Also check out the PODCAST which inspired this blog post.
OVERVIEW:
For years, I searched for the perfect lens-sensor combination; a lens and camera duo that would produce a beautiful image with few adjustments and little post-production. It would be everything I needed, and wanted, in a camera system. However, as I tested each pair, each told a different story. I soon realized that CAMERA SETTINGS needed to be lens-sensor specific...
ABOVE: I'm working on improving my lens-sensor relationships by creating LUTs & camera settings recommendations to work with the strengths (and weaknesses) of each lens.
MY GOAL: A REAL-LOOKING IMAGE
My #1 goal for these LUTs & camera settings is to capture the most "REAL" image possible. When I think about my motivation for choosing camera settings, I often think of Ansel Adam's "Zone System". His system focused on capturing detail in all but 2 of the 11 "zones" of a picture. These "zones" were light or dark areas that corresponded to an 11-step grayscale chart. The grayscale steps were marked by numbers ranging from "0" (the darkest area of the image) to "10" (the lightest area of the image) with "5" being "middle gray". (Zones "0" and "10" had no detail because they were either 100% black or 100% white, respectively, but every other zone would contain detail.)
To me, this approach preserves what I call the "sense of reality" which, in my opinion, can help keep viewers from being distracted by technical problems (such as unrealistic contrast, sharpness, or inaccurate color). To work toward this, goal, I've been creating custom CAMERA SETTINGS for every lens I own (and sometimes custom, lens-sensor LUTs to finish the image).
NOTE: This process will not apply to RAW video/photo workflows.
PROCESS OVERVIEW
To go toward this goal, I test and tweak the 4 basic camera settings of CONTRAST, SHARPNESS, NOISE REDUCTION and COLOR (and sometimes "Highlight Shadow" settings). While adjusting these settings, the standard and baseline I keep in mind is "reality" (what the eye sees). Another plus of this process is, because I'm attempting to get everything as close to a realistic-looking image SOOC (straight out of camera) while shooting, I seldom have to worry about matching cameras during post-production. Sometimes (less and less) I apply a LUT in post-production, but this is not always necessary because the in-camera settings do most of the work. This is a very time-intensive process to apply to every lens-sensor combination I've used, so I don't expect this is going to be easy the first time you try it, but I'm going to give a quick overview of the process I use when doing my "lens-sensor calibrations".
My Custom Settings Method (For CAMERAS):
ABOVE: I've got a very unconventional way for improving what I call the "perceptive dynamic range" when you're NOT shooting RAW. The over-simplified version is, I use CAMERA SETTINGS to reduce the contrast (and sharpness, etc.) and a custom tonal curve (with in-camera settings) which lets you to lower your exposure...which then captures high contrast situations better.
STEP 1 CONTROL THE CONTRAST
When I was growing up, I used to read a lot of photography books and magazines, and when the term "contrasty" was used, it has always been a good thing when referring to lenses. However, after testing several digital cameras over the years, I've learned that when trying to optimize the sensor output (to capture a realistic, high-dynamic range image) contrast can actually be a negative thing (no pun about "negatives" intended here). Therefore, to control the contrast I do two things (one is obvious, and the other maybe not so obvious):
First, turn down the CONTRAST
Then, apply a little NOISE REDUCTION (more details below)
Turning down the "contrast" works as you would expect, but also using Noise Reduction is a really interesting (and neat) way to "fine tune" the contrast a little more, especially in the highlights (more details coming on that in step #3).
ABOVE: A lot of the great lenses such as this Sigma 18-35 1.8 ART deliver a lot more color, sharpness and contrast info than needed to the sensor. My "custom settings" are simply an attempt to balance these out, in an attempt to capture a more "REAL" image.
STEP 2 TAME THE SHARPNESS
The primary reason why I try to "tame the sharpness" is because it is the main thing that makes an image look like it's digital (instead of being organic). An easy way to tell if an image is being negatively affected by too much sharpness is to look at the diagonal lines. If the lines look like stair steps (when you zoom in) then it may be too sharp, and I think this causes the image to scream "I'm digital! I'm fake!" This is when I turn the sharpness down.
STEP 3 USE NOISE REDUCTION (DIFFERENTLY)
Using noise reduction to further fine tune the image is my "secret sauce". Most times when I read about NR, people say "If it needs NR, I will fix it in post". Well, if we were talking about using noise reduction in the NORMAL way, I may agree, but we're talking about using NR in a much funner way...to make the image look better (not worse). Here's how: When you apply noise reduction, it attacks (or does the opposite of) what "sharpening" does: It REDUCES edge contrast (and does do other things too). This actually reduces both the contrast and the sharpness as well, but it does so in a very gentle, smooth way. The hidden benefit to this is that it ends up smoothing the highlight rolloff (a major challenge in some cases). The other thing noise reduction obviously does is reduce digital artifacts, which therefore makes it look more "real" (which I would take over sharpness any day).
ABOVE: Even lenses of the same brand as the camera (i.e. "native" lenses) aren't always optimized for each camera that brand is selling. In this case, the Panasonic 45-150 F/4-5.6 telephoto lens was included in the kit with my Panasonic GX85, but before I used my "corrected" settings, the color was oversaturated, the contrast too strong, etc.
STEP 4 CALM THE COLOR
The most important note about adjusting the "Color" setting is that this is not where I am trying to correct color temperature. That's a task better handled with 24-color charts and proper white balance. Rather, my target is to tone down the colors to a realistic level. I'm not trying to capture a gray, flat-looking image (that only looks good after post-production color grading) but rather an image that looks like what our eyes naturally see. I will say though, that if I err on one side of color (saturation) or the other, it would be to err on the side less color, because as we all know, saturation can easily be added in post-production, but removing excess saturation is sometimes impossible.
STEP 5 MAKE SURE THINGS WORK
After selecting the settings (which are also based on a bit of experience and intuition) I test the lens-sensor combination in as many environments as I can, low-light to lots of light, from day to night and from indoors to out. The goal is for these settings to work in any lighting condition (indoors, outdoors, etc.) I should mention that I usually like to perform the tests in bright sunlight (the most extreme condition for most lens-sensor combinations) to see if it can accurately render the different light levels, from highlight to shadow.
CONCLUSION:
After testing (and approving) the camera settings for each lens-sensor combination, I sometimes create a LUT to make the image appear closer to reality (to what our eye sees) as possible. This process takes quite a bit of time, but I really enjoy doing it and posting my custom camera settings on this website. So, stay tuned and check back for new lens tests.
To learn more, check out the following podcast episodes:
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