Your Canon Photos No. 35: 31st December 2023 to 6th January 2024

The Lace Monitor can grow up to 2mtrs in length. Not a good photo but you get the idea...

Hi Digirame, Thank You.....

.... and a Happy New Year to you to, I hope it's a good one. 👍

David,

Yes, the HDR photo from the Canon M50 MKII is a little unnatural. I was just playing around with the camera to see what it can do. My preliminary assessment is that the Canon RP does this better using the in-camera HDR feature with more settings. There's more control with that.

I didn't mean to offend anyone that takes better pictures with their camera, which is why I showed the message with a smiley face. I was just kidding around a little. By the way, my phone is old. I bought it used on Ebay. My previous cell phone was much more older. I don't use the cell phones for photography, but I see that the newer ones do this quite well.

I would love to see comparisons between the newer cell phone images and cameras, using features such as in-camera HDR or with software adjustments. Would anyone like to share?

Bryan,

Thanks for sharing with us the photo of the Lace Monitor. It does show the size quite well, since the leaves and branches help us with that.

It's that time of year when I put food out for the birds... and the squirrels eat it!

Dunlin,

Yes, a bird house has to be made and placed to keep the squirrel out. But even with that, I've seen the squirrels outside on the ground, picking up the seeds that were dropped. Nice capture!

Subject: Another HDR Photo

Here's another HDR photo I took yesterday from the Canon M50 MKII. I liked this one better. I suppose it depends on the lighting. Here there was a little sunshine. Previously it was cloudy.

Would you have liked it or would have someone else liked it, if I didn't say it was an in-camera HDR photo?

Model - Canon EOS M50m2
ExposureTime - 1/500 seconds
FNumber - 5.60
ISOSpeedRatings - 160
ExposureBiasValue - 0
FocalLength - 19 mm
Lens Model - EF-M15-45mm f/3.5-6.3 IS STM

Clearly the second version is an improvement but there’s still the halo effect along the roof/tree line. Do you think an HDR software package would have done a better job with the in-camera settings switched off?

Hi WolfsHead. I don't know. Once I tried to create a HDR photo with software and it didn't turn out very good. It was OK, but I found I could produce the same image using one exposure and then post processing it a little. I remember Mocha trying to help me on some pictures I took of Mt. St. Helens. I can't remember if that was on Dpreview or Dprevived. I don't normally do a lot of HDR photography, but it has caught my attention lately again. I was curious what other people could produce by creating some HDR photos, who may have more experience than I do at this and better software. My Canon RP gives me more options with the in-camera HDR settings. I just thought I'd play around with the Canon M50 MKII to see what it also could do (even though it's less capable).

I understand also that some smartphones take HDR photos too. But I don't know a lot about that, as my phone is quite old. But I'm impressed at what I see with other people's smartphone images. I just read that more than 90% of all people who take photos, do it with smartphones and many are using this HDR technology.

Also I should point out that the second HDR photo was resized, which I do for all my photos on Dpreview and Dprevived. I don't know how it would look printed out, if the halo effect would show. I'm setting up a new printer similar to one that Mocha recommended. So hopefully in a few days I'll be able to see what that looks like as a print.

Thanks for your comments and interest.

Is that the Canon G7020 ?
I ordered one and it's supposed to come tomorrow. I have a TS8020 and it's been acting up.
I have my fingers crossed.
Steve Thomas

Steve,

Yes, that's the Canon G7020 that I purchased. I have yet to install the heads, the ink, paper, and drivers etc. I am hoping this one will be good, without the ink drying out or the paper jamming. So, I'm keeping my fingers crossed too. 😀

Ah, yes. The ink cartridges 😀

If I have any trouble with the drivers, I'll be calling you 😀

Steve

Hi Digirame,

Using software to give HDR effects also has the same/similar problems, in the first photo (1_Original Raw File.jpg) you can see the sky is pretty much washed out and typical of RAW files low key colours.

The second picture (2_Lightroom auto attempt.jpg) is where I've brightened the scene and boosted the overall colours, I have also got Lightroom to pick out the sky for me, you can see its attempt as it colors it in pink so I can see the defects, note specifically around the trees where it has not done its job and also the field top right that it thought was the sky.

I know I've exaggerated the effects in the sky (3_Lightroom auto sky.jpg) to make it Blue but you can see where its errors in picking out the sky (I've circled them in red)has led to white patches. As with halos this just looks unnatural.

My answer is to forget auto generated effects with my software and use the Linear gradient (4_Lightroom with Linear Gradient.jpg) to totally cover the sky and some of the ground, pick up the shadows and manualy brush in the correct temperature for the building. No More Halos, white patches that should be blue etc.

1_Original Raw File.jpg

2_Lightroom auto attempt.jpg

3_Lightroom auto sky.jpg

4_Lightroom with Linear Gradient.jpg

Mocha,

Thanks for the details on creating HDR photos. It sounds a little complicated for us that don't do a lot of post processing with paid software such as Lightroom. It sounds like I need to get that software first if I want to expand from what I already am doing. I was reading more about it and there's times we may not want HDR, because then it might create things that we normally would not see...thus making it unnatural (like my buildings at night). But unnatural looking photos can be OK too for their artistic content. So, there's plusses and minuses for HDR and it depends on what we want for the finished product. Again thanks for the time you spent to create the four samples. I hope it helps other people too.

Your finished HDR photo is beautiful...great job!

Steve,

A few minutes ago I did successfully get the printer working from one computer. I found it necessary to follow the instructions carefully. The instructions I had did not describe where to install the two print heads, but see the printer between "Remove Packaging Materials" and "Installing the Print Heads". They should have put an arrow in there, describing exactly where the print heads are to be installed. When you lift up the cover, it's in the center, towards the back. This is where the orange protective plastic piece is to be found that is removed as shown in steps 1 and 2. I assume your instructions are the same as what I had.

This G7020 unit does not have ink cartridges but rather ink bottles that you pour into the appropriate tank. The PGBK bottle is the black ink and the colored ink is identified by C, M and Y.

If you are planning to use a Cat5e cable for a LAN wired connection, the port is in the back. It can't be seen because they put in there a white/gray plastic piece that covers it. Since I already had a cable available, that is what I decided to do (rather than using wireless). For the driver installation and getting this to work it can be a little complicated. They gave me and assume you too a CD-ROM for the drivers. Now some computers do not have a DVD-RW/CD-ROM tray for that, so you can either use an external DVD-RW device that connects to the computer with a USB cable or you can download the drivers as instructed.

I found that since I was planning to use a wired LAN connection, I had to enable that in the printer first (in the menu). Canon does provide good instructions for that with a google search. Once that is done then you can install the drivers. Hopefully it should find your printer on the network. In my case it did (Yay!).

I put in there plain paper and tested it. Success!!! 😀 Hey I didn't break anything so far. That is good news being that there is plastic everywhere. 😀

I hope that helps.

P.S. I'll edit this for a couple of more things. If you are using plain "letter" sized paper instead of A4 paper, you have to move the plastic blue piece to the correct location in the cassette. Be sure you know about that. It can be a little confusing.

Photo paper apparently is loaded in another tray (maybe...I'm still reviewing that). That will be something I want to do on another day. First I'm going to buy Canon photo paper that is good for this unit. I don't want to take a chance. I don't want there to be any reason that the paper jams again.

Another edit: OK, I did find that we load the photo paper in the back. We remove the covers and slide the blue plastic pieces to the width we want. Now, I can't wait to test that, as soon as I purchase the Canon photo paper. I hope that will be tomorrow.

Subject: New and Improved

OK, I adjusted the first in-camera HDR photo a little. I think this is better. You may or may not like it, but it's the best I could do with the Canon M50 Mark II without using something like Lightroom software.

Model - Canon EOS M50m2
ExposureTime - 1/800 seconds
FNumber - 4.50
ISOSpeedRatings - 500
ExposureBiasValue - 0
FocalLength - 26 mm
Lens Model - EF-M15-45mm f/3.5-6.3 IS STM