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Which RAW processor?
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PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 7:41 pm    Post subject: Which RAW processor? Reply with quote

I am faced with the likelihood that my RAW processor of choice (Corel's Aftershot Pro, which used to be Bibble) will be largely abandoned by its new owner, something they are specialists in doing. I have been trying out some options.

1. Capture One : excellent in every way, but slow and expensive
2. Lightroom 4 : very good, but Adobe is such a "let me take over your computer" software developer.I am a bit disappointed with the colour engine too.
3. PhotoNinja : excellent, but still relatively new and undeveloped feature set missing a lot
4. DxO : very good, but missing some critical features like redeye and dust
5. GIMP : slow and awkward, but still an improvement over PS!

Can anyone give me advice on where to move to. I want to use a single processor if possible.


patrickh


PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 7:52 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

RawTherapee possibly?


PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 7:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Check the current issue of c't Digital Photography, #10.
It has an 7-page presentation of Open Source RAW Processing.


PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 8:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've been using CS5 since not long after its release. I really like it. LR4 hasn't grown on me yet.


PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 8:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Rawtherapee and photivo ... both far stronger in some cases than anything commercial. and btw, gimp is not raw processor. it can be connected with ufraw or other, but itself, it cant develop raws...


PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 9:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've not tried other converters for years now. I've been quite happy with C1.


PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 9:21 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Forgot to mention I am Mac user Embarassed Embarassed


patrickh


PostPosted: Mon Nov 12, 2012 11:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Patrick, I am not a computer expert so I can not advice on the things like single processor etc.
Photographically speaking, in my opinion Lightroom is a step ahead of other RAW software as of today.
The correction of chromatic aberrations is the most advanced by far, it can really rescue photos that other software
can only dream to. You have local correction brushes that, although not as flexible and sophisticated as Photoshop's,
can handle 90% of the basic local editing needs. A moire tool has appeared in version 4 inside the correction brushes panel,
and this fills a gap, although the tool is not perfect yet. Some of the modules, like the shadow/highlight recovery, or
the aforementioned CA correction, are near perfect, other tools, such as sharpening or noise reduction, could use improvement,
but the architecture of Lightroom allows for plugins, and you can use software like Noise Ninja or other plugins together
with Lightroom, so if you want more control in sharpening, for instance, you can use a plugin instead of Lightroom's own tool.
Management of large collections, database searches, printing, web galleries and slideshows are all very easy.
For the selling price, Lightroom is a no brainer in my opinion.


PostPosted: Tue Nov 13, 2012 8:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thank you all for the information and advice. I went back and tried LR4 again and was pleasantly surprised by the relatively shallow learning curve, once I had spent a few minutes watching the tutorial vids. Way better than LR2 (the last version I tried). I think I shall move over to LR. It is sad to watch the demise of a small shop with a great idea and limited resources like Bibble, throwing in the towel. Rough out there.


patrickh


PostPosted: Tue Nov 13, 2012 10:52 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I can't help you out Patrick as I'm on Windows, but I have to thank you for starting this thread and all the contributors for your useful information. The software bundled with the NEX-7 is pretty awful and I've been looking for something similar to Canon's DPP since I got it. RawTherapee seems pretty much to fit the bill. Thankyou all.


PostPosted: Wed Nov 14, 2012 8:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I add another vote for RawTherapee. I used to be a Bibble user but have switched completely to RT. Its strength is that it offers probably the best ultimate image quality of all major raw converters. The downside is that you need to work a little harder at the sliders in order to get there because out of the box it defaults to a more "natural" look. It takes a while to learn to use all of its controls effectively. Also it doesn't have any local editing, layers, DAM functionality, 3rd party plugins and other advanced features like that. It focuses on being just a raw converter and it's very good at that.

Oh, and it's free. And it works on all major platforms (Window, Linux, Mac). Just make sure you get the absolute latest version.


PostPosted: Wed Nov 14, 2012 6:13 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

After trying RawTherapee, Gimp, CaptureOne, original Sony Software, Lightroom 3 and Lightroom 4 my votes goes clearly to

Lightroom 4!

If you have enough RAM (4GB recommended) Lightroom works smooth and is faster than Gimp etc., is very easy to use and has best and most effective functions.
Second place is CaptureOne, third Lightroom 3 and I would choose RawTherapree (which is also not usable but clearly not as good as LR4) if you have Linux or don't want to pay money.

Single core processor should be no problem with all these softwares - enough RAM is much more important! Only exception is under iOS - for running some of these softwares you might need an 64bit Intel CPU in your Mac!

Here's a nice quickstart video from Lightroom 4 which introduces most important functions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGREWqMSUJ0


PostPosted: Wed Nov 14, 2012 9:50 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

@miran

Thank you for letting me know they have a Mac version of Raw Therapee, I have been intrigued by it for some time. Unfortunately the lates version os for OS10.6, and I am on OS10.8, so it does not work Sad Sad


patrickh


Looks like LR$ is it


PostPosted: Thu Nov 15, 2012 5:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

However, I did find open source Darktable. It is amazingly good, especially for free.


patrickh


PostPosted: Mon Dec 10, 2012 6:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

patrickh wrote:
Unfortunately the lates version os for OS10.6, and I am on OS10.8, so it does not work Sad Sad


RawTherapee is quite simple to build from scratch on Mac if you're not shy of the Terminal; just follow the instructions included with the source file. It's what I did, and it works like a charm, even slightly faster than the "downloadable" version.

Btw, even if you seems to have made your mind the following links - it's a 5 parts post with 100% crops Cool - may be useful to someone else in your situation. I compared against each other almost all the raw converters available then. They were: Apple Preview, Canon Digital Photo Professional, CaptureOne 6, Corel AfterShot, DCRaw, DXO Optics, Gimp, Lightroom 3, PerfectRaw, Photoshop 5, RawTherapee, Rawker, RawDeveloper, RawPhotoProcessor, UFRaw.

http://www.addicted2light.com/2012/05/28/review-raw-converters-mega-test-part-i
http://www.addicted2light.com/2012/05/29/review-raw-converters-mega-test-part-ii
http://www.addicted2light.com/2012/05/30/review-raw-converters-mega-test-part-iii/
http://www.addicted2light.com/2012/05/31/review-raw-converters-mega-test-part-iv/
http://www.addicted2light.com/2012/05/31/review-raw-converters-mega-test-part-v/

And then I found another interesting one, free for Apple users with the Developers pack:

http://www.addicted2light.com/2012/06/30/review-core-image-fun-house-aperture-little-free-brother/

Hope this helps


PostPosted: Mon Dec 10, 2012 6:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

patrickh wrote:
However, I did find open source Darktable. It is amazingly good, especially for free.
patrickh

I tried it and well, I think I need to try again: the user interface is not the most easy to use... Aperture is no more supported on my OSX version (10.6) and I'm anticipating on being forced to change. And I'm not ready to go to LR yet...


PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 7:17 pm    Post subject: Darktable improved Reply with quote

The very latest version of darktable has a much improved gui. Makes learning curve quicker and resukts I am finding more than rival Lightroom.


patrickh


PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 7:30 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Is RawTherapee supposed to leave .pp3 files all over the place? It also seems extremely slow to load pictures. I think my copy has become too buggy. I'm back to PS C6, at least for the time being.


PostPosted: Sun Dec 23, 2012 12:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Several reports I have seen suggest darktable is actually better than rawtherapee Embarassed


patrickh


PostPosted: Sun Dec 23, 2012 11:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

patrickh wrote:
Several reports I have seen suggest darktable is actually better than rawtherapee Embarassed

There is no comparison, Darktable is the best open source RAW processing software there is right now.

Wait for some of the new toys coming, like sensor profiled noise reduction and multiple instances of modules. Your bodies aren't profiled yet, but more are being added every day. I've been playing with GIT builds, I just couldn't wait for the fun stuff to go to a stable release, I even profiled my own bodies for the noise reduction.


PostPosted: Sun Dec 23, 2012 8:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I shall probably abandon LR soon.


patrickh


PostPosted: Sun Dec 30, 2012 5:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

patrickh wrote:
Several reports I have seen suggest darktable is actually better than rawtherapee Embarassed


patrickh


Darktable is maybe indeed more powerful, but I've stuck with RawTherapee 3.x.x for a while because it's
amazingly stable one my machine.
And from my point of view the work-flow within darktable is not as intuitive as in RawTherapee.
RawTherapee provides interface that IMHO is one of the best designed ever, it's simple and clear.
I just love RawTherapee's workflow and I can not force myself to switch to darktable no matter how much I would want to do it;
the second reason (following the interface and workflow) is the fact that on some occasions I have to work on windows machine.
From the other hand the more powerful 4.x.x version of RawTherapee is not stable yet and it just denies to start on my old laptop
because of min. 2GB RAM requirements while 3.x.x version just works . Smile


PostPosted: Sun Dec 30, 2012 6:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

wariag wrote:
the second reason (following the interface and workflow) is the fact that on some occasions I have to work on windows
machine. From the other hand the more powerful 4.x.x version of RawTherapee is not stable yet and it just denies to start on my old
laptop because of min. 2GB RAM requirements while 3.x.x version just works . Smile


Maybe that's the reason for my problems with RawTherapee. I was using ver 4.0.9.50 on 32 bit XP. Where can I d/l ver 3.x.x please?


PostPosted: Sun Dec 30, 2012 7:18 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

peterqd wrote:
wariag wrote:
the second reason (following the interface and workflow) is the fact that on some occasions I have to work on windows
machine. From the other hand the more powerful 4.x.x version of RawTherapee is not stable yet and it just denies to start on my old
laptop because of min. 2GB RAM requirements while 3.x.x version just works . Smile


Maybe that's the reason for my problems with RawTherapee. I was using ver 4.0.9.50 on 32 bit XP. Where can I d/l ver 3.x.x please?


http://rawtherapee.com/downloads

From the dropdown lists choose your platform, bit depth and type.