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iDynamic Range possible to hack?
  • 95 Replies sorted by
  • Nice exposure stonebat!
  • What about I.resolution? I leave it off because I'm assuming its just digital sharpening?....
  • sharpening is always digital.
  • These days you may be right, but there was analog sharpening long before digital in video.
  • @stonebat
    "iDynamic is very nice. The cupcakes store sign was totally black. The iDynamic function brightened the sign while keeping the blue sky color. "

    I don't get this behaviour at all. So you did no post-processing?

    I must be missing something here.
  • It's the way that the gamma curve is mapped when the processing is done in camera from 12bit sensor output to the 8bit video output. It is real detail, that isn't recoverable after the fact from a 8bit video file
  • @Dazza did you do some test, because it would be a very big news if this is the case. Until now it is only a theory, unfortunately I have had no time to do some testing. But doing a with and without idynamic of the same scene and see if it is possible to get the same result in post with the one without or if not then the confirmation that idynamic process directly from the raw output.
  • Look at Lolo's test on the 1st page. Pretty obvious to me, far smoother graduation in the darker areas. The only way it could be that way
  • I wasn't questioning the idynamic at all, but @stonebat 's photograph, where he says the sign was all black. Idynamic isn't nearly that impressive on my cam and only shifts maybe a stop or maybe two stops. I like idynamic, but it doesn't give me the same result as @stonebat, given he hasn't done any post-processing on that shot.
  • @johnnym I don't see why not. If you look at @Matt's original post you can see that if he were to expose for the outdoors instead of the indoors he would have had nice blue skys and a much darker room. You probably would have had no detail on the bedspread and maybe the lower part of the wall. What we see in the second photo is a dramatic difference IMO. So I think the sign in @stonebat's example would be similar to what @Matt got with the bedspread.
  • @johnnym no post processing at all. i took jpeg photo. then exported to smaller jpeg for web. the change in camera was dramatic. after the feature was enabled, the sign was brightened smoothly from dark to what you see. it took about a sec. like a magic!!
  • @stonebat Ive experienced this magic as well... I some stuff when I was outside with my dog, shot low with the sun at her back... she was pitch black in regular mode and clear in iDynamic, setting is amazing when it works
  • @stonebat

    Thanks. I notice the smooth transition, too, usually more than several seconds. I haven't had the effect so extreme yet (pitch black->totally lit). I will test some more though.
    I'm very happy with iDynamic, but it does seem to work in its own way rather unpredictably.
  • I think I stumbled on roughly how the i-dynamic works. From what I've seen it seems to react to a combination of the ISO setting and the level of exposure. For example in my case if I have ISO-160 and exposure is at 2/3 bar and I shift it to +1 bar, the i-dynamic icon will shift from white to yellow about 2 seconds thereafter. If I shift it back down to +2/3 bar it shifts back from yellow to white 2 seconds later. I am assuming that yellow means its on and white means its off since if you shift it off, the icon stays white no matter what you do.

    At ISO 3200 the exposure bar has to be at 2.3 bars before the i-dynamic icon will shift to yellow, and it takes longer almost 5 seconds to turn on. At least indoors under artificial light settings this is the case. The other ISO settings gradually go up, as in ISO 400 will allow it to go on at 1.3 bars, ISO 800 at 1.6 bars etc.

    But indoors (at night) I haven't noticed any clear change in image performance. I need to try this out in the daytime and see if I can get the same amazing effect everyone else has. But it looks to me like its based on a combination of ISO and positive exposure levels.

  • @pedro: good find! I'm stuck here and can't figure out how to change the exposure setting (not iso, not shutter, not iris, but exposure) which button do you use for it?
  • The thumbwheel.
  • You use all of the above to get exposure up to where it needs to be to be able to shift it on and off. Remember iso 160 has a break point of 1-1.3 bars so if you set iso at 160 you have to adjust everything else and find a way to get the exposure to naturally exceed +1 bar in order to trigger the i-dynamic function.
    At higher iso settings, higher + bar settings are needed on exposure to get i-dynamic to turn itself on automatically.


  • I forgot to unset idynamic yesterday, and got the behavior that can be seen in the video below. Look at how the grass become lighter after some time. I always shoot in M mode, so the change in exposure can only come from iDynamic. It seems that the grass get some noise with this process, so I doubt it is really usefull. But I would be happy to be proved wrong. (Shot using Driftwood 176Mbit/s AQ3 settings.)

  • You doubt what is useful? IDynamic? Noise or no noise bring on IDynamic.
  • @fjolliton
    Yes, I see what you're talking about.
    I wonder what ISO it started and then ended up at.
    If this is what to expect from the dynamic aspect of things, I'm not liking it.

    This would be useful if we had control of how it behaves.
    I believe this is what you're refering to Ian, right?
    I do like the concept, but we need control to make it work right within lighting conditions.

    Better yet would be more useable cinema curves.
    I believe this is what Vitaliy and Chris are working on.


    Thanks for sharing.
  • @fjolliton and if it was a cloud?, try to replicate with more control in the parameters at stake please, :)
  • @Ian_T: I was refering to iDynamic. I was thinking, after reviewing my shot, that enabling it might lower the image quality, because once the image is lighten up, it *seems* that there is more noise. That's entirely subjective on my part. But since this test was accidental, I will try to reproduce it.
  • @lolo: That's what I wonder.. it might simply be a cloud moving at the time I shot that.

    However, I made some other tests: when displaying the histogram, we can clearly see that when enabling iDynamic, the image is lighten up (ISO or contrast slope, I don't know) whenever there are a large part of the image which is underexposed. (Easy to check by adjusting aperture and looking at histogram when switching from Off and High in iDynamic setting from the quick menu.) But that's what we could expect from such a feature.

    I will post some other shot samples soon.
  • I've no interesting subjects right now, but all my tests show the same behavior: image is gradually lighten up (take some seconds). I'm now almost sure it was indeed the effect of iDynamic.

    Below is a quick test showing noise.

    This is with iDynamic set to off:



    This is with iDynamic set to High:

  • @fjolliton it is a bit difficult to judge the noise because there are so much detail. You will need to get flatter surfaces to judge it. Now is it more noise or is it more visible because the lows get brighter. I will have to try to do so test.