E-30: Tones Comparison

I was in the car, going back from work. As I was passing under the overpass, I was struck by this scene. I was going west, so naturallly the sunset struck the building and resulted in an interesting contra joure effect.

Stuck in the traffic crawl, I quickly reached for the E-30 with the Zuiko Digital ED9-18mm f4-5.6 which was in the E-system bag at the back seat. All the settings were just right, and all I needed to do was to select the ART4 Light Tone filter.

Frame, focus, snap!

All were done in a mere few seconds.

The top image is normal with +0.3EV correction using Olympus Studio RAW, the middle image is Shadow Adjustment Technology adjustment, and the bottom image is the ART4 Light Tone filter effect.

From the SAT image, it was apparent that the shadows were retrieved. Note the image also resulted in some noise. It seemed that the retrieval was very aggressive.

From the ART4 Light Tone filter, it was apparent that the shadows were not aggressively retrieved. It was very similar to normal +0.3EV, but if compared with the tonal rendition, the ART4 provided smoother tones in a somewhat harsh and contrasty image.

I noticed, from the building with the sunlight, the Light Tone provided the best of both worlds. Subdued highlights and shadows. Tones were exquisite and pleasing to look.

I like it!!!