A few days ago Don Holbrook emailed me with info about a new book by
Darrell Young on the E-M1 (see link below). I hadn't heard about it,
checked the info on Amazon and decided to buy a copy. It arrived
yesterday. I was busy and set it aside but late last night started
thumbing through it.
To my amazement the second page I opened (somewhere in the middle of the
book) said: "Keystone Comp.". What? Yes, it's exactly what the name
implies... it adds simulated view camera tilt and swing adjustments to
the E-M1. I hadn't noticed it in the menu since my camera's firmware
was at 1.1 despite being only a couple of months old. I updated the
firmware to version 3.0 which is (wow!) 6 version levels above 1.1. I
also discovered that two lenses also needed updating.
Anyhow, despite reading what's in Young's book and in the E-M1 manual I
haven't quite figured out how to use it... or perhaps I have. Neither
source states the limitations but it appears that it's not possible to
do both tilt and swing on the same frame. I was initially very confused
since the only control I saw was for tilt when, according to what I had
read in the books, I should see both controls. I think now that I had
turned the rear dial (tilt control) prematurely. The tilt/swing scales
take several seconds to show up on the display after selecting Keystone
Comp. As soon as one of the controls is activated by turning either the
front or rear dials the display for the opposite control is removed.
The only time you can see both controls is when both tilt and swing are
at "zero", ie with the indicators centered as in a level guage. If you
try to change one the ability to change the other is removed. I think
it strange that neither source mentions this.
Some other oddities. Young apparently didn't do all his homework. He
says you must properly set your exposure before engaging Keystone Comp.
since the front and rear control dials are busily engaged in tilting or
swinging rather than exposure controls. What he didn't mention is that
the Keystone Comp. setting is one of the displays tied to the info
button. By pressing the info button you can rotate through the other
info displays which will allow you to change exposure. You can then go
back to the Keystone Comp. display if desired.
Another mystery is why the E-M1 manual says to use the cursor arrow
controls to "...to choose the area recorded." Useless advice. The
cursor seems to be almost non-functional except for sometimes and
unexpectedly jumping from one side of the screen to the opposite side.
Trying to figure out how to use this function has been more like
Keystone Cops that Keystone Comp. :-)
I may still use it from time to time. It doesn't do anything that
PhotoShop doesn't (less actually) but it does give you the opportunity
to see if applying perspective corrections will leave an acceptable
field of view after corrections are applied. It might be necessary to
shorten the focal length for a wider field if the correction leaves you
without fill on the sides of the image.
Chuck Norcutt
On 3/9/2015 7:12 PM, Don Holbrook wrote:
In case you're interested.......mine arrived today....first
impression----it's heavy.
http://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Olympus-OM-D-Darrell-Young/dp/1937538540/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1425942278&sr=8-1&keywords=darrell+young
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