Capture One: Image Quality of unsupported DNG in C1 vs Lightroom

[scyth]

so ACR is doing something special with them

Sigma raw files (from models that Adobe supports) do have separate workflow in the code with profiles hardcoded apparently...

[ErikKaffehr]

BigMacPro:TMP ekr$ cat h3fr.dcp
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<dcpData>
  <ProfileName>Embedded</ProfileName>
  <CalibrationIlluminant1>0</CalibrationIlluminant1>
  <CalibrationIlluminant2>0</CalibrationIlluminant2>
  <ColorMatrix1 Rows="3" Cols="3">
    <Element Row="2" Col="2">0.706700</Element>
    <Element Row="2" Col="1">0.196100</Element>
    <Element Row="2" Col="0">-0.113800</Element>
    <Element Row="1" Col="2">0.343700</Element>
    <Element Row="1" Col="1">1.186800</Element>
    <Element Row="1" Col="0">-0.487800</Element>
    <Element Row="0" Col="2">0.014100</Element>
    <Element Row="0" Col="1">-0.083500</Element>
    <Element Row="0" Col="0">0.493200</Element>
  </ColorMatrix1>
  <ColorMatrix2 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ForwardMatrix1 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ForwardMatrix2 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ReductionMatrix1 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ReductionMatrix2 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <EmbedPolicy>0</EmbedPolicy>
  <UniqueCameraModelRestriction>Hasselblad 50-15-Coated5</UniqueCameraModelRestriction>
  <ProfileLookTableEncoding>0</ProfileLookTableEncoding>
  <BaselineExposureOffset>0.000000</BaselineExposureOffset>
  <DefaultBlackRender>0</DefaultBlackRender>
</dcpData>
BigMacPro:TMP ekr$

Oh, now I remember, they don't have DCP files for the Hassys, so ACR is doing something special with them, maybe they actually have copied the proprietary Phocus profile format into Lightroom pipeline in some strange way... I don't have the latest Phocus nor Lightroom laying around now though so I can't test. Maybe they've announced somewhere how they do it? But if they do I suppose the Phocus and ACR portraits above should look the same, and they clearly don't.

Using the plain DNG in an older version of ACR or some third-party software will surely provide not-so-good colors though, as the DNG itself doesn't embed anything more than a single color matrix, and there is no DNG profile to load from the DNG converter profile directory.

[BobShaw]

This post goes something like this.
Option 1.
Take an egg. Hit it with a hammer. Analyse egg. Spend ages using third party and competition software to try to recreate the egg. Find that the egg has gone off. Complain that the chook lays bad eggs.
That is the LR, C1, DNG, DCP, OMG approach.

Option 2.
Enjoy egg.
That is the Phocus approach.

So how does DCP implement HNCS?
http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=96679.0

At the end of the day if Capture One has made a commercial decision not to support certain cameras then I can't see the point of thinking that you would somehow get great results trying to defeat it. You would just use software that at least says they do support it and for the really important stuff use the software designed for it.

[torger]

This profile, the one embedded in the DNG, is as basic as it gets, and if the raw converter uses that for rendering the colors the results will not be high end. Most/all third-party raw converters will do that (probably including C1), except possibly Lightroom/ACR.

As scyth mentions above some Sigma models have a separate pipeline with hard-coded profiles not showing up as DCPs, and my guess would then be that it's the same for Hasselblad. It would be quite simple to test, by doing a bunch of exports from Phocus with multiple color-picked white-balances, and do the same with the same color-picked white-balances in LR, and then do A/B swap comparisons. If they look the same, then the multi-illuminant HNCS has been integrated into Lightroom.

BigMacPro:TMP ekr$ cat h3fr.dcp
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<dcpData>
  <ProfileName>Embedded</ProfileName>
  <CalibrationIlluminant1>0</CalibrationIlluminant1>
  <CalibrationIlluminant2>0</CalibrationIlluminant2>
  <ColorMatrix1 Rows="3" Cols="3">
    <Element Row="2" Col="2">0.706700</Element>
    <Element Row="2" Col="1">0.196100</Element>
    <Element Row="2" Col="0">-0.113800</Element>
    <Element Row="1" Col="2">0.343700</Element>
    <Element Row="1" Col="1">1.186800</Element>
    <Element Row="1" Col="0">-0.487800</Element>
    <Element Row="0" Col="2">0.014100</Element>
    <Element Row="0" Col="1">-0.083500</Element>
    <Element Row="0" Col="0">0.493200</Element>
  </ColorMatrix1>
  <ColorMatrix2 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ForwardMatrix1 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ForwardMatrix2 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ReductionMatrix1 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <ReductionMatrix2 Rows="0" Cols="0"/>
  <EmbedPolicy>0</EmbedPolicy>
  <UniqueCameraModelRestriction>Hasselblad 50-15-Coated5</UniqueCameraModelRestriction>
  <ProfileLookTableEncoding>0</ProfileLookTableEncoding>
  <BaselineExposureOffset>0.000000</BaselineExposureOffset>
  <DefaultBlackRender>0</DefaultBlackRender>
</dcpData>
BigMacPro:TMP ekr$