Best raw conversion software?
Posted 07/11/2009 - 10:44 - Helpful Comment
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No-one has mentioned the Gimp which surprises me. It's free and does RAW and it's good.
David
Posted 07/11/2009 - 14:44
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Thanks so far. No clear winner; lots of suggestions. Guess as was suggested I start downloading trial versions and see which one suits me best.
Just in passing, the reason I'm looking is because I am unhappy with Corel - I use Paint Shop Pro X2 - which doesn't support files from the K20D. When I asked Corel's tech support why, I was told because PSP X2 Ultimate does (effectively - tough!).
I don't like being strong-armed into buying new products, so Corel is losing a customer.
Just in passing, the reason I'm looking is because I am unhappy with Corel - I use Paint Shop Pro X2 - which doesn't support files from the K20D. When I asked Corel's tech support why, I was told because PSP X2 Ultimate does (effectively - tough!).
I don't like being strong-armed into buying new products, so Corel is losing a customer.
Posted 07/11/2009 - 15:04 - Helpful Comment
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JohnX wrote:
I don't like being strong-armed into buying new products, so Corel is losing a customer.
In that case I would be careful with Lightroom. Adobe is trying to strong-arm users into buying the latest versions by not updating camera raw for Photoshop at least. I don't know what the policy regarding Lightroom is, it might be different.I don't like being strong-armed into buying new products, so Corel is losing a customer.
There is, however, a way around that in using the stand alone Camera Raw converter to produce DNG raw files.
My preference is Silkypix but I haven't tried a lot of RAW converters.
Prieni
How inappropriate to call this planet earth when it is quite clearly Ocean. - Arthur C. Clarke
Prieni's PPG page
Prieni's PPG page
Posted 07/11/2009 - 15:14
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Prieni wrote:
There is, however, a way around that in using the stand alone Camera Raw converter to produce DNG raw files.
Would the simple message here be don't shoot PEF, shoot RAW? There is, however, a way around that in using the stand alone Camera Raw converter to produce DNG raw files.
Would you lose / gain anything by doing that?
Would PSP X2 support the K20 this way?
Would this also solve the Camera Raw / Photoshop 'problem?'
Posted 07/11/2009 - 15:37
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Prieni wrote:
In that case I would be careful with Lightroom. Adobe is trying to strong-arm users into buying the latest versions by not updating camera raw for Photoshop at least. I don't know what the policy regarding Lightroom is, it might be different.
Don't know about that one either but does the old version of silkypix, V3 I believe... does that one support the K7?In that case I would be careful with Lightroom. Adobe is trying to strong-arm users into buying the latest versions by not updating camera raw for Photoshop at least. I don't know what the policy regarding Lightroom is, it might be different.
I believe any manufacture would leave their old products behind to update the new ones, Adobe does that quite fast though but I don't think they are the only ones.
Stefan
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
Posted 07/11/2009 - 15:47
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Unlocker wrote:
Would you lose / gain anything by doing that?
Would PSP X2 support the K20 this way?
Would this also solve the Camera Raw / Photoshop 'problem?'
Please excuse my ignorance, but I thought both PEF and DNG were Raw formats, PEF being the Pentax proprietary version, DNG the 'universal' standard courtesy of Adobe? Prieni wrote:
There is, however, a way around that in using the stand alone Camera Raw converter to produce DNG raw files.
Would the simple message here be don't shoot PEF, shoot RAW? There is, however, a way around that in using the stand alone Camera Raw converter to produce DNG raw files.
Would you lose / gain anything by doing that?
Would PSP X2 support the K20 this way?
Would this also solve the Camera Raw / Photoshop 'problem?'
In any event, it seems that each camera has a slightly different variation on both PEF and DNG files, hence PSP X2 is supposed to work with files from the K10D but won't work with files from the K20D.
I've tried both PEF and DNG files from my K20D in PSP X2 - PEF files are simply rejected as 'unsupported'; DNG files are seen and open but are blank.
My issue is why the software publishers can't/won't support all formats/all cameras. For them it's clearly to force users to up-grade, but as I've already said, I'm having none of it. I only expect to upgrade software if I want additional functionality, not in pursuit of backwards compatability which should come as standard! End of rant
Posted 07/11/2009 - 15:50 - Helpful Comment
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JohnX wrote:
In any event, it seems that each camera has a slightly different variation on both PEF and DNG files, hence PSP X2 is supposed to work with files from the K10D but won't work with files from the K20D.
No that is the difference between DNG and other RAW's.In any event, it seems that each camera has a slightly different variation on both PEF and DNG files, hence PSP X2 is supposed to work with files from the K10D but won't work with files from the K20D.
DNG is a standard just like JPEG is so it needs to follow those standard meaning the basics of the file is always the same. Where as with PEF it can be different for every model.
Stefan
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
Posted 07/11/2009 - 15:56
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Anvh wrote:
No that is the difference between DNG and other RAW's.
DNG is a standard just like JPEG is so it needs to follow those standard meaning the basics of the file is always the same. Where as with PEF it can be different for every model.
Thanks Stefan, in which case I'm even more at a loss with PSP X2, which is supposed to support DNG but in my experience doesn't.
No that is the difference between DNG and other RAW's.
DNG is a standard just like JPEG is so it needs to follow those standard meaning the basics of the file is always the same. Where as with PEF it can be different for every model.
Posted 07/11/2009 - 16:08
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Anvh wrote:
Don't know about that one either but does the old version of silkypix, V3 I believe... does that one support the K7?
Yes, it does (just downloaded the V3 on my Mac laptop). This is the most recent version available for Mac. So the updated support might change when V4 and Develper Studio Pro is available for Mac...
Don't know about that one either but does the old version of silkypix, V3 I believe... does that one support the K7?
How inappropriate to call this planet earth when it is quite clearly Ocean. - Arthur C. Clarke
Prieni's PPG page
Prieni's PPG page
Posted 07/11/2009 - 16:11 - Helpful Comment
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John, it might be worth downloading the free standalone Camera Raw converter from Adobe and put your K20 PEF files through that to convert to DNG. Maybe PSP X2 is able to read those?
I made a habit of using Camera Raw to convert to DNG before touching them with Silkypix. The DNG's produced by Camera Raw are much smaller than the ones produced in camera. It would only put an additional step in your workflow but you wouldn't need to change it otherwise.
Prieni
I made a habit of using Camera Raw to convert to DNG before touching them with Silkypix. The DNG's produced by Camera Raw are much smaller than the ones produced in camera. It would only put an additional step in your workflow but you wouldn't need to change it otherwise.
Prieni
How inappropriate to call this planet earth when it is quite clearly Ocean. - Arthur C. Clarke
Prieni's PPG page
Prieni's PPG page
Posted 07/11/2009 - 16:46 - Helpful Comment
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Anvh wrote:
DNG is a standard just like JPEG is so it needs to follow those standard meaning the basics of the file is always the same. Where as with PEF it can be different for every model.
Do not be kidded into thinking DNG is a standard for all cameras and will therefore produce the correct results for any DNG capable camera. JohnX wrote:
In any event, it seems that each camera has a slightly different variation on both PEF and DNG files, hence PSP X2 is supposed to work with files from the K10D but won't work with files from the K20D.
No that is the difference between DNG and other RAW's.In any event, it seems that each camera has a slightly different variation on both PEF and DNG files, hence PSP X2 is supposed to work with files from the K10D but won't work with files from the K20D.
DNG is a standard just like JPEG is so it needs to follow those standard meaning the basics of the file is always the same. Where as with PEF it can be different for every model.
It may be a standard format which can be read by any DNG capable converter, BUT, and this is an important "but", it also needs to be correctly profiled for each particular camera to obtain the correct colour/WB etc., so you would need your Raw converter to not only read DNG, but each particular cameras DNG, i.e. K-7 DNG, Ricoh GR3 DNG, Leica M9 DNG etc., etc.
You can see this quite clearly with Capture One v4 (C1v4). If you shoot a PEF and a DNG of the same shot and examine the result, the colour balance is quite different as C1v4 automatically applies a "DNG Neutral" profile to the DNG shot and a "Pentax (model)" profile to the PEF shot. Rather strangely, if you manually apply the correct Pentax profile to the DNG shot, it still isn't the same. I think this is a peculiar Capture One issue. I haven't yet upgraded to C1v5, but will do so shortly.
However, Silkypix (v3, v4 and Pro) reads both PEF and DNG exactly the same, as it applies the correct colour/WB profile according to the camera model, and the results are identical.
I prefer to shoot in PEF (as my K20D doesn't shoot compressed DNG) and use Silkypix Pro as my preferred converter.
Posted 07/11/2009 - 17:05
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John I can only echo Prieni, sorry for not adding something useful.
Stefan
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
Posted 07/11/2009 - 17:12
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Richard that's the way a file is read by different software and has not much to do with the format itself.
Since like you said you can use the Pentax colour profile if you wish.
Since it's a DNG file it's quite logical for capture one to use the DNG colour profile but you can also manually chose the Pentax one.
Lightroom 2 for example use the Adobe cr4.5 colour profile or something like that as standard for every raw file, I however have it now set to use pentax profile since I find the colours better then.
But colour profile is no part of a RAW file since the RAW file does not implement one.
Since like you said you can use the Pentax colour profile if you wish.
Since it's a DNG file it's quite logical for capture one to use the DNG colour profile but you can also manually chose the Pentax one.
Lightroom 2 for example use the Adobe cr4.5 colour profile or something like that as standard for every raw file, I however have it now set to use pentax profile since I find the colours better then.
But colour profile is no part of a RAW file since the RAW file does not implement one.
Stefan
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
K10D, K5
DA* 16-50, DA* 50-135, D-FA 100 Macro, DA 40 Ltd, DA 18-55
AF-540FGZ
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