A900 and LR3 Color Cast?

[deathvalleydave]

Hi David,

I read that the slight changing of color when opening RAW A900 files in LR3, is due to LR3 throwing out the jpegs and adjusting to the camera's original RAW files. (1) Is this correct? (2) Bibble 5.1.1 and IDC don't do this, so does this mean I have to perform an extra WB step in all of my LR3 RAW files to get closer to the same "true" color of the images that IDC or even Bibble provides right out the gate?

I'm not sure if I'm asking the right question correctly, but for some reason LR3, while great at everything else, doesn't inspire confidence in my processing photos for this very color cast type of reason...

Thanks,
Dave

[David Kilpatrick]

No such thing as 'true' colour but LR and ACR are not very good generally with Sony files. You need to make a lot of adjustments to match the in-camera JPEG if that is what you want to do.

I find it is nearly always necessary to set the white balance colour temperature much lower than shown- usually 4800 or so instead of 5200.

David

[agorabasta]

Btw, the wrong interpretation of WB greatly affects the colour reproduction. E.g., if ACR reads or achieves correct WB at a higher than actual colour temperature, the blues get rendered with higher lightness and less saturation, the reds then get higher saturation and lower lightness. If the error is towards the lower temps, as it is with a900/a700, the shifts in lightness/saturation happen in the opposite direction.

I find it's best to have the profiles calibrated for correct temp reading at about 6500K natural light (overcast skies daylight).

[deathvalleydave]

Thanks David,

I might be interested in trying one more RAW converter. I have IDC 2.3.2, Bibble 5.1.1, and LR3. If I'm mainly interested in having an "all in one" RAW converter that handles the following really well (Noise, Workflow, Spot Removal, Dynamic Range, File System Access on the Developer), i.e. is easy to use and a kind of all in one application, which other converter would you recommend to me, as an A900 landscape shooter? I was thinking maybe DXO?

Dave

[David Kilpatrick]

For landscape work, LR3 is the only real choice. First of all it preserves details extremely well with moderate levels of noise reduction, meaning you can achieve very smooth sky tones without loss of textures. It is possible to adjust the calibration extensively, and save as a Camera Raw Preferences setting for a specific ISO. Let's say you decide that all your landscape work will be shot at ISO 160, but for portraits you will use ISO 125. Provided you don't use Auto ISO and then get different raw pref claibrations at random, you can use these two settings to automatically select two entirely different finely tuned 'looks'.

They are sufficient controls in LR3 to make any colour and contrast look you wish. You can even set a calibration/pref which always used a fixed WB instead of the camera's AWB or presets, so the A900 behaves like film.

On top of this, LR3 offers the best spot removal plus superb dodging, burning and graduated filter controls. These controls make it as versatile as HDR digital plus darkroom hand printing and they have transformed my own work. I actually use ACR/Bridge more than Lightroom but the controls and the 'engine' are the same.

LR3 has many DAM/workflow benefits including GPS geotagging map display, keywording, copyright embedding, cataloguing and organisation. Much though I like both DxO and C1 Pro, it would be my choice. I actually use Expression Media 2 for the DAM/keywording process as it's better, for me, at handling my overall library (now almost 15,000 finished images on the external HD).

David

[David Kilpatrick]

Also for landscape work see this offer, today only:

http://www.photoclubalpha.com/forum/vie ... =25&t=4760

hiccup!!!

David

[deathvalleydave]

Thanks David for the detailed response... I must confess that I really enjoy Bibble's user interface mainly because it has the file system on the left of the screen, while at the same time you have the developer tools on the right, and thumbnails on the top also. The reason I like this is because if I don't want to import or do any batch work, Bibble has a quicker user interface, although LR3 is faster at 64 bit.

Plus, I have a graduated filter plugin that is similar to making the A900 behave like it has auto-HDR! Now, with all this said, I pretty much can see how awesome LR3 is - and it's just a matter of me wanting to learn how to use it - for instance, where's its graduated filter feature, how do you use it, etc... Time to get out my LR3 book by Nat Coalson! I still wish LR3 allowed you to just use it with a direct link to the file system, and not have to import before you can develop...

Also, when I've opened A900 files in IDC, at low ISO it for some reason seems to show the "sharpest" looking files? But IDC doesn't seem to have a friendly user interface and is limited in features...

[chriznatch]

I find it is nearly always necessary to set the white balance colour temperature much lower than shown- usually 4800 or so instead of 5200.

David[/quote]

When you say lower than shown, do you mean lower than the temperature shown under the "As Shot" category? Or would you make the equivalent adjustment to all the presets as well (Daylight, Flash, etc.)

[David Kilpatrick]

Lower than the temperature shown 'As Shot'. Presets are usually OK, it's only the way ACR/LR handles AWB which seems to be inaccurate.

David