P65+

[KevinA]

I have a job coming up which requires low light performance. The possibility of renting a P65+ is on the cards.  Does the P65+ on the reduced setting perform well at 1600-3200iso, compared with something like a 1DsmkIII how does it stand up?

Thanks,

Kevin.

[Streetwise]

I'll be curious to hear what others think as well. Off hand, the 1DsMKIII's high iso ability will be way better than the 65+. BUT, given the choice (and if it's possible for your application), I would take the P65+ and shoot long exposures at the lower iso which would blow away the Canon. If however, you've got a moving subject to deal with, or need to shoot handheld, then you'd be better off with the Canon. I have an Aptus 65 and a 5DMKII. For high iso, the Aptus starts to fall apart at 200+. So it really depends on what your shooting.

Dave

[Dick Roadnight]

I have a job coming up which requires low light performance. The possibility of renting a P65+ is on the cards.  Does the P65+ on the reduced setting perform well at 1600-3200iso, compared with something like a 1DsmkIII how does it stand up?

Thanks,

Kevin.

Have you considered / could you get a Leica M9?

[KevinA]

Have you considered / could you get a Leica M9?

I thought about the M9 and Noctilux, but talking to a dealer he is as yet to see a Noctilux. I have done this kind of work before (night shooting from a helicopter), recently infact. I just used the 1DsmkIII at 1600iso with the 24 f1:4 and 35mm f1:4 and it worked well. I doubt the Leica would improve on it much. I've looked at the Nikon, the 700/D3 is good but less Mp's and a distinct lack of fast lenses in the stable, so any noise gain at comparable iso gets lost with lenses ( except one) 2 stops slower, thus requiring higher iso.
This got me thinking about the P65+, you would think with it's larger sensor working at 15mp it could deliver stunning results in the dark, if it's stunning at 3200iso It would be usable. If it falls short of the 1DsmkIII/5DII then it would be a waste of time.
I have not seen any reports on it's ability to shoot at high iso with regards to the final quality.

Kevin.

[mtomalty]

I don't believe the M9 or any current digital back would be the right tool for the assignment as you've described given the options in 35mm DSLR's.

Noisewise, the M9 is an improvement over the M8 but falls  short of any current pro or prosumer body from Canon or Nikon if you're specifically looking at
low light, hi iso as an important criteria for your shoot.

 I did a direct lowlight comparison last week between an M9 with 24 1.4 asph and a 5D Mkll with a 24 1,4L Mk 1 shooting inside of Notre Dame Basilica
in Montreal.
Up until 800 iso one could flip a coin and easily confuse both.
Beyond that point, the 5d Mkll starts pulling ahead, more so with each increase in iso

That's not to say the M9 performs poorly beyond 800 iso only that it shows more noise.

I didn't shoot the D3 at this time but I did the same series of shots about 6 months ago and wager that the D3 starts pulling
ahead of the 5D Mkll at about 1600 iso but, of course, you have now dropped to a 12 Mp capture.

My 5D Mkll seems to be about 1 stop 'cleaner' than my 1Ds3 so a 5D Mkll might be the way to go

Mark

www.marktomalty.com

[KevinA]

I don't believe the M9 or any current digital back would be the right tool for the assignment as you've described given the options in 35mm DSLR's.

Noisewise, the M9 is an improvement over the M8 but falls  short of any current pro or prosumer body from Canon or Nikon if you're specifically looking at
low light, hi iso as an important criteria for your shoot.

 I did a direct lowlight comparison last week between an M9 with 24 1.4 asph and a 5D Mkll with a 24 1,4L Mk 1 shooting inside of Notre Dame Basilica
in Montreal.
Up until 800 iso one could flip a coin and easily confuse both.
Beyond that point, the 5d Mkll starts pulling ahead, more so with each increase in iso

That's not to say the M9 performs poorly beyond 800 iso only that it shows more noise.

I didn't shoot the D3 at this time but I did the same series of shots about 6 months ago and wager that the D3 starts pulling
ahead of the 5D Mkll at about 1600 iso but, of course, you have now dropped to a 12 Mp capture.

My 5D Mkll seems to be about 1 stop 'cleaner' than my 1Ds3 so a 5D Mkll might be the way to go

Mark

www.marktomalty.com

It looks like everything points to the 5DII, best high iso and Canons fast lenses. I would still like to know where the P65+ fits into this.

Regards,

Kevin.

[JdeV]

It looks like everything points to the 5DII, best high iso and Canons fast lenses. I would still like to know where the P65+ fits into this.

Regards,

Kevin.

Call me contrary but I prefer the D3x to the 5DII for low-light work. Yes, the noise is more apparent but it looks crisper and more film like. The Canon tends towards a more synthetic look and handles bad mixed light worse.
I should emphasise I am talking 1600 ISO here, not above. I did a lot of comparative testing at that speed with the two cameras prior to a recent job.

There is, of course, no comparison when it comes to autofocus and accuracy of manual focus in dim light. The Canon is much poorer on both these counts.

[georgl]

Night shooting from a helicopter?

So no need for AF or 8fps? Just crisp, detailed shots?

The new phase-backs are really good but you would loose to much speed due to the slow lenses.

The M9 is sharp and the fast lenses blow everything else away at f1.4. The Noctilux might be too extreme, even at 10k$, f0.95 results in certain aberrations or "look" - but the Summilux 50Asph is superb, even at f1.4.

ISO800-1600 is quite usable, but keep in mind that it's a CCD-camera, so you'll have to do most of the noise reduction yourself.

Here are two nice samples from the Leica-forum - D700 (upsampled to 18MP) vs. M9 (with NR) @1600ASA:

http://fc06.deviantart.com/fs36/f/2009/269...ainadamsson.jpg (D700)

http://www.jackals-forge.com/TMP/Leica_160...son_degrain.jpg (M9)

[BernardLanguillier]

I have a job coming up which requires low light performance. The possibility of renting a P65+ is on the cards.  Does the P65+ on the reduced setting perform well at 1600-3200iso, compared with something like a 1DsmkIII how does it stand up?

Is stitching an option at all? Either hand held or not.

If your platform is stable enough (an helicopter reducing its speed might be), then increasing the resolution with stitching is a great way to reduce the apparent noise in the resulting image.

So I would go for a solution offering image stabilisation at a focal lenght of around 50mm equivalent and just shoot 2 rows of 4 images in quick succession. If you shoot Canon, a 5DII with the 24-105 IS or the new 7D with the excellent 17-55 IS might be 2 options worth considering.

Cheers,
Bernard

[narikin]

Have you considered / could you get a Leica M9?

thanks for your usual non sequitur Dick.

no digiback from Phase or Leaf or Hassy is any good for high ISO.
if thats a requirement of your job use a 5D2 or 1Ds3.

[KevinA]

Is stitching an option at all? Either hand held or not.

If your platform is stable enough (an helicopter reducing its speed might be), then increasing the resolution with stitching is a great way to reduce the apparent noise in the resulting image.

So I would go for a solution offering image stabilisation at a focal lenght of around 50mm equivalent and just shoot 2 rows of 4 images in quick succession. If you shoot Canon, a 5DII with the 24-105 IS or the new 7D with the excellent 17-55 IS might be 2 options worth considering.

Cheers,
Bernard

Strange you mention stitching, I just did a job both day and night for stitched 360 from a helicopter. I would try to avoid stitching as something to rely on.
Has no tried the the P65+ at 1600 iso it dim light?

Kevin.

[Christopher]

I just don't get why people are so goo-goo over the M9. Seeing that 1600 ISO sample tells me it's NOT a high ISO camera. Blotchiness is very present and no way of ridding that. The Nikon sample shows no comparable blotchiness.

When it comes to high ISO, here are the smart choices (no-brainer):

Canon 5DII, 1DsIII
Nikon D700, D3, D3x

I really think the M9 shot holds up very well for a CCD sensor. I think the d700 image is rather ugly in terms of noise. However as far as I can see both were processed in ACR which does not leave much to judge about noise.

[Bruce MacNeil]

Has no tried the the P65+ at 1600 iso it dim light?

I have shot an awful lot with the Canon 1Ds3 in very low light. And have shot a fair amount with the P40+ in equally low light.

Sensor wise - I might give it to the phase back.

But - the Phase (Mamiya) lenses are not up to the task as they are 3 stops slower then the Canon glass.

[Dick Roadnight]

thanks for your usual non sequitur Dick.

no digiback from Phase or Leaf or Hassy is any good for high ISO.
if thats a requirement of your job use a 5D2 or 1Ds3.

Several people have mentioned the M9 in this topic, and it is reputed to be the ultimate Low-light camera ...so, why do you accuse me of non sequitur?

[TMARK]

My opinion is that if you are getting paid, and someone other than yourself is paying for chopper time, by all means, use what has worked in the past or what you know will work, no questions asked.  That means a dslr.  I'd hate to tell a client the images are less than satisfactory because I used the wrong tool.  

As to the Leica, unless I owned it for some time and used it with the same lenses and saw that focus is reliable and there are no electronic bugs, I wouldn't consider it.

All that being said, after testing on my own dime I'd be up to try any of these cameras, and ion fact, I'd bring one along to test it out, knowing that the Canon/Nikon got the shot.

[BernardLanguillier]

Strange you mention stitching, I just did a job both day and night for stitched 360 from a helicopter. I would try to avoid stitching as something to rely on.

Care to provide details on the problems your encountered?

Cheers,
Bernard

[KevinA]

Care to provide details on the problems your encountered?

Cheers,
Bernard

No problem I did not expect, even in the hover you still move about a bit,  and up and down, back and forth, even if you think you are dead still,  you can forget about spinning the camera around the nodal point, which can make for some extreme stitching. Stitching is fine but I would not want to rely on it. You could easily find the sharpness to differ between frames.

Kevin.

[KevinA]

I just don't get why people are so goo-goo over the M9. Seeing that 1600 ISO sample tells me it's NOT a high ISO camera. Blotchiness is very present and no way of ridding that. The Nikon sample shows no comparable blotchiness.

When it comes to high ISO, here are the smart choices (no-brainer):

Canon 5DII, 1DsIII
Nikon D700, D3, D3x

If the M9 sensor is good in low light, the Leica has other advantages for handheld. The main one being no flapping mirror, other advantage would be the f0.95 Noctilux and although I use the Canon lenses at f1:4 when the light gets really bad, I think they should be stopped down one or two. I have no experience of Leica lenses at f1:4, I would expect them to have the edge over the Canon, although it would have to be one hell of a lens to significantly better the 35 mm f1:4.

Kevin.

[KevinA]

If the M9 sensor is good in low light, the Leica has other advantages for handheld. The main one being no flapping mirror, other advantage would be the f0.95 Noctilux and although I use the Canon lenses at f1:4 when the light gets really bad, I think they should be stopped down one or two. I have no experience of Leica lenses at f1:4, I would expect them to have the edge over the Canon, although it would have to be one hell of a lens to significantly better the 35 mm f1:4.

Kevin.

One other point probably more important than lens quality and that is manual focus. The AF can get very confused in low light (especially the sMKIII), the lenses on the Canon / Nikon have no stop for infinity. I have tried manual focus with them, but for some reason I can't get infinity everytime, it looks right in the camera but is often off when viewed on screen. A problem most of my colleagues encounter also, it's been discussed over and over amongst some of us. With the Leica lenses I would tape them to infinity.

Kevin.

[BernardLanguillier]

No problem I did not expect, even in the hover you still move about a bit,  and up and down, back and forth, even if you think you are dead still,  you can forget about spinning the camera around the nodal point, which can make for some extreme stitching. Stitching is fine but I would not want to rely on it. You could easily find the sharpness to differ between frames.

Understood, thanks for the feedback.

Cheers,
Bernard