Nikon D850 Monochrome Examples, Eastern Sierra
Background: The Nikon D850 monochrome is a Nikon D850 with its color filter array (CFA) removed by maxmax.com. The NEF files are converted to monochrome DNG via LibRaw Monochrome2DNG and “Method B”, then processed using Adobe Camera Raw. Doing so avoids any demosaicing and thus retains full spatial resolution.
This page shows examples from the Eastern Sierra shot with the Nikon D850 monochrome, a Nikon D850 with its color filter array (CFA) removed.
Most examples shot with frame averaging for superior tonality and lower noise, and most of these include the single frame image for comparisons.
Nikon D850 Monochrome Examples: Eastern Sierra
Nikon D850 Monochrome Examples: Eastern Sierra, Man-Made Structures
Includes images up to full camera resolution, but some of the images also provide variants scaled up to 100 megapixels using Gigapixel AI, with wonderful results.
WOW! I don’t think I have seen image quality this high from any 35mm camera ever before.
Image quality is outstanding in a single shot at ISO 64 on the Nikon D850 monochrome, with an incredible detail equivalent to perhaps 70 megapixels from a Bayer matrix color capture of most subject matter. I would say closer to 100 megapixels if the subject matter is of a frequency or color that works poorly with Bayer demosaicing.
Check out the 100 megapixel upsamples and see for yourself. Maybe it is “cheating” to use Gigapixel AI and consider black and white capture, but it gets the D850m files into Fujifilm GFX100 territory, and I would say often sharper in practice (lens performance and depth of field versus sensor resolution). Certainly the visual impact is hard to deny and the Zeiss Otus 55/1.4 is just about unbeatable with a B+W Green 061 filter on the D850m.