F-Stop metadata on Aperture for Leica M9

Unfortunately not. I have sent feedback to Apple about this. Do so also, so maybe we get it in the following update. - vintoia -

http://www.apple.com/feedback/aperture.html

This is not a problem with Aperture but is due to the fact that Leica M cameras only have a mechanical link to their lenses i.e. there is no electronic interface to transmit the lens aperture set by you, the user, to the camera. Hope this helps,

Mikey.

Then, how come Limelight 3.0 can read the f-stop correctly ?

I don't think this is correct. I asked at a Leica shop and they said that f-stops are correctly imported into Adobe Lightroom and that they have heard of this problem with Apple Aperture before. Though I don't have Lightroom, I have just tried it with Adobe Bridge and the f-stop is correctly imported into this application. Therefore, there is definitely a problem with Aperture.

Well, my problem is similar with you: I can see the F-stop metadata in Aperture, but I cannot see the "Aperture" metadata of my photo in Aperture.

I'm using a Leica M9 and its new 50/1.4 ASPH lens.

I would be very thankful for a solution to this question as well. I have a Leica M9 since February and have never seen the F-stop in the metadata. I haven't checked with other programs yet.

Aperture (well, Mac OS X) does not make this information available at present, unfortunately.

It is in the DNG files: I've used exiftool to display it. But I don't write RAW decoder software so I don't know what if any tricks they pulled to get it.

I reported the issue to Apple a while back; more feedback if you need it wouldn't hurt.

Six month later it seems nothing has happened, was hoping the recent updates would include it, can't be rocket science ? It would read the D-Lux 4 without problems.

For the time being I download critical pictures into Lightroom 3 first, which reads them fine, and then export to Aperture, since I prefer to work with it in general.

I think I understand the questions being asked here, but please forgive me if not. Certainly I can talk about the M9.

With the Leica M system of cameras there is no mechanical or electronic connection between the lens and the body that transfers information about the lens' aperture setting. That is, the camera does not know what the lens is set to and so does not have metadata for aperture, f-stop, whatever. As such, there is no f-stop metadata for software like Aperture to work with.

The thing to be aware of is that the Leica rangefinder camera concept dates from the 1920s, revamped into the current system in the 1950s, with digital capability added in the 2000s. Think of an M9 as a box with a very nice sensor to which a long history of very nice lenses can be attached and you've got it. The latest lenses can tell the M9 camera what they are (via a physical code engraved on the lens' bayonet mount which is read by the camera) but cannot transfer f-stop metadata. There is none to transfer and no means to transfer it if there was. They are purely mechanical lenses that make superb images.

M9 images do include metadata for parameters other than f-stop, as the camera body does know what shutter speed was used, what the ISO was, etc.

This is wrong. The data is there, and other software, including exiftool, can read it. It's just in a nonstandard place in the raw files I believe.

Note: It might not be there for ALL lenses, but the newer coded lenses definitely have the data in the raw files. Have a look with exiftool.

Please tell us, what information about aperture setting does exiftool read from your M9 files.
Is it really "Aperture" or "F Number"?
For my M9 files this is not true. I can only get following informations from exiftool affect aperture settings: "Max Aperture Value" and "Approximate F number". First value is derived by 6bit encoded lens information, last one sounds a little bit funny to me.

OK, so here's the deal:

The Leica M9 can't actually read the "real" f-stop. It actually guesses, based on the light meter and what gets to the sensor. This result is "reasonably" accurate (not exact, but better than nothing). It then stores this as the "Approximate F number" in the maker notes section of the EXIF information.

Maker notes are not standardized. They are a proprietary EXIF extension:

http://wiki.photoolsweb.com/index.php?title=EXIFMakerNotes

Anyway, the approximate aperture value is stored there by Leica. Exiftool reads the information in the maker notes and displays it. Apple is not currently decoding this proprietary info, so it's not displayed in Aperture or iPhoto.

I'm sorry William, but it's not wrong. 🙂 You may be seeing something in metadata with exiftool, but it is not, repeat not data that has been generated by the lens telling the camera what it's aperture/f-stop setting is, either mechanically or electronically. If you look closely at an M9 camera body you will see that it has a small circular window above the lens mount. This window takes an approximate measure of how much light there is out in front of the camera, regardless of which lens is attached and what it's aperture setting is. This is compared with what the light meter inside the body detects through the lens to provide an approximation of what the lens' aperture setting is. But it's pretty rough. Leica don't present it as an aperture reading in image metadata, because it isn't.