How much latitude does a G9 raw file have

[panamike]

This is just an interesting example, ok i still didnt end up with a usable image but i was curious as to what was in the file

My error shot

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What is still in there

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[ralf-11]

did you mean exposure latitude?

 

[panamike]

did you mean exposure latitude?

Yes

 

[masayoshi]

It's amazing you can recover pigeon's eye from that image.

I think my custom settings for BIF are coming down to two flavors, one for 'bright light BIF' and another for 'low light BIF'.
For bright light, I use M mode, SS1/3200, Aperture 6.3 to 8, and limit ISO max to 800, and center weight metering.
For low light, I use S mode, SS1/3200, and limit ISO max to 3200, and ESP metering.

 

[ralf-11]

they seem to have a few stops of exposure latitude, but I was never able to find out exactly how much

it will differ on high vs. low exposure, and will be less than a bigger sensor

all my m43 bodies seem a lot better than the 1" sensor in my Sony RX100m3

 

[retiredfromlife]

I have very limited PP experience but I find it easier to get something out of the highlights if all is not lost, but very hard to get something out of the shadows fron my G85.

 

[ralf-11]

I routinely exposure bracket all landscapes with sky in them. I have it set to the front switch on my G9. I make an HDR file in post and discard the raw... uh... raw raw files. It just can't do what FF does.

 

[D7k1]

With the size of today's cards bracketing makes a lot of sense.

This is a great example of why RAW is still an important tool. But I must admit since I went to JPEG+RAW I love seeing detail on the LCD when reviewing

 

[KBeezie]

Guess the raw file wasn't quite clipped, or the part that would have been was only a few points away from being clipped. (doesn't matter how good the sensor or software is, once you clipped, there's no latitude/recovery). I can see where it did clip in the trees, but that's not the important part.

Am impressed that you were able to compress that much color variance on the pigeon without seeming unnatural and keeping the background natural looking.

And I sometimes do the same as Jeff above when I need to, since only the Jpeg is going to give me a sharper preview on the LCD (or closer to accurate I guess).

One of the main reason I shoot raw isn't really for recovery (I try my best not to clip the highlights, but I still shoot right-leaning for shadow details), but because I edit in 16-bit, and with the 12-bit I get from the raw file I'll have much more room to edit in a 16-bit space so that the final image (even if it ends up being 8-bit in the end) will end up with more color range than if I lost most of that starting with an 8-bit image. Even though most end users wouldn't see the difference unless I pointed it out.

 

[ToxicTabasco]

Much like the high ISO shots it would depend a lot on how much existing light there is, and how well exposed the shot is. With G9, I've had great results pushing 3 stops of shadows in night scenes. Some say MFT lacks dynamic range, but that's not the case with the Lumix G9. That version of Venus processor has some tricks and so does the sensor they used.

There was a online review that showed the G9 to have more dynamic range than a lot of APSC crop cameras as well as some older FF DSLRs.

Nevertheless, having the right exposure is the key to taking advantage of the dynamic range of any camera.

 

[ralf-11]

do you recall where that online review is?

the G9 certainly has more DR than older APS-C Nikons that I've owned; close to the D5300; less than a FF Nikon

 

[IronOak]

In my experience the G9 is able to recover highlights much better than pull the shadows

 

[Matt Drown]

I have very limited PP experience but I find it easier to get something out of the highlights if all is not lost, but very hard to get something out of the shadows fron my G85.

This is why you Expose to the Right - ETTR. Don't blow the highlights, Don't blow the highlights (twice), and you can recover quite a lot of dynamic range. Not specific to Panasonic gear.

 

[KBeezie]

This is why you Expose to the Right - ETTR. Don't blow the highlights, Don't blow the highlights (twice), and you can recover quite a lot of dynamic range. Not specific to Panasonic gear.

A lot like slide film recover from underexposure (may lack some details, but can recover), but not overexposure, versus negative film where you could recover from overexposure.

I'm almost always doing the ETTR method, but as Matt said you have to be careful not to clip the highlights because you can't recover them once they've actually been clipped.

Also the trick is, when you do edit the raw file, don't rely heavily on the exposure slider when you ETTR , work on the black/white, shadow/highlight sliders before you touch the exposure one to yield the best signal-to-noise ratio. (or can do what looks best to you, but if you do get a bit of noise, try that).

PS: as you may already know for sure, ETTR doesn't work for jpeg or video (unless somehow your camera can shoot dng raw video frames like a blackmagic camera)