Tips for processing RAW images
- Thread starter Ursidae69
- Start date
bigreen505
Expedition Leader
Go to http://www.d-65.com/downloads.html and buy the CS2 book. I'll answer as many questions as I can, but that will get you up and running better and faster than anything else I can think of.
Robthebrit
Explorer
If you are using XP, here is a replacement viewer (from MS) that handles Canon/Nikon Raw files, this should also allow the explporer thumnail display to handle them.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...8E-B10D-4CE4-A141-5866FD4A3286&displaylang=en
I also use a tool called ExifPro which is not an editor but a viewer that is super fast even for folders with hundreds of raw images. it supprts pretty much all Raw formats and also handles all the embedded info within the image including manufacturer specific data.
http://www.exifpro.com/
The best software I have found for initially tweaking the raw images is the Canon software, either the EOS Tools, Zoom Browser or Digital Photo Professional. These have the same processing and setting controls as the camera itself so you can adjust white balance, color tone etc which is something Photoshop cannot do, or cannot do exatly the same as the camera would of done.
Remeber no versions of photoshop support High Dynamic Range images, your raw files are stored as 36 bits per pixel, 12 bits for each of RGB and all three components are allowed to go above 1.0. Photo shop only supports 24 bits (8 bits per component) in the range 0.0 to 1.0. The photoshop raw dialog that appears when you load a raw file is the only place where the HDR data properly handled. Once you have passed that dialog and gone to the main photoshop window you are back to 24bit and you lost a lot of precision. This matters for things like exposure adjustments. For example, you have a raw picture of the sun, if you half the exposure in the RAW tools the sun is still white but if you do the same operation in photoshop after leaving the initial raw dialog the sun will be mid gray. Basically in the original HDR data you might have a white pixel within the image of the sun with a value of 2.0, photoshop cannot handle numbers outside 0.0 to 1.0 so it will clamp anything above 1.0 to 1.0 which still appears white so initially all is good. Now is you reduce the brightness to 50% the photoshop pixel is 1.0/2 which is 0.5 or midgray but the original pixel would be 2.0/2 which is 1.0 so is still white.
This has been a problem for years in movies and video games where the lighting data is true light values and your source data can have a massive dynamic range, especially if the sun is in the scene. We use a load of clunky tools to deal with the HDR data without destroying it, I can give you more details if you desire to enter a world of pain. Ww have asked Adobe many times for full HDR support but they keep saying it would require a complete rewrite of the Photoshop and it would break all the plugins. Maybe one day.
Rob
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...8E-B10D-4CE4-A141-5866FD4A3286&displaylang=en
I also use a tool called ExifPro which is not an editor but a viewer that is super fast even for folders with hundreds of raw images. it supprts pretty much all Raw formats and also handles all the embedded info within the image including manufacturer specific data.
http://www.exifpro.com/
The best software I have found for initially tweaking the raw images is the Canon software, either the EOS Tools, Zoom Browser or Digital Photo Professional. These have the same processing and setting controls as the camera itself so you can adjust white balance, color tone etc which is something Photoshop cannot do, or cannot do exatly the same as the camera would of done.
Remeber no versions of photoshop support High Dynamic Range images, your raw files are stored as 36 bits per pixel, 12 bits for each of RGB and all three components are allowed to go above 1.0. Photo shop only supports 24 bits (8 bits per component) in the range 0.0 to 1.0. The photoshop raw dialog that appears when you load a raw file is the only place where the HDR data properly handled. Once you have passed that dialog and gone to the main photoshop window you are back to 24bit and you lost a lot of precision. This matters for things like exposure adjustments. For example, you have a raw picture of the sun, if you half the exposure in the RAW tools the sun is still white but if you do the same operation in photoshop after leaving the initial raw dialog the sun will be mid gray. Basically in the original HDR data you might have a white pixel within the image of the sun with a value of 2.0, photoshop cannot handle numbers outside 0.0 to 1.0 so it will clamp anything above 1.0 to 1.0 which still appears white so initially all is good. Now is you reduce the brightness to 50% the photoshop pixel is 1.0/2 which is 0.5 or midgray but the original pixel would be 2.0/2 which is 1.0 so is still white.
This has been a problem for years in movies and video games where the lighting data is true light values and your source data can have a massive dynamic range, especially if the sun is in the scene. We use a load of clunky tools to deal with the HDR data without destroying it, I can give you more details if you desire to enter a world of pain. Ww have asked Adobe many times for full HDR support but they keep saying it would require a complete rewrite of the Photoshop and it would break all the plugins. Maybe one day.
Rob
dhackney
Expedition Leader
Another raw photo file browser that is orders of magnitude quicker for viewing, sorting, etc. images than CS2 is Breeze Browser Pro.
I agree with Rob's comments on processing RAW files. The manufacturer's tools will give you good results, sometimes very superior results. The latest versions of Canon's DPP are even getting better from the useability standpoint.
Up to now, AFAIK, the manufacturers are keeping the engineering data behind their RAW formats to themselves. This means that the file formats are proprietary, and every piece of 3rd party software that manipulates the RAW files has required their developers to reverse engineer the RAW file format in order to open and process it. Obviously, that hasn't been all that hard to do, but if forces us to assume that there are things in and about the file data structures that the manufacturers are not sharing and that the 3rd party software vendors may not have figured out. I think this is one big factor for the native camera vendor's tools still delivering some of the best results when processing their proprietary RAW formats.
Long term, history has demonstrated the anything proprietary from a vendor is destined to eventually become unsupported. That's why Adobe's generic RAW format makes sense for long term storage and read-ability, even though it is incapable of supporting all the proprietary meta data contained in the manufacturers RAW files. Better to give up some of the esoteric data and still be able to open and edit your files a few years down the road. Try doing that with a Wordstar document file...
I agree with Rob's comments on processing RAW files. The manufacturer's tools will give you good results, sometimes very superior results. The latest versions of Canon's DPP are even getting better from the useability standpoint.
Up to now, AFAIK, the manufacturers are keeping the engineering data behind their RAW formats to themselves. This means that the file formats are proprietary, and every piece of 3rd party software that manipulates the RAW files has required their developers to reverse engineer the RAW file format in order to open and process it. Obviously, that hasn't been all that hard to do, but if forces us to assume that there are things in and about the file data structures that the manufacturers are not sharing and that the 3rd party software vendors may not have figured out. I think this is one big factor for the native camera vendor's tools still delivering some of the best results when processing their proprietary RAW formats.
Long term, history has demonstrated the anything proprietary from a vendor is destined to eventually become unsupported. That's why Adobe's generic RAW format makes sense for long term storage and read-ability, even though it is incapable of supporting all the proprietary meta data contained in the manufacturers RAW files. Better to give up some of the esoteric data and still be able to open and edit your files a few years down the road. Try doing that with a Wordstar document file...
Scott Brady
Founder
I am very happy with Aperture for nearly all photo workflow. The new version 1.5 has more image processing tools and I have yet to pull an image into PS for post production. Aperture is happy working with RAW images. But I do very little manipulation to my images (I was trained as a traditional photographer, where I am anal about composition and lighting)
Rob,
Good tip on the XP viewer. I did that a few weeks ago.
Rob,
Good tip on the XP viewer. I did that a few weeks ago.
JMyerz
Adventurer
RAW processors are like film now days, each yield different contrast ratios and color renditions. I would highly recommend testing all available demos and decide how you like the outcome.
I have several I use for different results. My goto processor is Adobe Lightroom however. Its their next generation pro RAW processing and work flow program that I think yields much better colors and much less artifacting than apples aperture.
J
ROFSheriffHL:
I have several I use for different results. My goto processor is Adobe Lightroom however. Its their next generation pro RAW processing and work flow program that I think yields much better colors and much less artifacting than apples aperture.
J
ROFSheriffHL: