# Monochrome-only body?



## jolyonralph (Nov 28, 2016)

How many people would like Canon to do a monochrome-only body option, similar in concept to the Leica M Monochrom?

I'd certainly be very interested...


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 28, 2016)

Done.


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## Mikehit (Nov 28, 2016)

Leica M users seem to appreciate the subtle differences the monochrome sensor produces. It would intrigue me more than interest me (that is, seeing what it can do rather than actually wanting it).


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## ahsanford (Nov 28, 2016)

LR had a look at a Leica Monochrom vs. color FF sensor comparison with a 'stump the judges' element to it:

https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2016/02/comparing-the-leica-monochrom-to-a-sony-a7r-ii/

But they somewhat s--- the bed and confounded the comparison by using a higher resolution color sensor.

- A


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## Sporgon (Nov 28, 2016)

ahsanford said:


> LR had a look at a Leica Monochrom vs. color FF sensor comparison with a 'stump the judges' element to it:
> 
> https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2016/02/comparing-the-leica-monochrom-to-a-sony-a7r-ii/
> 
> ...



Interesting, looks like I was on the right path in guessing that you have to factor in the Bayer array effect when looking at higher pixel numbers and resolution. Anyway, the B&W sensor. My understanding is the major "benefit" is being able to use traditional coloured filters, so you'll be looking through yellow or orange or whatever colour your wanting to use for a specific effect.


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## jolyonralph (Nov 28, 2016)

There wouldn't be much point with a lower-resolution sensor as downsampling would overcome any issues with the bayer filter's conversion to mono - so I'd expect theoretically a 5DSR to be able to generate a 12 megapixel greyscale image that would be every bit as good as a dedicated 12 megapixel monochrome sensor (assuming all else equal.)

But I could imagine a 30 megapixel 5DIV sensor designed for monochrome would be seriously interesting.

I expect it'd also be very popular for deep-sky astronomy (if the UV filter isn't too hard to remove)


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## ahsanford (Nov 28, 2016)

Sporgon said:


> My understanding is the major "benefit" is being able to use traditional coloured filters, so you'll be looking through yellow or orange or whatever colour your wanting to use for a specific effect.



Sure, but can't you do that on a color sensor anyway by just defeating any WB corrections (i.e. just shooting RAW)?

- A


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Nov 28, 2016)

jolyonralph said:


> How many people would like Canon to do a monochrome-only body option, similar in concept to the Leica M Monochrom?
> 
> I'd certainly be very interested...



Not many. The development cost and low production rate would put the price out of sight.

Canon is geared for high production, they do not know how to produce just a few cameras, their business systems, buying contracts, everything is geared to mass production. Cheaper to buy the Leica. Leica is geared for low production rates.

I've seen companies who excelled at high production rates stumble with low production rates before, its a real thing, and not easy or cheap to overcome.


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## AJ (Nov 28, 2016)

Instead of a RGBG Bayer filter you could have a patterned filter with various grey levels for a ND effect. The end result could give you a very wide dynamic range.


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## Pookie (Nov 28, 2016)

As an ardent Leica user there are two cameras I have never quite understood... the type 246 and type 262 M-D. 

I'll take my M 262, MP or M6 (if I don't want to chimp) any day of the week though... and can then shoot color and BW.


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## Don Haines (Nov 29, 2016)

You don't have to invent a whole new camera, you just need to get rid of the Bayer filter....


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## mb66energy (Nov 29, 2016)

neuroanatomist said:


> Done.



NOT done - roughly 75% loss of photons due to color filters in bayer array.


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## mb66energy (Nov 29, 2016)

jolyonralph said:


> How many people would like Canon to do a monochrome-only body option, similar in concept to the Leica M Monochrom?
> 
> I'd certainly be very interested...



I am interested too - just remove the bayer filter (like DonHaines proposed) but just scratching off the filter array from the sensor maybe doesn't work and if, you have to live with a permanent setting in exposure compensation - because the camera firmware doesn't know about the increased sensor sensitivity.


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## Antono Refa (Nov 29, 2016)

Mt Spokane Photography said:


> jolyonralph said:
> 
> 
> > How many people would like Canon to do a monochrome-only body option, similar in concept to the Leica M Monochrom?
> ...



What production issues are there, beside

1. Not adding the Bayer matrix to the sensor? Should be as simple as the difference than that between the 5Ds and 5Ds R.

2. Software modification, e.g. adding a raw format variant, skipping the demosaicing stage, and a gray scale JPEG engine (the standard exists). I guess this part would be harder to implement.


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 29, 2016)

mb66energy said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > Done.
> ...



Here, let me make this a bit bigger since maybe you missed the little one.


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## Don Haines (Nov 29, 2016)

mb66energy said:


> jolyonralph said:
> 
> 
> > How many people would like Canon to do a monochrome-only body option, similar in concept to the Leica M Monochrom?
> ...


Yes.

Obviously one would have to adjust the software, but in this case it would consist mainly of removing colour settings from the menus, and as you say, adjusting the software for (roughly) four times the amount of light. The RAW files would also need to be decoded appropriately as well....


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## Don Haines (Nov 29, 2016)

neuroanatomist said:


> mb66energy said:
> 
> 
> > neuroanatomist said:
> ...


There is a difference between a Monochrome ONLY body, and converting a colour image to simulate monochrome. You end up missing all the light that the bayer filter blocked.


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## jolyonralph (Nov 29, 2016)

Antono Refa said:


> What production issues are there, beside
> 
> 1. Not adding the Bayer matrix to the sensor? Should be as simple as the difference than that between the 5Ds and 5Ds R.
> 
> 2. Software modification, e.g. adding a raw format variant, skipping the demosaicing stage, and a gray scale JPEG engine (the standard exists). I guess this part would be harder to implement.



It's not much different than the difference between the 20D and the small-scale 20Da, 60D and 60Da already produced for astrophotography.

The 20Da was actually quite a revolutionary camera, far more than just a 20D without the UV/IR filter - it also was the first EOS to have live view.

I'm sure the market for a mono body is going to be larger than for astrophotography (and could possibly cover this market too). 

And although greyscale jpeg is not a bad option - the camera could record 8-bit lossless greyscale images in PNG format - or even as GIF files!


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 29, 2016)

Don Haines said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > mb66energy said:
> ...



Really? Seriously?!? See, I wasn't really sure why but I just _knew_ there had to be some reason I bought a couple of $14,000 Zeiss AxioCam HRc color cameras for brightfield microscopy, and a couple of $14,000 Zeiss AxioCam HRm monochrome cameras for fluorescence microscopy where sensitivity for low intensity signals is critical. Thanks for edumacating me!

Now, let's try this again, shall we?


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## mb66energy (Nov 29, 2016)

neuroanatomist said:


> mb66energy said:
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> 
> > neuroanatomist said:
> ...



not missed but misinterpreted + size sometimes doesn't matter


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 29, 2016)

mb66energy said:


> not missed but misinterpreted + size sometimes doesn't matter



Well spoken, Sir! ;D


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## AvTvM (Nov 29, 2016)

I am sure there are millions of units in pent-up demand for a black&white only Canon camera.  ;D

a B&W digital camera would be really, really stupid, Canon!


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## ahsanford (Nov 29, 2016)

AvTvM said:


> I am sure there are millions of units in pent-up demand for a black&white only Canon camera.  ;D
> 
> a B&W digital camera would be really, really stupid, Canon!


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Nov 29, 2016)

AvTvM said:


> I am sure there are millions of units in pent-up demand for a black&white only Canon camera.  ;D
> 
> a B&W digital camera would be really, really stupid, Canon!



In that case, why not start up a crowd funded operation to produce one, its so easy.

If there were even half a million buyers, smaller camera companies would be all over it. Even 100,000 units!

There were about 5.8 million DSLR's shipped from Jan - Sept of 2016. How many millions of those would have been sold if they did not have color? Certainly not 20%.


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## jolyonralph (Nov 29, 2016)

I know this is probably Economics 101, but a monochrome camera body isn't going to be something that people buy instead of a standard DSLR, it's something some will buy as well.

So the only calculation needs to be whether enough people will do this to make it worth the production & marketing effort. 

Probably not, but I'd still like one.


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## vlad (Nov 29, 2016)

One of my coworkers has a webcam that has somehow become monochrome-only. We are all software engineers working on videoconferencing solutions (Skype for Business), and it's a continuous source of amusement and puzzlement how an RGB device could fail in such a way. Reading this thread, I'm thinking maybe it's a feature and not a bug!


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## Don Haines (Nov 29, 2016)

neuroanatomist said:


> Don Haines said:
> 
> 
> > neuroanatomist said:
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<EDIT>
Love your humour.... just got it.... ignore what follows!

The same holds for astrophotography.... you see VERY!!!!! similar colour and B/W versions of the same camera for just that reason....
</EDIT>

Ok... Seriously..... can you explain to me why I am wrong?

A normal colour camera has a bayer filter. The bayer filter blocks light. For each block of 4 pixels, two will only see green light, one will only see blue light, and one will only see red llight. If we assume an even distribution of light across the visible spectrum, then for each pixel, 2/3rds of the light will be blocked. 

It would follow that if you removed the bayer filter, then each pixel would receive 3 times as much light. Surely having 3 times the signal to deal with is preferable to setting a processing flag after an image with 1/3 as much light is taken?


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## Don Haines (Nov 29, 2016)

Mt Spokane Photography said:


> AvTvM said:
> 
> 
> > I am sure there are millions of units in pent-up demand for a black&white only Canon camera.  ;D
> ...


AvTvM - you may need an even more obvious way to mark your comment as humour....l


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## ahsanford (Nov 29, 2016)

Don Haines said:


> Mt Spokane Photography said:
> 
> 
> > AvTvM said:
> ...



Yep. It's almost like it's Emoticon Blindness Awareness Week with this thread. 

AvTvM *doesn't* think there is a market here, people.

- A


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 29, 2016)

Don Haines said:


> Ok... Seriously..... can you explain to me why I am wrong?
> 
> A normal colour camera has a bayer filter.



You are wrong beacuse you're spelling color with a 'u' and failing to capitalize the eponymous Bayer filter.


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## rfdesigner (Nov 29, 2016)

jolyonralph said:


> How many people would like Canon to do a monochrome-only body option, similar in concept to the Leica M Monochrom?
> 
> I'd certainly be very interested...



I have one.

It's called the Atik 383L+

But it's not a DSLR.


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## danski0224 (Nov 29, 2016)

jolyonralph said:


> How many people would like Canon to do a monochrome-only body option, similar in concept to the Leica M Monochrom?
> 
> I'd certainly be very interested...



Anything with a Foveon sensor will give you monochrome capabilities and no resolution loss due to a Bayer filter.

Something from the Merrill or Quattro sensor generations are most current. There are differences. 

The Merrill SD1M and current production SDQ mirrorless have a removable "hot mirror" that opens the door to IR photography. 

One is limited to either Sigma lenses or M42 for easy adaptation. 

A single well exposed image from either of those sensors will give a 50mp 35mm format camera a run for its money.


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 29, 2016)

danski0224 said:


> A single well exposed image from either of those sensors will give a 50mp 35mm format camera a run for its money.



Except for that whole spatial resolution thing…


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## unfocused (Nov 29, 2016)

I'm just curious, doesn't having three color channels have some advantages? Pick the channel you want to emphasize and adjust accordingly. Probably couldn't do that with a single monochrome channel.


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## Don Haines (Nov 29, 2016)

unfocused said:


> I'm just curious, doesn't having three color channels have some advantages? Pick the channel you want to emphasize and adjust accordingly. Probably couldn't do that with a single monochrome channel.


Like just about everything else, it's a trade-off....

A colour camera gives you more spectral information, but at the cost of sensitivity...

An interesting twist on things is a monochrome sensor and the use of external filters... This way you get to choose what is important to you. B+W photographers have been using coloured lens filters for a long long time.... Astrophotographers do the same, but with very specialized filters....


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## Mikehit (Nov 29, 2016)

here is a review of the Leica Monochrom when it first came out and comparison of the technology

https://luminous-landscape.com/leica-m9-monochrom/


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## jolyonralph (Nov 29, 2016)

danski0224 said:


> Anything with a Foveon sensor will give you monochrome capabilities and no resolution loss due to a Bayer filter.
> 
> Something from the Merrill or Quattro sensor generations are most current. There are differences.
> 
> ...



Except that the Foevon sensors, including the one in the Quattro, have a poor reputation for noise.


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## danski0224 (Nov 29, 2016)

neuroanatomist said:


> Except for that whole spatial resolution thing…



I looked that up: http://www.dspguide.com/ch25/1.htm

I won't pretend to understand all of it, but the first two sentences make sense.

A Foveon sensor does not have any interpolation like a Bayer sensor. This is critical along things like high contrast edges.

A Foveon sensor will resolve more detail. 

A "50mp" Bayer sensor really only has either 16.6mp (50/3- RGB) or 12.5mp (50/4- RGGB) of image data, and these sensors are in 35mm format cameras. The Merrill generation is 46mp using Bayer math and it is APS-C.

Here is some more on edge artifacts: http://foveon.com/files/Color_Alias_White_Paper_FinalHiRes.pdf


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## danski0224 (Nov 29, 2016)

jolyonralph said:


> Except that the Foevon sensors, including the one in the Quattro, have a poor reputation for noise.



If you work at low ISO, that is not necessarily true.

High ISO images, say 1600, often transfer to monochrome very well even if the color looks bad or noisy. 

Yes, many will say that the best place to be is 50, 100 or 200 ISO. This is really no different from using a Canon 1DsIII at 100 ISO only, which seems acceptable to many 

No, the Foveon sensor will not "work" as well as a Canon or Sony above 1600 ish.

But, if one cannot afford a Leica M, the little Sigma DP Merrill 2 or 3 can provide stunning color and monochrome images with some effort. They look like point and shoot cameras, but they aren't  The SD1M DSLR has the same sensor, but lacks any live view capabilities.

Some strip the Quattro blue layer using Raw Digger and get monochrome that way, the top layer is 19mp. The Merrill sensor and earlier is 1:1:1 RGB.

The SDQ with the 30mm lens kit is a killer deal for what it can do with some effort.


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 30, 2016)

danski0224 said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > Except for that whole spatial resolution thing…
> ...



First off, I was wrong – I somehow thought the Sigma Foveons were FF, but given that they're APS-C I would say you're right that they rival a 50 MP FF Bayer sensor for spatial resolution. But not for overall image quality. 

Color interpolation does _slightly_ reduce spatial resolution, but no where near the factor of 3-4 as you suggest. Rather, it's about a factor of 1.2-1.5, the former for typical images and the latter for high contrast monochromatic features. I know this based on empirical testing with microscopic resolution targets, colored beads and fluorescent particles (quantum dots) of known size, using the Zeiss AxioCam HRc that I winkingly mentioned above. The color version of the camera has a Bayer array and can do color interpolation, but it also can do co-site sampling, which is where a piezoelectric motor moves the sensor exactly one pixel distance, first in the X then in the Y. That way, each pixel area of the sample is recorded successively in all three color channels (only works with static subjects, obviously, but that's the norm in microscopy). 

Your other logical error is having your cake and eating it, too. You can't both divide the MP count of the Bayer sensor (by your too-large factor of 3), _and_ at the same time multiply the MP count of the Foveon. The Merrill is a 15 MP APS-C sensor. That determines the maximal spatial resolution, Sigma calling it a 46 MP sensor is marketing-speak. Comparing to 24 MP APS-C sensor with a CFA, interpolation will drop the effective MP count to 16-20 MP. Pretty much in the ballpark. Comparing to a 50 MP FF Bayer sensor, the larger pixels would result in a lower absolute spatial resolution (effectively ~13-16 MP count), but again in the ballpark as far as equivalent MP count. 

However, when looking at overall IQ and comparing at a fixed output size (which is how you should compare different sensors), the greater enlargement needed for the Foveon APS-C sensor would cost you sharpness, and the larger light-gathering area of the FF sensor would mean lower image noise. So for IQ, the Foveon will rival a 20-24 MP APS-C sensor, but will fall well short of a 50 MP FF sensor.


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## Valvebounce (Nov 30, 2016)

Hi Neuro. 
Just because there are more of you that spell colour wrong due to the population of your country does not make the correct incorrect if you see what I mean. ??? ;D Plus not capitalising bayer is probably not wrong in this instance, as Don describe a GGBG array! 

In fun, Graham. 



neuroanatomist said:


> Don Haines said:
> 
> 
> > Ok... Seriously..... can you explain to me why I am wrong?
> ...


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 30, 2016)

Valvebounce said:


> Plus not capitalising bayer is probably not wrong in this instance, as Don describe a GGBG array!



Of course you're right that Bruce Bayer didn't design a GGBG array. But don't you mean capitalizing?


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## Don Haines (Nov 30, 2016)

Valvebounce said:


> Hi Neuro.
> Just because there are more of you that spell colour wrong due to the population of your country does not make the correct incorrect if you see what I mean. ??? ;D Plus not capitalising bayer is probably not wrong in this instance, as Don describe a GGBG array!
> 
> In fun, Graham.
> ...


OOPS! Corrected the mistake in my earlier post..... But there is no way to convince the neighbours how to properly spell the colour grey.... They believe that their version of spelling trumps all....


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## Valvebounce (Nov 30, 2016)

Hi Neuro. 
Do you have an emoticon for a "can of worms" that we could use when opening one! ;D

Cheers, Graham.


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## c.d.embrey (Nov 30, 2016)

I'd buy a *5D4 Monochrome.* A $4,000ish price would be OK with me.

BTW Leica isn't the only one to make a B&W digital. Phase One makes the Achromatic + http://www.achromaticplus.com/Achromatic_Plus/Achromatic+.html

"The Achromatic+ digital back is a 39 million pixel camera, with a sensor that measures 49.1 x 36.8mm and a pixel size of 6.8 micron (square). Technically speaking, *this is a 39 megapixel* digital camera. However, because there is no bayer pattern over the sensor, and the light is not separated into colors when being recorded, each pixel is capable of receiving pure and uninterrupted information. This absolute information translates into what could be perceived as a much higher resolution image, even *comparable to 80mp*. The experience is beautiful, and the images spectacular."

You should be able to make impressive large B&W prints with a *Canon 5D4 Monochrome* file. I want one.


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