone quite reasonably thinks he is hiding something, because that was a super weird response.

And there is nobody else suggesting this either. I do not understand.

Sorry my reply wasn't clear: I'm agreeing with you, and while there was no doubt about the cropped image when it was first posted, there certainly is now, after his bizarre response.

 

[Michel van Lint]

The image was cropped because my family was in the lower part of the image. That’s all. The idea that I’m hiding something or trying to mislead is ridiculous. If I take the camera out at night again and have similar results I will make sure I take an additional photo without people in it. I haven’t taken the camera out since that night. For the record I had the GR III and GRIIIx and I never had vertical line banding in any photos.

Nowhere in my response did I suggest you are trying to hide something or mislead. What makes you think that I do?

And now everyone quite reasonably thinks he is hiding something, because that was a super weird response.

And there is nobody else suggesting this either. I do not understand.

Sorry my reply wasn't clear: I'm agreeing with you, and while there was no doubt about the cropped image when it was first posted, there certainly is now, after his bizarre response.

No worries, I got what you meant!