Luminous Landscape Forum

Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Adobe Lightroom Q&A => Topic started by: rickshanahan on May 12, 2008, 11:35:39 pm

Title: Why do my RAW files default to +50 brightness?
Post by: rickshanahan on May 12, 2008, 11:35:39 pm

If the images are properly exposed, why do they require +50 brightness...?  Shouldn't it default to 0 brightness?

Thanks

Title: Why do my RAW files default to +50 brightness?
Post by: Schewe on May 12, 2008, 11:52:33 pm

Quote

Shouldn't it default to 0 brightness?
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=195365\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

No, the Brightness scale is set to be "normalized" at 50...so you can lower the brightness.

Title: Why do my RAW files default to +50 brightness?
Post by: Brad Proctor on May 13, 2008, 03:57:18 am

Quote

No, the Brightness scale is set to be "normalized" at 50...so you can lower the brightness.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=195374\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

The brightness scale goes from -150 to +150.

Title: Why do my RAW files default to +50 brightness?
Post by: NikoJorj on May 13, 2008, 11:40:00 am

Quote

No, the Brightness scale is set to be "normalized" at 50...so you can lower the brightness.
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a] (http://index.php?act=findpost&pid=195374\")

Well, for sure it would have been more intuitive for a newcomer to name this default position "0"... But now, I think it is much too late, and we are so used to think "50=0" that it would confuse most of us to rename it.  

If the OP finds that disturbing, he can always throw in a [a href=\"http://www.adobeforums.com/webx/.3bc34322/]feature request[/url].

Title: Why do my RAW files default to +50 brightness?
Post by: madmanchan on May 13, 2008, 02:55:49 pm

Quote

If the images are properly exposed, why do they require +50 brightness...?  Shouldn't it default to 0 brightness?

Thanks
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=195365\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Rick, the problem is that our visual system (eyes and brain) do not respond linearly to light energy, unlike digital camera sensors. Even with a well exposed image, a tone curve adjustment is required to produce an image that appears more natural to the human eye.


You can turn off the brightness portion of Camera Raw's tone curve entirely by setting Brightness to zero. However you'll probably find that the image doesn't look so good when you do that.

Title: Why do my RAW files default to +50 brightness?
Post by: Schewe on May 13, 2008, 03:24:22 pm

Quote

You can turn off the brightness portion of Camera Raw's tone curve entirely by setting Brightness to zero. However you'll probably find that the image doesn't look so good when you do that.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=195533\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Which is why it was decided to "normalize" the Brightness to 50...(I think I said that already :~)

All of the numbers in Camera Raw are "defaults", you can change them to ANYTHING you want and save those settings as new defaults (and also reset back to the normal defaults if you screw them up). So, it would be useful to get the hang out of using the settings and if you ALWAYS want a setting to be different by default, change it.