Raw conversion color differences

Yes, I know that Adobe had to guess at how raw files are encoded (I shoot Nikon)a and that perfect color conversion should not be expected but...
I started with Capture NX2 and while I loved the quality of pictures I could get from it, it was very slow and cumbersome, and publishing photos was not possible.
I switched to LR3 and found the photo management (publishing, collections, etc) to be marvelous (maybe other products have it as well, but I found my happy place. However, I noticed that even with a calibrated monitor the colors were not right. Below are two pictures labeled cnx2 and LR3. The CNX2 version was processed to include "bluing" the sky. Not much else was done. The LR3 version (done as a training aid until this was found) is unprocessed except for an X-rite color checker profile applied (more on this later). Notice how the CNX2 red has turned pink or magenta in the LR3 version. To try and fix the pink, I bought an X-Rite color checker and installed their plugin for creating profiles. Made no significant difference. This is really bothering me. Sure with some skills I haven't yet acquired I may be able to target the red and fix it, but to do it correctly I'd need to know what It's supposed to look like, and I had hoped to no longer require the use of CNX2 so that wouldn't be the case. I'm considering going back to CNX2 for raw conversions and maybe capture sharpening (I'm more comfortable with CNX2 capture sharpening numbers than I am with LR3).
CNX2
LR3/ACR 6.x
Thoughts? Suggestions?

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Jeff Schewe wrote:
Really, people tend to give Nikon and Canon far too much credit...in fact, they just barely got this stuff to work. I will say the cameras and sensors are pretty darn impressive...their image processing knowledge, not so much.
Canon does seem to know how to make pleasing images and get the most out of their data.
Some examples: Canon does a better job, in some ways, at rescuing partial overexposure (compare sunset images). And they know how to put a raw converter in a piece of silicon that runs in a tiny fraction of a second.
But these things aren't really important... The real issue is even simpler:
If all you did was make the default profile for each camera produce the same colors the cameras themselves produce, while still providing all the same configurability and features, you'd cease to get complaints about colors being "off".
Whether you think the cameras produce "good" color or the camera company engineers know anything about color is irrelevant.
No one would be harmed by this, but you'd stop confusing customers who expect one thing and see another.
-Noel

Similar Messages

Raw Conversion: Colors not accurate. Correction with profile?

Hi,
When I create JPGs from my Raw files, the results don't look natural. Some colors have more saturation, some less. For example, the colors of the KoMi A series look somehow dirty; the reds of the Maxxum 5D seem to be oversaturated (dark reds are to bright, brown faces look rather pinkish).
This is in comparison to the orignal objects, to the JPGs generated from the KoMi Raw converter and to the in-camera JPGs.
Since Lightroom has tremendous color tuning options (under HSL and Color), I wonder whether a camera-specific profile can make the colors more natural. Has anybody tried for the KoMi cameras? Can anybody share a profile?
I don't have a color checker, so this would be a tough one for me. I tried a bit, but whenever one color seemed right, another color had become worse.
Here is my equipment:
Cameras: Konica Minolta A2, Minolta A1, Konica Minolta Maxxum 5D.
Other: My room has fluorescent tubes of type 950 (5000K, highest quality, Philips Graphica Pro) or of course daylight from outside. My screen is calibrated using ColorPlus hardware. I used a grey card for most of my photos. JPGs viewed with IMatch (color-profile aware).
Regards,
Martin

Hallo Uli,
there are two aspects of the color deviation:
1. Displaying colors in LR
This is what you are addressing in the other thread. I can confirm this behavior, but let's not touch this matter here.
2. Raw conversion
This is what I am talking about in this post. The effect is actually larger than the display deviation.
Regards,
Martin

CS3 raw conversion color shift

When using the RAW converter in CS3 there is a noticeable change in color from the RAW image to the converted image. I am using two Dell E228WFP monitors that have been calibrated and this allows me to see both images at the same time. I moved the images so they sat side by side on the same monitor and a difference in color was still evident.
I suspect something is happening in the conversion process and would appreciate any suggestion to correct this.
I am using a Dell Dimension 9200 with a VISTA operating system.
Thanks

What application is displaying the raw file, and which application is displaying the converted file?
If you are looking at the preview of the raw file in Camera Raw's dialog--which application is hosting the Camera Raw plugin at the time?

Exported Raw Conversion Image Resolution and Assigning a Color Profile, etc

In Aperture 1.1, although I set the exported Raw conversion image resolution to 300 dpi in the preferences, it continues to come out at 72 dpi which is something of an inconvenience. Also, is it possible to assign a color profile to the "exported version" so that it is congruent to my PS CS2 color workspace (if that is what its called). Is this program capable of carrying out a conversion as a background operation? Finally, can the layout windows be configured so that they remember how they have been used in the past? Thanks.

Iatrogenic huh! Cool!
Anyway, I'm not real clear on what it is you are trying to accomplish. Despite your obvious vocabulary skills, there seems to be some disconnect relative to what you are trying to accomplish. You are right that "exporting a version" in Aperture is roughly equivalent to what happens in ACR when you "Open" a RAW image into Photoshop. In both cases you have, hopefully, already done the adjusting of parameters you want prior to "exporting", or "opening". When you "open" or "export" you wind up with an "image" composed of pixels, whereas in the RAW adjustment phase you are just working with a temporary thumbnail and a set of mathematical instructions. Big difference, I suppose is that when you "open" and image from ACR into CS2, the resulting image is truly just pixels and has not had a "file type" applied to the file yet, until you "save" it, while in Aperture, if you "export" a file to CS2, or to the desktop, you end up with the file type already applied. Presuming you "export" a 16 bit TIFF or PSD, there is no operational difference.
I could be wrong, but with the new Bayer Demosaicing algorithms in Aperture 1.1, and the Camera RAW adjustments, you should be able to come up with an adjusted image that is VERY close if not identical to one done in ACR, with the possible exception of lens abberation adjustment. I was very critical of the RAW adjustments in 1.0.1, but I am very happy with the capabilites in 1.1. That said, I think there is still some room for improvement in user friendliness of some of the adjustments such as Levels.

Nikon D3 Raw Conversion difference between ACR4.4 and CaptureNX

Digital Photography Review has just published an in depth review of the D3. In it they compare raw conversions by ACR 4.4, ViewNX 1.0.3 (Capture NX), and Capture One 4.0.1. The ViewNX conversion mirrors the camera's jpg standard; but there are significant differences - to my eye at least - between that and the colours in the GretagMacbeth chart of the ACR result.
Is this sort of thing common knowledge among the LR community?
I would have thought this a rather fundamental issue; but would welcome any thoughts from those more familiar with this level of colour expertise.
Anyone interested can see the dpr result on page 17 of the review at
www.dpreview.com/reviews/NikonD3/page17.asp

It's not unique to a D3. Check out http://www.damianharty.com/Purple.html for my take on it all - including a step-by-step guide to the calibration process Michael mentions.
Others get very uptight about the fact that this isn't a "proper" calibration and I'm sure that technically they're right, but life is short and this route works well for me. It also ends up as an LR preset and is super-fast to apply.
If "accuracy" was the only consideration, the camera wouldn't have "vivid" and "portrait" and all those other settings in it. We also wouldn't have had, in days gone by, the choice between Fuji Velvia and Kodak Portra - see http://www.damianharty.com/Film.html for my take on all that, too.
Both my articles are typically short-attention span things that appear on the net. Try "Real World Color Management" for a genuine guide through it all.
Or else don't worry about it.
Damian
PS I'm sure I used to be able to format links more nicely than that. Where did that go?

Bad D3 RAW Conversion - Clipped color in shadows...

...and other issues.
Well. My thread was deleted last time and I didn't get any reasons as to why. What is up with this place? Good thing I always copy my message before posting. Never know when the internet is going to go kaboom... (or somebody is going to delete your thread.)
I just shelled out $200 for this product and the moderators are deleting my threads?!
I think I smell fish.
- Issue 1.
Aperture's raw conversion for the Nikon D3 is clipping the color from shadows.... generally. (About 99% of the time.) It is possible that the couple of images I haven't seen the problem occur in have color detail just above the clipping threshold.
This really makes for some ugly images.
Aperture team: How about we get an update to fix this?
I just spent 5 hours importing and organizing ~3k images into my existing library now that Aperture finally supports the D3 but now I can't use it. Unfortunately I have been forced to use Bridge for the last couple of months due to no D3 support. Through this, I have become accustomed to its (Bridge's) speed and ACR's RAW conversion. Now Aperture flies and it is MUCH appreciated but the raw conversions are a little noisy and the colorless shadows is a BIG problem.
In the samples below, watch the shadow on the brown wall behind her as well as the shadow areas on the neck in the close up. Note that the red strap in the file with the color clipped has almost no red left.
I have another image I took that I was playing with to see how far I could pull the file and still retain shadow detail. The image is in color and looks alright when opened with ACR but when I open it in Aperture, there is almost no color at all in the image. This leads me to believe that Aperture's D3 raw conversion is throwing away color information at a specific level.
I have a couple of sample images side by side here:
http://www.uberfoto.com/images/misc/temp/colorclipfull.png
http://www.uberfoto.com/images/misc/temp/colorclipcrop.png
- FYI, I don't have any of these issues with D200 NEF's.
- Issue 2.
The RAW sharpening has absolutely no affect on any of my D3 images. I bring up the camera model because it could be a specific camera issue. I haven't heard of anybody else having this problem.
- Issue 3.
Where are the CA removal tools?
I don't mean this in any sort of rude way. My intention was to bring up some issues that I have come across and see if I could get some feedback.
-Josh

The email I received was strictly regarding my post being deleted. I have not heard anything in reference to the RAW 2.0 problem.
Here is a comparison of the same image. One exported from Aperture and the other opened in ACR and saved as a JPG.
http://www.uberfoto.com/images/misc/temp/colorclipAP-ACR.jpg
http://www.uberfoto.com/images/misc/temp/colorclip_AP-ACRzoom.jpg
Another thing I noticed is that Aperture preview generator does not clip the color data like the raw converter does. Previews created after image adjustments retain their color in the shadows while the full composite view displays in monochrome. This is an image I took in the studio where the PW died and the flash didn't pop so it was very dark. The original image was nearly all black with no discernible details until I pulled the exposure back up. The ACR conversion looks nearly identical (discarding small differences in brand interpretation) to the "Preview" in AP2.0.
http://www.uberfoto.com/images/misc/temp/colorclipraw.jpg
http://www.uberfoto.com/images/misc/temp/colorclippreview.jpg

JPEG color difference between Adobe Raw and Microsoft Image Viewer

When I calibrate my monitor or use the monitors ICC file which came with the Monitor, there is a color difference between Camera Raw image and the JPEG I save from Camera Raw, displayed in Microsoft Image Viewer.
However, if I make my ICC file for the system to be SRGB Color Space Profile, and go through the same conversion, the JPEG image created and viewed in Microsoft Image viewer is identical to the one seen in Camera Raw.
It appears therefore, that the operating system only uses SRGB Color Space profile for Microsoft Imaging Viewer?
Most people I give photos to, do in fact look at them in microsoft viewer.
How can I use the ICC profile for my calibrated monitor and end up with the same results in terms of color with Camera Raw and Microsoft image and Fax Viewer.

All profiles are not created equal. There's a basic version issue (ICC v4 vs. earlier), and profiles are complex things containing many fields. Lots of things can go wrong in the creation of a proper color transform from the combination of the document and device profiles, and it kind of depends on what color management code the software uses whether it can be done properly. Adobe has their own - the Adobe Color Engine - and there are others such as LittleCMS or even Microsoft's system-provided ICM that application designers may be using in their code.
It may be that the profile your calibrator/profiler has produced for your monitor (or other device) isn't compatible with every application. It happens.
This isn't intended to provide a solution or workaround, just to help explain things a bit.
-Noel

Color Difference - Camera Raw & Nikon Raw NEF

Hello everybody
When i open a Nikon Raw file in Camera Raw (Photosop CC) I notice a distinct color-difference between the integrated preview image in the Raw file and the camera Raw standard.
I want to start with the exact same color how it came from the camera.
Refers to Nikon D300 or D800 in Raw / Nef format.
left, from Camera Raw 8.4.1 "Camera Raw Standard"
right, integrated preview from the original raw-file
Mostly i have the difference in Blue, it's too much cyan in there an looks not "natural"!
thanks for help

The third icon in from the right (looks like a camera) called camera calibrations is where the presets live that supposedly match that of your camera.
Even though you use those presets, you are not done. To match what you see in your camera, you must manually adjust the sliders under the basic tab until it does match.
What you see in your camera is a processed image, which is applied to a jpg only. The raw file is just that raw, no processing is done to it. Think of it as a negative. It is your permanent record of the image. Camera raw is then used to manually set up the image to your personal liking. Which does a better job the camera or yourself, is dependent on your skills. You can get details out of that raw file that the camera can not.
When you find you are placing the sliders in certain location more than once, then it is time to create a preset in camera raw that stores those settings. The more you use camera raw, more you can see when your own preset can be used (even as a starting point) and when it is time to do everything manually.
So in other words it is going to take time to 1)get a keen eye 2)understand the subtle differences in what each setting does and 3) collect a library of presets that you can use time and again.

RAW conversion with Aperture

Has anyone compared the quality of RAW conversion of Aperture vs. Nikon Capture as well as other converters?
I really like the quality of nikon capture and would not want to purchase aperture unless the conversion was at least equivalent.
Thanks for any input.
mark
G4 17" Laptop Mac OS X (10.4.3)

I've compared Aperture's conversion side by side with Adobe Camera Raw's. My method was to do some conversions with Camera Raw and save the result along with the RAW file. Then, in the Apple Store, I performed the conversions using Aperture.
The results from Aperture are not good. They look okay at reduced size, but if you look more closely, the de-mosaicing Aperture performs is quite bad. On some images it is only "somewhat" worse than Camera Raw; on others it is so bad as to be unusable. Shadow detail suffers the most, but highlights are not immune. Some images showed color fringing that was not present in the Camera Raw conversion, even with all chromatic aberration adjustments set to zero in Camera Raw.
I ignored differences in color and tonal rendering because I did not have enough time with Aperture to learn to get the best results out of it in terms of color. It takes a while to figure out how to get good color out of a RAW converter.
In no case was Aperture as good as Adobe Camera Raw in terms of image quality. The difference was immediately obvious at 100% magnification.
I would not use Aperture for RAW conversion.
EDIT: I forgot to mention, in case it matters, my camera is a Nikon D2X.

RAW conversion comments

I respect a photographers personal opinions regarding their perceptions of differing quality levels in RAW conversions but in the commercial world these perceived differences between Aperture and say ACR are so minimal they certainly do not qualify as a deal breaker.
In the real world of commercial photography, design and printing, photo images are ultimately used as 8 bit CMYK files or when used for Giclee printing as 8 bit RGB files. These files go through so much retouching and manipulation after the RAW conversion that the esoteric quality differences talked about in these posts are irrelevant.
The proper use of any Camera RAW converter is to balance the image before outputting it as a 16 bit TIFF or PSD for refined manipulation in Photoshop. This would include refined levels adjustments sometimes with layer masks and appropriate sharpening at the final output size.
We typically use the RAW converter to:
1- Pull back highlights that appeared to be blown
2- Open shadow detail that appeared to be plugged
3- Correct color casts and saturation
4- In some cases add special effects such as conversion to rich B&W
Very few serious professionals in either the commercial or fine arts world are going to use the RAW conversion as their final image.
We can argue forever about the pros and cons of this or that RAW conversion quality, but in the real world Aperture's solution, while not absolutely perfect, does an excellent job within a program that enhances real world productivity.
Dual 2ghz G5 Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Tom...
With respect, your logic is hard to accept. You state that in the commercial world, images are typically so heavily manipulated that initially quality of RAW conversion is non-issue.
I am surprised that no one has bothered to challenge this idea. So I'll step up.
If my RAW conversion out of ANY program is going to introduce banding artifacts, 'parquet flooring' patterns, or other noisy type data into solidly colored areas, that will need to be fixed in this manipulation of which you speak. Who could justify having to do this sort of thing when there are perfectly good RAW converters out there that don't add this particular headache to the workflow?
Your message states that "Apertures solution, while not absolutely perfect, does an excellent job within a program that enhances real world productivity."
That statement stands as a contradiction when you consider that extra 'fixing' may need to be done to some images coming straight out of Apertures RAW conversion.
I suspect that you (and others) are not seeing problems because evidence is mounting to support the idea that Apertures RAW conversion works better for some flavors of RAW than others. So, perhaps some people are seeing consisten image trashing, and some not. If this is the case, one could easily understand why some are 'satisfied' and some are positively livid.
However, I digress. I still don't agree at all with the idea that in the commercial world a substandard RAW conversion would make an acceptable starting point for any commercial image, regardless of how much manipulation down the track its going to go through. I can't see any art director being satisfied knowing this was going on in their shop.
"Aperture - sure it mangles your images, but it does a heck of a job keeping track of them!"
Jim

Poor raw conversion from Fujifilm X100 .raf format in Lightroom 3 and 4

I'm seeing very poor results when doing raw conversion from Fujifilm X100 .raf format. Who can I contact about this? Is there anything I can do?
See below for what is supposed to be a white curtain, lit by stage lighting. It results in a blown out blue channel, serious loss of detail, and very ugly gradient.
(Lightroom 4.2, Camera Raw 7.2 on LEFT --- Fujifilm X100 in-camera jpg on RIGHT)
And for more detail:
(Lightroom 4.2, Camera Raw 7.2 on TOP --- Fujifilm X100 in-camera jpg on BOTTOM)
(Lightroom 4.2, Camera Raw 7.2 on LEFT --- Fujifilm X100 in-camera jpg on RIGHT)

The blue light is so intense that it is, or almost is, saturating the sensor.
The camera’s built-in raw conversion handles this by shifting the color to cyan—clipping the blue and allowing the green to contribute more. I doubt there was cyan lighting in the scene, only blue.
Adobe does not shift the hue, but this makes the blue seem over saturated. Adobe’s conversion may be more colorimetrically correct, but less pleasing in this case of intense lighting that the sensor cannot accurately record.
It is a difference in camera profile used between the camera and Adobe. Since Adobe does not supply camera-match profiles for much more than Nikon and Canon cameras, you’re not going to be able to fix things other than managing the over-saturation using HSL or WB or other things like lower-vibrance, higher saturation.
You could try making your own camera profile using an X-Rite Color-Checker Passport or the color-checker and the Adobe DNG Profile Editor:
http://xritephoto.com/ph_product_overview.aspx?id=1257

Lr vs CS3 color difference rendering on-screen

I edited an image in Lr1.1 and saved the metadata to file. When I view the same image in PS CS3/ACR there is a color difference. Skin tones are different. [Note: I have ProPhoto as the default CS3 RGB color space].
But wait... there's more.
Now when I export the image in Lr 1.1 (set to ProPhoto), that exported image when now imported and viewed in Lr 1.1 or PS CS3 look identical, and identical to the source/metadata file viewed in CS3.
What I see is that Lr1.1 metadata driven rendition is different from the same operation mechanized by PS CS3/ACR. The latter is identical to an export of the same data (to JPG/TIFF) by Lr 1.1.
What's going on?
System: Mac Pro - OS X 10.4.10

I'm not supposed to be monitoring this stuff right now since I'm on vacation, but the set of people who can reel off all of the possibilities is limited...
Lightroom uses perceptual rendering when drawing to the screen and hence if you actually have a monitor profile that exploits this, it will look different from Photoshop which always uses relative colorimetric plus the relatively hokey optional gamut compression.
If you are viewing images in any module other than Develop, then you need to be aware that the preview cache is generally stored in AdobeRGB (unless you turn the quality up to high) which means that colors outside the AdobeRGB gamut can get clipped to AdobeRGB before being clipped/mapped to the display which will generally result in different appearance than simply clipping/mapping ProPhotoRGB to the display. But this should only affect colors outside the AdobeRGB gamut.
Older versions of Photoshop had a less accurate conversion path for display for speed reasons. I don't know whether this has been fixed in CS3.
As for white balance settings transfer, Camera Raw applies more aggressive rounding to the values it edits and displays than does Lightroom.
Mark

Raw conversion to JPG better with DPP than ARC 5.X

I started testing conversion from raw to jpg with Canon's Digital Photo Professional and ARC 5.x (CS4) and noticed a much better conversion with DPP. At low ISOs does I don't see much difference, however at 800+ it is very noticeable. I hate to give up the work flow of Bridge and ACR and go back to using DPP. Is there anything that can be done to improve this?

Quoting from an old post of mine, with apologies to all who have read it before:
This has been covered ad nauseam here. Please do a forum search for more details.
Camera manufacturers, Canon and Nikon in particular, perform in-camera RAW to JPEG conversions designed to generate the over-saturated, over-contrasty and over-sharpened images that appeal to most amateurs.
Their stand-alone RAW conversion software also performs the same conversion to your RAW images.
Noise is also hidden by compressing the shadows so you don't see much of the noise inherent in the image.
Adobe Camera Raw, ACR, on the other hand, comes with default settings designed to give you the most detail possible
(even if this sometimes means revealing some of the noise hidden by the camera manufacturers in their RAW conversion software), as well as the most natural images.
That being said, you can calibrate your camera to ACR and come up with your own settings to produce exactly what you want, including the JPEG-look of the camera manufacturer, and save that as your profile.
The key is to learn how to use ACR properly and to calibrate your camera to ACR.
The camera calibration refines the settings by letting you adjust for the exact sensor response of your individual camera unit rather than the average of a sampling of such unites provided by Adobe.
The ACR defaults are nothing more than a suggested starting point.
The color temperature won't necessarily match either.

Sharpness of NEF raw conversion for landscape photo is poor compared to ViewNX raw conversion

Raw conversion in ViewNX is far sharper than Aperture for some photos, enough so to differentiate as usable or unusable images. I tried adjusting sharpness and edges sliders in "RAW Fine Tuning" adjustments but even at maximum is terribly blurry compared to default ViewNX raw conversion. Overall color and dynamic range seem better in ViewNX for landscape shots but not critical like the blurriness... the difference is profound so I think I'm doing something wrong or the 3.2 update may have a serious bug. Anyone else have thisissue?
Aperture 3.2:
ViewNX:

I was talking with some others in another forum and someone suggested ViewNX may be automatically applying settings from camera default picture settings. So I just checked and in
menu->shooting menu->set picture control
(Nikon D90)
the standard "SD" setting is set to sharpen value 7 on a scale of 0-9. Sounds like ViewNX is reading that value and applying some very strong sharpening in software on the raw image. However, I'd expect to set the Aperture RAW fine tune sharping adjustment to 100% and get reasonable close to similar sharpness. At this point I think I understand the issue but I also feel that ViewNX is much better able to sharpen the RAW image while introducing less unwanted artifacts. It's a pretty significant point and I'd be quite happy to see improvement in sharpness from Aperture RAW conversion of NEF files.
I don't suppose there is any way I can configure Aperture to use the Nikon RAW converter? I'd love to have the option to choose or switch back and forth depending on the picture and results. There are times I prefer Apertures converter to Nikons.

Color difference b/t JPG images seen on DPP vs. Preview

I take photos w/ Canon 30D using RAW file and touch up/convert to JPG on DPP. There is a significant color difference on the same JPG image when seen on DPP vs. when seen on Preview. Does anybody have the same problem? It only looks different on Preview b/c when I upload it on a web gallery, the color looks fine, so it's not the converting process that's messing up the color but something about Preview that's causing the problem. Any solution to this?

I've got the same problem on my new macbook. And what's more disturbing is I still could not find one display color profile could give the right color...the color LCD one is ok for daily use, but the color is still duller than it should be, when editing photos.

Raw conversion color differences

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