How much do I need to do with the RAW transformation?

[tonygamble]

I am working with scripts in batch mode and intend to start with my ex camera RAW file.

Having always had my RAWs converted into workable format by other software (Luminar most recently) i have never seen a RAW image.

How much work do you folk do? Is it simply a matter of taking any surplus off the shadow and bright sides of the image? Do you attempt any white balance correction at this stage?

Anything else?

Sorry but I can't find much info in the documentation files.

Tony

[jsachs]

If you have a good raw converter that you like, I recommend continuing to use it. Especially the newer products do a very good job of noise reduction and removing distortion and vignetting.

If you use the Raw Develop transformation in PWP, you will generally need to adjust the brightness curve and color balance manually.

[tonygamble]

Thanks Jonathan,

I will probably use Luminar to produce TIFFs straight from my RAWs and then do the rest in PWP.

Still struggling to get Scrips alongside my Exports in Batch mode - as posted in that other thread. Can you take a look please.

EDIT. Not sure what I did but they now appear. Bravo..

6.jpg (34.26 KiB) Viewed 3573 times

Tony

[jsachs]

Sorry, I don't see another thread. For more detailed instructions on batch processing, see the document Batch Processing.pdf:

https://www.dl-c.com//Documents/Batch%20Processing.pdf

[tonygamble]

It was the one about five below this.

"Loading a folder of RAWs..."

But sorted now.

Thanks

T

[tonygamble]

Just to conclude this thread (as far as I am concerned anyway) i have given up using the PWP Raw Converter and now use DXO to produce TIFFs.

There is a 'Standard' setting and one that claims to do even less work on the file. I found next to no difference - but opted for Standard.

Tony

[tonygamble]

OP here - opening up the thread one more time.

I'm now using RAWTherapee. It offers a choice that includes Unclipped and Neutral. It offers Profoto or RTv4_sRGB.

I have tried every combination and cannot see one being particularly better so I am adopting Unclipped and Proto.

I than let PWP convert them when collecting the TIFFs.

[HanSch]

Your previous post mentioned, that you use(d) DxO to produce TIF. That's ok, but DxO also offers the option to export "corrected raw" DNG files. That's what I prefer. I started to use DxO after many years of RAW conversion in PWP7.
The optical corrections, noise reduction and sharpening (I mean: lens sharpening, or correction of softness of the lens-camera combination) of DxO PhotoLab or PureRaw are excellent. I export the corrected DNG and do the RAW conversion in PWP7. Didn't use PWP8 yet for RAW conversion. In my experience, the use of the HSV color space in PWP better preserves bright colors than RGB, as used when you export TIF from DxO, Lightroom, Adobe CameraRaw or whatever. In RGB, bright colors tend to go to white, while in HSV the hue is preserved. A matter of taste.
Of course no more NR or sharpening in PWP during RAW conversion.
The resulting file can be further edited in PWP.

[tonygamble]

Han.

I seem to get more space at the side of my curves using RT than DXO - so assume they are less likely to clip.

Are you still using PWP7 to get from RAW to TIFF.

I am not sure how you 'use HSV space' in PWP. My curves default to HSV but I thought PWP was working with RGB files internally.

So much to learn.

Tony

[HanSch]

Tony,

Several transformations in PWP8 and PWP7 can be done in RGB, HSV or HSL color space. E.g. Brightness Curve.
In the RAW conversion of PWP7 you can select HSV or HSL color space. In general, I prefer HSV for the RAW conversion. The RAW dialog box in PWP7 has options that PWP8 doesn't offer. Optical corrections are not available in PWP7 and the noise reduction of DxO is far superior to the NR in PWP7 (progress in time), that's why I use DxO first. Apart from the basic options, there are many other corrections possible, that sometimes are more easy to do in DxO, but often can be done equally convenient in PWP.
For other transformations, like Brightness Curve or Saturation, I select the option that gives the best result. For small corrections there is often little difference, but if the corrections are large the differences between the 3 color spaces are very visible.

The help of the community and the possibility to request changes/additions in PWP make PWP a unique product, in my opinion. Long ago I started with the first versions of Photoshop, mainly for my job. Not for editing images, but to create test images for wide format printers. As a photo editor, PWP was far more easy to use and offered transformations in 48b TIF that weren't available in PS. So I changed to PWP shortly after my first steps in photo editing. No program offers more value for money than PWP.