Apologies if a similar question has already been posted here...
I have been converting 40D RAWs with Adobe Lightroom and occasionally with Bibble, and have been quite satisfied with the quality. However, when opening the same files with DPP 3.0.2, I noticed that the image quality, exposure and color tone is much better, and in effect reduces the amount of tweaking I would have otherwise need to do in LR and Bibble to get the image just right. Is RAW conversion better in DPP, or am I missing something?
I have noticed similar results using CS3, the 40D raws open up needing a very slight tweak of the blue hues ( they sometimes look very very slightly purple in bright skies).
In DPP the colours look spot on straight off, DPP seems to handle sharpening in a different way to CS3, but the results in a large file size look natural.
If you want to appreciably alter exposure , highlights , shadows etc, then CS3 does a very good job.
My approach at the moment is to view and batch convert in DPP, save and then open the images that need any further processing in CS3.
It would be intersting to hear other peoples ideas ?
I own Bibble, C1, DxO, CS2 and DPP. I've also used LR and LightZone. DPP almost always produces better jpgs. The only exception is blown-out highlights, which is where LightZone has an edge. I'm sure it's something like the early days of Windows programming where Microsoft didn't document thousands of calls to programmers.
I do exactly what brimo does - convert in DPP and tweak in CS2.
I'm not all that experienced yet, and I've only tried DPP and Camera Raw. I like what I see in DPP better than what I see in Camera Raw. I've been wondering myself about other possibilities...
I believe CS3 and the like, or many of Adobe's softwares, ship with presets not ideal for everyone.
With work and experimentation with presets you can get Adobe's ware to open the same file pretty close to DPP.
But again, we all have our own tastes. I had a file I wish I could make better and just for fun I opened it up in ZoomBrowser. It did the best job (on that file) out of all the programs I have
Thanks everyone for the very useful info. Consensus seems to be that DPP does a good job ok the conversion, but lacks the advanced features of other software like LR and CS3. Question: do TIFF files offer the same latitude for tweaking that RAW files provide, in terms of WB, dynamic range and exposure? If so, that at least solves my problem, insofar as I would convert with DPP and continue processing with LR or other software. Cheers, Spyros
Spyros D wrote:
Thanks everyone for the very useful info. Consensus seems to be that DPP does a good job ok the conversion, but lacks the advanced features of other software like LR and CS3. Question: do TIFF files offer the same latitude for tweaking that RAW files provide, in terms of WB, dynamic range and exposure? If so, that at least solves my problem, insofar as I would convert with DPP and continue processing with LR or other software. Cheers, Spyros
Would love to see answers/feedback regarding his Q. Is TIFF much better than jpeg, as far as the conversion file type to use for PP after converting from RAW?
Definitely batch convert to TIFF if you are planning to do further
editing/resizing in PhotoShop. The TIFF is lossless. JPEGs loose
some quality every time you do a file save.
I am confused (that is not hard for me with DPP and LR--
My question is does DPP perform non destructive edits to RAW files the same way LR does?
I edited a shoot with DPP and did a bulk save-(not a process to tiff or jpeg) but just saved the raws to the folder
I then looked at the same saved RAW files in LR and they were the pre edited ones before the DPP edits
Does DPP saves he edits stored the same way as LR does ?
same here, i have notice huge difference between all raw software and DPP. i compare to be exact, aperture, lightroom and CS3. and i have notice much better image quality with DPP. especially when i zoom in i see much more details in DPP and it looks kind soft or a bit blur in the other softwares. i tried many times to convince myself that aperture is as good but its not working.
No, DPP does not do non-destructive editing. I believe that the reason you saw pre-edited versions in LR is because you were seeing the previews that LR stores in the catalogue so it doesn't have to actually grab the image.
If I like the shots out of the camera, I just put my sharpening at 3-5, then save as jpeg. I also use the DPP software for cropping, and resizing.
However, if I like a whole series, or even just one image and I want to do more with it, I convert to tiff, and then work on it in CS2.
That said, since I'm too damn stupid to figure out the action (I got as far as it saying to find the paths for your logo in illustrator, and I don't have illustrator, so I guess I cannot find the paths) I use paint, then paste my logo in...I guess it's not the most efficient, but it works
If you use Photoshop CS3 there is little if any reason to use a third-party RAW converter. ACR is an outstanding converter and its tight integration with PS is very valuable.
Dan
Spyros D wrote:
Apologies if a similar question has already been posted here...
I have been converting 40D RAWs with Adobe Lightroom and occasionally with Bibble, and have been quite satisfied with the quality. However, when opening the same files with DPP 3.0.2, I noticed that the image quality, exposure and color tone is much better, and in effect reduces the amount of tweaking I would have otherwise need to do in LR and Bibble to get the image just right. Is RAW conversion better in DPP, or am I missing something?
danmitchell wrote:
If you use Photoshop CS3 there is little if any reason to use a third-party RAW converter. ACR is an outstanding converter and its tight integration with PS is very valuable.
Small point, but I think you got it backwards. DPP is the real, original RAW converter. All others, and I mean ACR specifically, are second choice or commonly called "third-party" converters.
I also think the whole point of the DPP comments is dialectically opposed to what you're saying. I use ACR exclusively, but I may go back and process some images in DPP to see if I can do better, and from what many have said for years, you can do better. BTW, I use specific camera profiles to make up for ACR's (CS3/4.5) inability to handle some colors well.
with DPP and LR--
