Canon G9 - Infrared Photography

[Michael Steinberg]

I have been using a Epson R-D1 to take infrared photographs and the pictures have been wonderful. I recently purchased a Canon G9. I am using the lensmate adapter with a Hoya 58mm R72 filter. All the infraed photos I have shot are filled with noise even at ASA 80. I do not know what I am doing wrong or is it the camera. Non-infrared photos are great. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

I have been using a Epson R-D1 to take infrared photographs and the pictures have been wonderful. I recently purchased a Canon G9. I am using the lensmate adapter with a Hoya 58mm R72 filter. All the infraed photos I have shot are filled with noise even at ASA 80. I do not know what I am doing wrong or is it the camera. Non-infrared photos are great. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Hi Michael, welcome to OPF.

Not all digicams are that suitable for IR photography. Their main task is to produce good quality visible light images, with accurate (or pleasing) color. For that purpose they are usually equipped with an internal IR blocking (reflection and/or absorption) filter. That will result in a reduced sensitivity for near infra-red wavelengths.

The real IR imaging challenge, especially with tiny sensel cameras, will be to get an adequate exposure in all three (R/G/B) color channels, because that will reduce the average noise. Make sure you expose long enough to at least get one color channel to fill the histogram to the right, without overexposing it.

Depending on how the other two color channel histograms look, you may need to make additional exposures to get them equally well exposed. When the subject is stationary, camera on a tripod or other stable support, that would allow to combine the best exposed channels in postprocessing, if you are up to such manipulation.

Maybe the final conclusion will be that the G9 is less suited for IR Photography, but you still have a fine camera for the other purposes. Just make sure your exposures are optimal, before you can reach that conclusion.

Maybe you can post an example, as that could perhaps help to improve the result some.

Bart

 

[Michael Steinberg]

I saw some pictures that Diane Fields took with this camera and they looke spectular.

 

[John Stitt]

I have tried IR with the G9 with a B&W 92 opaque to the eye filter and was not at all happy 15 sec at F/4 and the image still was not good. They must have a very strong IR filter in the stack. Am thinking about having one converted for IR though. Anybody done that yet?

John Stitt

 

[Diane Fields]

There was one person on dpreview.com that had bought the G9 to be converted. Here is the link to his photo.net gallery with photos taken with his G9 converted (by Lifepixel) to IR.

http://photo.net/photos/howardfuhrman

Diane

 

[Diane Fields]

I have tried IR with the G9 with a B&W 92 opaque to the eye filter and was not at all happy 15 sec at F/4 and the image still was not good. They must have a very strong IR filter in the stack. Am thinking about having one converted for IR though. Anybody done that yet?

John Stitt

John, 15 sec. seems to me a long exposure for an IR on the G9. As I recall the B&W92 is very opaque. I would think the R72 to be about as opaque as would work well with the G9. The longest shutter I used was 2 sec. in moderate light but I used higher ISOs (200 and 400), got a very good exposure, shot in RAW, processed in LR (or ACR), used Martin Evening's technique of using the HSL panel to set all saturation sliders to 0 (not the same as desaturating via a saturation slider), then adjusting using the luminosity sliders, going back and using sliders in the basic module, etc. He has a very good video tutorial
http://lightroom-news.com/2007/08/24/tips-for-better-black-and-white-conversions/ which can used identically in ACR. Adding just a bit of color noise reduction in ACR/LR and perhaps a bit of luminosity works well. You could also do a low level amount of NR in PS if you so chose, but I didn't find the noise unacceptable and esp. not for a print.

I might mention that I always bracket exposures and choose the best. Sometimes I will shoot at different ISOs also. I don't stop down much--the G9 already has a very deep DOF due to its small sensor--so I just normally shoot at f/2.8 or 3.2/3.5. I experimented with the G9 (used to shoot a lot of IR with the original G1 and tried with all bodies since, the D60 having the strongest AA filter, but the 5D is acceptable), but weather really isn't helpful right now for IR shooting LOL. The more amount of sunlight, the better for IR in my experience (and less wind too).

Hope this helps. I was looking at 1:1 of some of my IR experiments (in LR) and found a great deal of noise on some exposures, very little on others--of the same subject--with just changes in shutter speeds, ISO, apertures. I'd be glad to show some small 100% crops if anyone is that interested, but really--bracketing, experimenting is the only way until you get a very good feel for it I think.

BTW--have you taken the shots to the final output--be it print or web--and how did you feel about them at that point?

Diane

 

[Diane Fields]

Addendum to above post---I mentioned a 15 second exposure to be long on G9--but made an assumption I shouldn't have--what the subject, lighting was. Yesterday, in the rain (certainly not IR friendly conditions but wanted to experiment), I shot from my porch using both the G9 and 5D with a couple of IR friendly lenses that I can use with my current Hoya. I did have to up ISO to 400 and 15 seconds on G9 to capture a decent exposure--and yes, had noise---and I found in comparing the 5D (with a very inexpensive sigma 28-300 bought for the D30 for my husband to use as a digicam a good while ago and the 28 f/1.8 and 50 f/1.4) that I got quite good sharp shots with little noise even at ISO1600 and ISO800 and long exposures--whereas the G9's shots just couldn't resolve nearly as well under the circumstances/fuzzy almost OOF feeling on foliage (I experimented nd found the best combination of ISO, aperture and shutter speed for both cameras). So--that confirmed to me that the G9 would really only be good for IR with very good sunlight--whereas I could shoot IR with the 5D in less than good circumstances and still get good results (both shot in RAW, processed in LR and a bit of touchup in PSCS3).

I don't intend to convert my G9 but feel, if one were going to do a lot of IR shooting, that would be a better way to go to use it in the manner in which I considered when I bought the G9--handheld, small, very portable.

Just some thinking out loud LOL--


Diane

 

[John Stitt]

Diane, Sorry I have taken so long to get back to this thread. Have to work sometimes so I can afford toys. You certainly have done a thorough review and good experimentation. I think I will have to invest in some R72 filters. The 092 is, as you say totally opaque, and does produce dramatic black and whites. I started using these with my M6 and for some reason at some time had bought one in 58mm so tried it on the G9. Same results. And yes, I took to the print stage and it was not good at all, in fact pretty bad. I too shot from my porch but it was fair IR light at that time.

I am still toying with the idea of having a second G9 converted but in the mean time I have bought an old 20D and am sending it to Life Pixels for the Deep IR conversion. Lots to carry when I travel but I will find out if I want to do the digital IR that much. I travel much of the time so maybe the G9 conversion will be the way to go if I get the IR addiction like I did with film and Leica M.

Thanks again for your in-depth response.

John Stitt

 

[Diane Fields]

I am still toying with the idea of having a second G9 converted but in the mean time I have bought an old 20D and am sending it to Life Pixels for the Deep IR conversion. Lots to carry when I travel but I will find out if I want to do the digital IR that much. I travel much of the time so maybe the G9 conversion will be the way to go if I get the IR addiction like I did with film and Leica M.

Thanks again for your in-depth response.

John Stitt

I considered the same, but decided to keep the G9 intact for now. I've thought about having my old 10D (sold my 20D) converted. Still not sure how much I'll do with it. While uploading some 2001 G1 DVDs to an external HD recently, then into LR, I found quite a lot of IRs taken with it--and same filter---and got the bug again LOL.

Diane