SteveTog Loc: Philly

Hello,

I'm looking into smaller gear for pro-grade work. Strangely, and against my advice, my photos are showing up occasionally in galleries and one-man shows. I like to travel light, but even when I travel, there's always a chance that 'the shot' turns up. I'd hate to waste that shot on a camera that isn't up to the job for printing a large, gallery-sized print.

Does anyone on UHH have experience printing M43 to roughly 4'x5'? How did that work out?

Thanks in advance.

blackest Loc: Ireland

If thats 4 x 5 feet at 300dpi the image would need to be 259.200 Mpix on the other hand stand far enough back and you can get a reasonable result with much less.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

If you are the sort of pixel peeper who views prints from 13" away, no matter whether the print is 8x10" or 40x60", well, you will be disappointed.

However, if you are the sort of normal John Q. Public who understands that nearly all prints are made to be viewed from 1x to 1.5x the diagonal of their dimensions, then you will be perfectly happy.

The human eye can resolve detail of around 240 PPI when viewed from 13". That is an 8x10 with 1920x2400 original, captured-in-the-camera pixels. If you enlarge that same exact file (via interpolation) to 16x20, then view IT from 26", you will see the same exact amount of detail. (If you MUST view the 16x20 from 13", you will need to make it with 3840x4800 original, captured-in-the-camera pixels, and not interpolated pixels.)

You've undoubtedly seen billboards made with Apple iPhones. When they first started making them, those phones had about 8MP. Micro 4/3 cameras have at least 12, usually 16, and now 20MP to play with.

I have a Lumix GH4 with 16MP sensor. I've made 40x30 inch prints from full frame images. They look stunning from 50 to 75 inches away (1x to 1.5x the diagonal of a 40x30). Yes, the resolution is below 120 original PPI at that size, but who views a 40x30 that closely? I could make a 40x53.33 inch print, and it would still look good from its diagonal.

The GH4 sensor is 4608x3456 pixels. At the minimum extinction resolution, 240 PPI, it is capable of making a 19.2x14.4 inch print.

Can you make "better" prints from a 32 MP, 36 MP, 50 MP, or higher pixel count camera? Yes, if you MUST pixel peep, more pixels will help. But how many folks do pixel peep?

Here's a guy who has sold most of his big Nikon gear, and now uses Lumix cameras for most of his work. http://naturalexposures.com/lumix-images-good-film-markus-bolliger/

Dan Cox has many magazine covers to his credit, including some for National Geographic. He and his wife give photo tours and safaris in exotic places. Check out the rest of his blog if you think M4/3 is inadequate.

Will Crockett is a commercial photographer in Chicago, and a photo consultant to the Pentagon, and a long-time photo educator and speaker at trade seminars. He also uses Lumix gear, which has mostly replaced a mix of Nikon and Fujifilm dSLRs.

I could list others. Suffice it to say, you CAN make big prints from M4/3 cameras. The trade-offs you will notice are:

• INCREASED depth of field for the same field of view. A 25mm lens is normal on M4/3. At f/4, it has the same depth of field at the same distance as a 50mm lens at f/8 on full frame.

• INCREASED noise and DECREASED dynamic range at high ISOs. At ISO 1600 on M4/3, you get the look of ISO 6400 on full frame (two stops difference).

You can compensate for the depth of field issue by using wide aperture primes, adding neutral density filters, and using your lenses wide open to two stops down.

You can compensate for reduced low light performance by using a tripod, O.I.S. or IBIS, or dual IS, or adding light to the scene.

SteveTog Loc: Philly

Thank you, BP. What an excellent, helpful and well presented answer.

- S

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

I use m43 but have not tried printing that large. Most of my prints are up to 18x24 and are fine. The few that I've done larger, I use Perfect Resize to up-res the files.

I do have an m43 friend who does large-print exhibits, and has printed that large from 16 mp Olys, they are fine from normal viewing distance though differences would probably show up on very close exam. I would expect problems would be manageable except for images suffering from detail loss due to high ISO or aggressive processing. There's no denying that m43 sensors are somewhat more noise-prone than larger sensors.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

You're welcome. One more thing I'll add — Most of what determines quality in an image isn't gear. It's what's about a half a foot behind the gear...

I've known plenty of folks with high end dSLRs who couldn't get an image to look good if they tried. I've known some real pros who could use an iPhone and get museum quality results. Knowledge is more important than gear. When you have good knowledge of your craft, good gear gets a lot better.

SteveTog Loc: Philly

Thanks for the Perfect Resize tip. Good to know if that's the way I go.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

That is probably the best way to maintain detail in your images when taking them to large sizes. We used its predecessor, Genuine Fractals, in the lab where I worked. We took some 6 and 8.2 MP images to 40x60 with it. Yes, up close, you could tell, but not from normal viewing distances.

Jer Loc: Mesa, Arizona

But sensor size has other issues. Color saturation, low-light sensitivity, lens availability.... for example, do they make a wide-angle lens if you do that type of shooting for your camera. Remember you always have to factor in the crop factor when choosing a lens.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

A 7mm lens on M4/3 is a 14mm field of view on full frame. So the 7-14mm lenses from Panasonic and Olympus act like 14-28mm full frame zooms.

Over 90 native lenses fit M4/3 cameras. Plenty of options exist to adapt most existing lenses to some degree, and some (Canon) can retain all electronic features.

You get two stops more equivalent depth of field increase at any equivalent field of view. And you get two stops less low light capability, on average, compared to full frame; one stop less than APS-C.

I can live with that. Others' experience will vary. I'm getting better images from my GH4 than I ever did from my Nikon F3s and 35mm film of equivalent speeds.

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

I fully agree that it is always a good idea to check the lens array for any camera system you consider. One factor some people forget in evaluating mirrorless purchases is to pay attention to the size of these lenses, too, because they vary widely among systems. Probably because it's the oldest of the small mirrorless systems, m43 now has a huge array of excellent lenses to choose from, from fisheye and wide angle to macros and long teles. The Oly Pro line is very high quality glass. Many of the cheap kit lenses are remarkably good but both Oly and Panasonic make enough variety between them to keep anybody happy.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Very true. Panasonic has 12mm, 15mm, 25mm, and 42.5mm LEICA primes, and a LEICA 45mm macro, in addition to several LEICA zooms including a new 12-60mm and the immediately legendary, ONLY $1800, 100-400mm f/4–f/6.3 (full frame equivalent is 200-800mm!). They also have several weather-sealed pro lenses (I use their 12-35mm f/2.8 and 35-100mm f/2.8). Of course, they have dozens more lenses, at least one in every flavor, as does Olympus. The Oly 12-40, 40-150, 75mm prime, and 300mm prime are all primo glass.

Many of the Panasonic lenses include Optical Image Stabilization. Some of them will get firmware updates later this year to make them compatible with Panasonic's new DUAL IS II, a scheme that uses lens OIS PLUS In-Body Image Stabilization on certain new models (G85 and GH5 are two).

Some longer Olympus lenses include built-in stabilizers, but Oly already has the best IBIS on the planet, so that only makes it better.

The mostly complete lens list (as of 12/2016, so it's missing lenses introduced at CES and later): http://hazeghi.org/mft-lenses.html

SteveTog Loc: Philly

This has turned into a very informative string.

So if I was looking for a lightweight street/travel kit covering wide to short tele, like a 35mm equivalent of ~15mm to ~85mm, that I could use in low light, night street photography, using the good in-body and good in-lens IS. What would you recommend?

The idea for this would be to go as light as possible, and I LOVE fast primes, so one each of a wide, normal and 'portrait length' prime is not out of the question. Zooms are nice, but primes are primes, if you know what I mean.

And from what you're saying, don't expect as much boceh from a 1.4 M43 lens as a 1.4 FF or APS-C?

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Lumix G85 body IBIS/Dual IS II
7-14mm Olympus f/2.8 (14-28)
12mm Leica f/1.4 (24)
15mm Leica f/1.7 (30)
25mm Leica f/1.4 or Panasonic 25mm f/1.7 (normal/50)
42.5mm Leica f/1.2 or Panasonic 42.5mm f/1.7 (both have OIS) (85)
Olympus 75mm f/1.8 (150)

These are all excellent in their class. Yes, f/1.7 on an M4/3 lens of equivalent field of view has the bokeh of f/3.5 on full frame.

No OIS below 30mm. Panasonic Dual IS II requires compatible Panasonic lenses with a firmware upgrade. The G85 IBIS works with non-OIS lenses. Olympus lens stabilization is incompatible with Panasonic IBIS and Panasonic lens OIS is incompatible with Olympus IBIS.

SteveR Loc: Michigan

Burk....I needed you in another thread where I'd said a photographer had tried to use a camera not up to the job to do a portrait sized photo of a bride. While it may have been ok to shoot the wedding, my feeling was that a large format camera was necessary for a really good portrait sized photo. In this case, the portrait was actually blurry. I used the example of the outstanding portrait which had been done of my Dad which could be viewed at any distance. CatMarley objected, however, and felt that smaller cameras could do large portrait work....and that "sharpness" wasn't totally desirable in portraits. I indicated that while you may not want to see pores and zits, you need to start from a sharp image. My Dad's photographer used a 5x7.