Choice of Photoprocessing Software (Newbie question)

[smgorsch]

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Okay, so I've made the commitment to get an M8 but I have nothing in preparation for the leap to the digital world. I plan on purchasing a MacPro & wonder what the optimal software might be. Apple markets something called "Aperture" -- is this any good & is it sufficient for RAW processing of M8 files? The forums are full of acronyms like CS, ACR, etc. What would be the best package for M8 files? The only digital program I've worked with thusfar is Jasc PaintShop.

 

Thanks for the help

 

Stefan

[mjh]

Apple markets something called "Aperture" -- is this any good & is it sufficient for RAW processing of M8 files? The forums are full of acronyms like CS, ACR, etc. What would be the best package for M8 files?

Aperture doesn't yet support the M8, but there are lots of applications that do – Adobe Photoshop or Elements with the latest version of Adobe's Camera Raw plug-in, Adobe Lightroom, Capture One (LE), Bibble, Raw Developer ... I'm using Raw Developer myself.

[Guest WPalank]

Apple markets something called "Aperture" -- is this any good & is it sufficient for RAW processing of M8 files? The forums are full of acronyms like CS, ACR, etc.

Stefan, as an avid Aperture user, the M8 is not yet supported in the software although they (Apple) will probably get to it in the future.

PS=Photoshop

CS- refers to the versions of Photoshop. There was Version 7, then CS, then CS2 (currently sold) and now CS3 available as a public beta.

ACR-stands for Adobe Camera Raw which is the plug-in within CS, CS2 and CS3 (and Elements) that allows you to process the RAW images before import into Photoshop. Hope this helps!

[chrism]

You will get a CD with the M8 with a free copy of Capture One LE, which will process the raw files very nicely. It's not the most intuitive of programmes, but it gives great results with a bit of study.

 

Chris

[LJL]

Stefan,

As Chris pointed out, the M8 comes with C1LE, so you will have a very good RAW processing tool to start. I would suggest you also download the profiles prepared by Jaime Roberts that are linked to at the top of this forum. He has done some very nice things and also has made it possible to eliminate most of the magenta cast from shots taken without the UV/IR cut filters, if you do not have them yet for your lens(es).

 

Additionally, I would suggest you download a demo copy of RAW Developer, and also some of the profiles prepared by Brian. Although these are two very differenet tools, and it may be a bit confussing working with both at once, I do think you will quickly discover what works for you, as well as to see how some very good conversions can be achieved. The other tools mentioned, such as ACR and LightRoom will also do a very respectable job, and you should be able to download free beta versions of them to test also.

 

As it stands, you already have an excellet tool shipped with the M8, and the others can be downloaded as tested to help your learning, define your workflow preferences, and maybe provide you with some addtional preferences of your own. I use several, including Aperture, even though it does not yet handle the M8 DNG files. However, I can process the files in C1LE and import the 16-bit tiff files into Aperture to do a lot of post conversion work, and I have been finding that I prefer how I can do some B/W work there.

 

Have fun, enjoy your great new M8, and do not be afraid to ask questions. This forum is chock full of very bright and helpful photogs.

 

LJ

[smgorsch]

Thanks for all the help --

[Cruewell]

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I am late for this thread! In case you had any doubts, go Mac instead of PC. And if you can afford to, keep the Mac free from as much software as possible which is unrelated to photography, and even keep the Mac away from Internet -even though viruses and such are mostly designed to destroy the Bill Gates empire = Windows.

[wparsonsgisnet]

I am using the C1-LE software that came with the M8. It took a little work -- but not as much as PSCS. I do, however, wish there were a book j-u-s-t e-x-a-c-t-l-y like Scott Fraser's "Real World Camera RAW." Fraser is going to be sorely missed!

 

It took a couple of hours to learn to cope with new software (this old dog is getting used to having to learn a new trick EVERY week -- damn digital), and I now find it a very sensible approach to raw processing.

 

The flow is as follows:

1. Crop.

2. Then White Balance first. I really like this way of working.

3. Make changes to exposure -- I preferred the double method in PSCS(2) of both exposure and seperate mid-tone brightness -- but this works ok.

4. Focus (who knew) -- I see the effect of this, but don't understand why it's working.

5. Save the processed file as tiff or jpeg.

 

6. I am using the profiles that Jamie Roberts made and they're really nice. The problem wth the default profile from Phase One is that it was made for the original M8 that still had the IR problem. One expects that Phase One will provide new profiles.

7. I also use Neat Image for noise reduction. However, I find that many of the M8 shots that I have processed via C1 do NOT need noise reduction. This is a nice change.

 

Regards,

[skass]

Bill, I have a D2, which is not supported by Capture 1, so I'm not familiar with C1's features, and I never heard of a "focus" adjustment. What does it do? Is it simply a sharpening tool? Could you post a before and after picture of an image that was a bit soft. Steve

[erl]

Steve,

 

Basically, I agree with Bill's workflow but am limited at present as my M8 is in Solms. My early experience with the 'focus' tool in C1LE is that does no operation on your file. It simply allows you to see which image of a series is best focussed, or where the camera focus lies in an image. A bit like a super magnifier. It is quite handy, but only as an aid.

 

My only problem with C1 is how to control the image numbering! . The documentation is pathetic. It's overall image processing is great though and I will probably stick with it.

 

Cheers,

Erl

[wparsonsgisnet]

Steve,

 

Basically, I agree with Bill's workflow but am limited at present as my M8 is in Solms. My early experience with the 'focus' tool in C1LE is that does no operation on your file. It simply allows you to see which image of a series is best focussed, or where the camera focus lies in an image. A bit like a super magnifier. It is quite handy, but only as an aid.

 

My only problem with C1 is how to control the image numbering! . The documentation is pathetic. It's overall image processing is great though and I will probably stick with it.

 

Cheers,

Erl

 

We need a successor to Bruce Fraser to write "Real World Capture One RAW" for us!

[erl]

I totally agree Bill.

[devils-advocate]

Don't forget Lightroom, which is still a free download. Ulike C1, it's highly intuitive and the processing controls are superb. I haven't attempted any comparisons, but LR (to add another acronym) is probably the most user-friendly coverter out there.

 

- N.

[woodyspedden]

Aperture doesn't yet support the M8, but there are lots of applications that do – Adobe Photoshop or Elements with the latest version of Adobe's Camera Raw plug-in, Adobe Lightroom, Capture One (LE), Bibble, Raw Developer ... I'm using Raw Developer myself.

 

Michael

 

I am with you. Raw Developer is a special product, It is small, cheap (RELATIVELY!) and has the most accurate output color of any raw converter I have seen. C1 is very good but very expensive ( I am not talking about the lite version C1 LE but the full C1 Pro which is what you will need if you do extensive raw processing). I have also tried all versions of ACR, Silkypix (good but not great), Lightzone, LIGHTROOM BETA, Aperture and most of these are again good but not great at the process of converting raw to tiff. I like C1 pro so I will look again when the version 4.0 comes out. Could be a great product. But until then I will stick with the Iridient Raw Developer which is so good and so affordable. Brian Griffeth, the developer is someone special who deserves your attention and praise.

 

Cheers

 

Woody Spedden

[wparsonsgisnet]

... the full C1 Pro which is what you will need if you do extensive raw processing

 

Woody (or other C1 guru), I am a windoze user still so am still thinking up going to the C1-Pro. What are the extra raw processing features I'll see, and will I get both exposure and brightness, a la PSCS2, which I miss?

 

I do expect to be processing l-o-t-s of raw images.

 

Sorry for the query, but I don't get this info from Phase One's site, which I find murky.

 

tnx,

[stunsworth]

Bill, have you tried the CS3 beta? There are a lot of extra options on the RAW processor - which isn't to say that you won't prefer C1.

[gesper]

I find C1 gives me the best look right out of the camera (using Jamie's profiles) and adjusting white balance is the most intuitive of any program I use. I then export to CS3 for fine tuning. Note that in CS3 you can open tiff files in ACR and have access to that set of adjustments.

[stunsworth]

I know you can open Jpegs in ACR, but I didn't realise you could open Tiffs. There's only an option for Jpegs in the file handling preferences.

[AlanG]

We need a successor to Bruce Fraser to write "Real World Capture One RAW" for us!

 

I think I could do that, but I don't have the time right now. It would be great if there could be a sticky post where one could add information about C-1.

 

First of all the Focus tab in C-1 allows you to view a section of the image at 100% in order to judge focus, not really control focus. At 100%, you can see the effects of any sharpening, banding, or noise adjustments you make.

 

I'm pasting in a previous post that may help you and others. (I don't know how to link to the permalinks elsewhere on this site.)

______________________

 

I have been using C-1 almost every day for about 3 1/2 years. I know the interface may be daunting at first but it actually is very well thought out and efficient once you learn it and use it properly. I will give a brief run down on how to start using it. I've only used the Windows "Pro" version, but I think that most of the work flow is similar in LE. (Tethered shooting is not supported in LE.)

 

Keep in mind that C-1 generates "preview" files from the raw files. The preview files are for on screen use and greatly speed up the program's ability to browse images and adjust those images. I store all or my preview files in one folder. (The default folder that C-1 creates.) Preview files can later be removed when they are no longer associated to files that you are working on in C-1) The "Focus" magnification window lets you see any part of the image at 100% whenever you need closer inspection. So the lower resolution of the Preview files is not a limitation.

 

Here's how I do basic C-1 work flow with Windows. (Mac should be similar.) In Windows Explorer, I create and name a new folder for the project that I want to download. Lets call it "Images ABC." I then transfer the images from the card reader to this folder. (You can also create the folder from inside C-1 and you can use the C-1 utility to import the files.)

 

Start up C-1 and use its browser's navigator to go to "Images ABC." Click on that folder and the previews will start getting generated into C-1's browser. At this point I use a button on the C-1 folder menu to create a sub folder of this project and call it "Best ABC" In the C-1 browser it should now display the title "Images ABC" and another title with "Best ABC." I click on "Best ABC" to highlight it and then I click on the top menu choice "Collection". Inside "collection" I click on "Assign as the move to collection." Now the title of the folder "Best ABC" will turn blue.

 

This makes "Best ABC" the folder that your best images will be sent to whenever you press the Backspace key. I find this to be a key feature for me because it will allow me to quickly separate my best images from the others. (You can also tag the images but I prefer to physically move them to a new folder.)

 

So then I click on the "Images ABC" folder and start browsing through them. When I see one I like, I hit the backspace key to move it to the "Best ABC" folder. Once I'm done making my selection, I then click on the "Best ABC" folder and the browser will now display all of the images that I moved there. These are my selected images for the job. I then go into the little window over the browser and type what I want to name the images. Let's say some of them are children on bicycles. So I type "Children on bicycles" in the input window. I then highlight all of the images in the browser that are of children on bicycles and then click on the rename icon. All of these images will be renamed and numbered. (Various numbering parameters need to be set in advance.) I can then type in another title for other images and I keep repeating the process until all of my best images are named and numbered.

 

I then select each image and adjust it using C-1's controls. (I won't go into that as I'm just going through the work flow.) If you have similar images you can adjust one image and then apply those adjustments to a group of selected images. At this point, I generally don't make final tiff conversions, but I often make small jpeg files for my clients to use for selection. So I highlight all of the files in the "Best ABC" folder and then go to the menu item "Collection" and click on the sub menu "Quickproof" this opens up a feature that will very rapidly produce small jpegs or tiffs of the selected raw files. And these small files will show all of the color and exposure modification that I made. (You can set the size of these Quickproof files and choose tiffs or jpegs as output.) The default folder will be titled "Quickproof" and will be stored inside your "Best ABC" folder. The beauty of this system is that C-1 does not have to access the raw files and convert them in order to make the Quickproof files. Instead it works from the Preview files and can make a Quickproof image in just a few seconds per photo.

 

Later I go back to the "Best ABC" and work on each image separately after the client gives me a list of the images they want. These I convert to hi res tiffs. Usually this is a pretty easy task as I already have the images adjusted pretty well. Of course I often do some fine tuning at this point. These images will be stored in a folder titled "Developed" which will be inside the "Best ABC" folder as well.

 

I know this is complicated and it is just part of what C-1 can do. It took me a long time to learn all of the features but I found it well worth it as the work flow for selection, renaming and Quickproof is very efficient. Lately I have been doing all of my final conversions in DxO because it has lens correction and better dynamic range control. (Highlight recovery and DxO lighting for shadow detail.) DxO also has more ways to control the color such as the ability to shift the hues, saturation, and contrast of each color individually. I generally prefer the color I get in DxO. However, DxO does not currently support Leicas.

 

Maybe the next version of C-1 will have some of DxO's features, but it is hard for me to believe they will test each lens as DxO does. (This allows for automatic correction of vignetting, C/A, sharpness, and distortion

 

At some point maybe I could explain a little more about adjusting an image. As others have pointed out you probably want to white balance first. There is usually a basic tone curve set such as "Film Standard" or "Film extra shadow" or "Linear response." These are the basic tone curves that affect your overall image. Then go to the "Exposure" tab. Adjust the "EC" slider for overall exposure. This can let you lighten and darken an image quite a bit and is much different from sliding the white, black, and mid tone pointers in the histogram.

 

And you can also design your own tone curve here. For instance by moving the EC slider to the left you can darken the image and recapture some shadow detail. Then you can try to adjust the tone curve to regain some shadow detail and mid-tone contrast. The "CC" slider is overall contrast and the "CS" slider adjusts color saturation. There really is a lot of ways you can go with all of the White Balance and Exposure controls so I suggest you spend a lot of time trying them out to see what they do.

 

There are several icons that let you save specific tone curves or overall adjustments for use later. And there is also an icon that let's you apply the adjustments you make on one image to a highlighted group of images. (You can choose any or all setting to copy from one image to the others.)

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[bnelson]

Thanks Alan. A great help to me and I use C1.

 

Bill