Raw processing - give me some tips!

[Riku]

I'm new to raw processing and I know there are great tutorials, links posted to this forum too. I will read them, but I made this topic so I can ask some questions and learn as I go.

Is there good websites where to calibrate the monitor?

This picture for example, red looks terrible, right? Can something be done?

[Borges]

For exact monitor calibration you need hardware like the spyder line from colorvision. Software calibration, for example with adobe gamma (part of many adobe products), is only a compromise and not very exact.

The best way of raw processing depends on your software and your camera. I think this image isn't straight from raw without any saturation - the red looks really to terrible.
If your camera generally tends to saturate red too much, perhaps you should use a raw development software like lightroom. With LR you can fine tune the saturation for each color. And there are many presets for the characteristics of different cameras.

Perhaps you can post a link to the raw file?

Michael
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[Riku]

Thanks for your reply!

My camera is K100D. I think colors were like that because "Image Tone" was set to "Bright". I didn't know that affects raw-files too. I have the software that came with the camera and just installed UFRaw. All suggestions and tips are welcome, I'm a total newbie

[Jigt]

I use pentax fotolaboratory to produce a 16 bit Tif and then use photoshop.

The sensor of a dslr is sensitiv for infrared, since IR has a different focus point its not only a coulour problem you get some sort of haze. Its a week point in my Ist Ds but I have seen it in other camera's too.

DSLR that are good with red flowers tend to have problems with other colours, due to more filtering in front of the sensor.
I made a few shots with a D70 and it had problmems with green and blue.

Guido
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[Riku]

[Orio]

You can't do anything about the reds until you change camera to a camera that uses separate RGB sensor cells (such as in Foveon sensor).
The way the sensors are designed in the most popular reflex cameras of today (Canon Nikon Pentax etc), reds will always suck, because they are captured at a reduced resolution.
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[Riku]

Maybe reds will suck, but not that bad as in the first pic I posted. If I just knew how to fix it...

[Orio]