Image from micro 4/3 - C&C please

[davidedric]

Hi,

I very recently bought a Panasonic G5 with the original 14-42mm kit lens, to encourage myself to have a camera with me. (I know the kit lens is not the greatest, but I wanted a low cost entry point).

This is an image from a test shoot. You should be able to see the Exif, but just in case it's taken RAW at 42mm, 1/250s, f8.0, ISO 160 (base for this camera), which should be around the sweet spot for the camera/lens. I have done a fair amount of pp in Lightroom to get the image looking as near as I can to what I remember seeing.

I would appreciate any comments, especially on your view of the IQ of the image. Any other comments also welcome, of course, as are any improvements.

If anyone is interested, the scene is one of the reservoirs in the Goyt valley, in the peak district a few miles from home.

Many thanks,

Dave

[deetheturk]

Hi Dave,is the image hand held or on a tri-pod? it looks a tad soft to me,but i'm on an 18inch laptop and not a big monitor!apart from that it looks ok,hope this helps.

David

[davidedric]

I also think it looks a bit soft, even with a fair amount of sharpening.

It was hand held, but I thought that at 1/250 and 84mm equivalent, plus IS built into the lens, I should have been OK. The air seemed very clear, but I suppose that haze could have been another issue on the far side of the water (focus was simply on the hillside in the middle of the image).

Thanks for the feedback,

Dave

[Wavelength]

The lighting in this image is awesome; excellent

[deetheturk]

Like everything we get new,it takes a bit of getting used to Dave,keep at it bud,and as Nandakumar says the light was great,there is a bit of movement in the water,that might be just enough to make things seem a little soft?

Cheers David

[ajohnw]

The lightings great but I suspect that is also what's making the image look a bit flat plus there is little contrast in the trees on the right.

Having a bit of a play tone mapping can clear that up. It can be made almost sun set/rise like if the saturation is increased as well. There is plenty of scope in that direction.

You might be able to recover more from the dark areas as it's taken from raw. That might be part of the reason as well. Tone mapping will boost the lighting contrast as well so it will loose some of the softness in that.

One thing I have found on Olympus m 4/3 is that there is a lot of detail buried in the dark end of camera jpg's. Sacrilege but it's often easy to adjust. Some parts of the trees seem to be clipped at that end on the shot you have posted.

John
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[davidedric]

Thanks for the feedback, folks.

There actually isn't any clipping in the trees, at least that's what Lightroom thinks!

Interestingly, I just came across this review of Panasonic lenses (only published on Monday!), which comments that the 14-42mm "series 1" lens is low contrast "which might make it appear soft". However, banging up the contrast in pp doesn't seem to me to reduce the apparent softness.

http://cameraergonomics.blogspot.co.uk/

Dave

[dje]

Hi Dave

I think it's the early morning light that makes this shot and I would increase the contrast and saturation a bit to emphasise this. Also if you have the Nik software, the Detail Extractor in Colour Efex Pro would enhance it too.

The sky is the weak part of this image IMO and I would look at cropping about half of it out, even though it means losing the top of the tree on the RHS.

Dave

[ajohnw]

I just kept cranking up the level at the black end and lots of the parts of the tree remained back.Even from mid tones the rest was more or less completely washed out. - didn't check any pixel readings. There is very little contrast in the brown areas on the other side of the lake either.

I think this has pushed up the contrast but it could be pushed up further.



Must admit that I went for Olympus as I had a feeling that their optics would be better. With theirs I have a suspicion the MK1 is better than the 2. Not really compared side to side though so might be imagining it..

John
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[ajohnw]

Just checked clipping something in the white bits is < 2bits.



John
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