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Author Topic: Raw Therapee  (Read 19856 times)

glacort

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Raw Therapee
« on: May 08, 2007, 12:48:57 pm »

Hi all,

try this: www.rawtherapee.com

for me the best raw converter available today, Lightroom is the only one that comes close, (I bought CS3 with ACR, RSP, Lightroom and DPP that came with my Canons 5D and 20D and I tried almost all the others, RT is the only one doing justice to my cameras)

Details, colors and lack of artifacts are outstanding; just a bit slow in saving the converted file and it does not have batch processing: you'll need to adjust and convert pics one by one. Also the highlight recovery tool is a bit tricky (read below) but the best I found so far.

Some suggestion for a good start:

- take out the auto exposure and adjust it with the brightness slider,
- in most cases the "compress highlight" slider is best at max: 130
- check the "shadow/highlight" box (use it as default)
- after the above, if needed, use the brighteness curve and/or the other sliders under the "exposure" tab
- put the "color boost to 20 (I go up to 40, but this is personal taste)
- use the sharpening as a pre-sharpener radius 0,3-0,4 amount 150-200, threshold 512/768
(do final sharpening in PS or alike, to avoid any post process try radius 2 amount 150/200 threshold 512/768)
- be careful with the "color propagation" option of the "recovery highlight" tool: if the clipped area is too large and too clipped it can make weird colors, in such cases use the "luminance recovery" option
- if you REALLY need to reduce noise use the "edge sensitive" option.
- read the manual ... a must

As said above RT is not for mass production, but it is the perfect tool for those who want the max out of their raws and are not afraid to make the right corrections for each one, in order to obtain the best Tiff or Jpeg for final tweek in PS or alike. Yes Jpeg: I found that Jpegs out of RT are very usable, unless you want to make very extreme curve adjustments.

Last: if you like and use it, don't forget to make a contribution to Gabor the author: in this way we can be assured of continued development.

(By the way: I am not connected with Gabor, only used RT since version 1, and gave some suggestions for improvements, many were implemented)

Let me know your opinions, and, since I have several thousands raws of experience with RT and ACR/LR, ask if you need more tips.

Gabriele
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Schewe

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« Reply #1 on: May 08, 2007, 01:31:35 pm »

Wow. . .first post is to tout something OTHER than Lightroom in the Lightroom forum. Sure seems suspicious even if you say you have nothing to do with the product...

You might have actually contributed a little bit to the community before doing your tout...you know, get to know the tone & tenor a little bit?

You might also have pointed out that it's Win/Linux only...(well, ok, the Linux version ain't out yet).

Also noted that the head to head comparisions are between TR and Camera Raw 3.4. with no mention of actual settings used, so that's pretty usless.

You going around to all the forums doing this?
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glacort

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« Reply #2 on: May 08, 2007, 02:17:51 pm »

Dear Shewe,

I thought this forum is also to share experience, I am a Lightroom user myself and felt that my post could be of interest, if it is not right here I apologise, ask the moderator to delete it.

By the way:

I am suggesting to try RT in many forums, and got good interest, many took the opportunity to suggest improvements for the program, yours is the first rebuke I got ... so far.
I am Italian, Gabor is Hungarian.

Ciao

Gabriele
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digitaldog

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« Reply #3 on: May 08, 2007, 02:27:29 pm »

It appears to only work under Windows, making it useless for my needs....
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glacort

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« Reply #4 on: May 08, 2007, 02:42:07 pm »

Eventually the rebuke from Shewe made me discover on the web his very fine article "The Art Of The Up–Res" and the "Digital Photo Pro" web site that I have bookmarked.
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Schewe

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« Reply #5 on: May 08, 2007, 05:54:07 pm »

Quote
Dear Shewe,

I thought this forum is also to share experience[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=116412\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Actually, it's Schewe (notice the 'C')...

The forum is more of a community as opposed to a forum for random posts about other products...many of the people here know one another if not personally (in person) at least online...so when a new person joins in the discussions (completely welcome) it's useful to try to fit in...which basically means, your first post should be more of an introduction (who you are and why should we care) as opposed to a blatant attempt at evangelizing...which is what your first post sounded like...even if you have no affiliation with the developer.
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61Dynamic

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« Reply #6 on: May 08, 2007, 07:32:48 pm »

The LL forums aren't like other forums. Much like the TV show Cheers the LL is a place you can go where everyone knows your name.
« Last Edit: May 08, 2007, 07:33:19 pm by 61Dynamic »
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bjanes

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« Reply #7 on: May 08, 2007, 09:14:45 pm »

Quote
It appears to only work under Windows, making it useless for my needs....
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Andrew,

This might not be the proper forum for discussing raw converters, but since we have your attention, what do you think of Raw Developer? I see you published an article on it last summer. Since I use the PC I can't try it out, but the sharpening options are intriguing. It has an option to use Richardson-Lucy Deconvolution algorithm for deblurring and sharping.

[a href=\"http://www.clarkvision.com/imagedetail/image-restoration1/index.html]Roger Clark[/url] reported on his web site that he can enlarge twice as large using 20 iterations of this algorithm on a Canon 1D MII image as compared to traditional unsharp masking methods. It took 20 hours, but it might be worthwhile for a special picture.

I understand that Photoshop's smart sharpen also uses a deconvolution algorithm, but I have not been able to find many details on how it works. Any plans to use these algorithms in PhotoKit sharpener?

Bill
« Last Edit: May 08, 2007, 09:16:02 pm by bjanes »
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digitaldog

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« Reply #8 on: May 08, 2007, 09:16:58 pm »

Quote
Andrew,

This might not be the proper forum for discussing raw converters, but since we have your attention, what do you think of Raw Developer? [a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=116484\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I very much like the quality of the raw conversions from that product. Very clean.
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bjanes

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« Reply #9 on: May 08, 2007, 09:21:39 pm »

Quote
I very much like the quality of the raw conversions from that product. Very clean.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=116486\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

How about the Richardson-Lucy sharpening?

Bill
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glacort

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« Reply #10 on: May 09, 2007, 08:06:48 am »

Schewe,

sorry to have missed introduction and apologies for the missing C.

About myself:

I an a mechanical engineer, live in Rome, Italy, photography is for me is a passion more than a hobby.

Started when I was ten, giving a lot of trouble to the only artigianal photo lab of my little town (many times, visiting him, I did not pay full attention to the black curtains introducing to the darkroom).

My first reflex was an all manual russian Zenith (could not afford anything more).
I developed and printed myself BW, color negs and slides (Cibachrome) for 40 years. After a lot of initial resistance eventually I moved to digital. At same time started to scan a selection of my traditional photos: a long work, but a nice way to revive the past in no hurry.
My equipment: Canon 5D, 20D and 300D with a few lenses, a Panasonic Z50, a few Sony compacts for quick notes, a Nikonscan 5000ED and an Epson V700.

Computers: Dell 9150, 2 G Ram, and, sadly I admit, Windows. I love the Macs of my sons and friends that I use often, but I need full compatibility with the office and ... I have mixed feelings with Aperture.

I have not completely abandoned film: I use sometimes my Fujica W645 scanning the negs that I still develop myself. Sadly I don't use much my old Canons and their many FD lenses. When job time will allow I will retry them in BW. My darkroom equipment is taking dust in the attic.

My favourite subjects: Family (including the very day I met my wife), Landscape (for this I love Luminous Landscape), stitched panoramas; would like to do some reportage, but that has to wait my retirement.

My son has started a web site with some of my scans of his choice: www.glcphoto.com. Critics to him not to me.

Raw processing:
started with DPP, used a long time RSP, then ACR, then Lightroom, then tried Silkypix, C1 and .. . eventually after several thousands conversions I found RawTherapee so good that I was surpised and taken by enthusiasm. I have redone with RT most of my previous conversions: maybe just because I learned a lot meanwhile, but for sure I get consistently more pleasant results. Post process: Picture Windows Pro, Norman Koren has been my guru.

My intention with RT is to get opinions from those more qualified than me, along with suggestion to Gabor for improvements. Frankly to qualify a proposal to try and a few tips for first approach as  "blatant evangelizing" is a shade too much: why use such less then gentle terms: shouldn't courtesy be part of the forum etiquette ?)

No grudge anyhow, compliments for your Web site (the selfportrait is a bit intimidating a rebuke from you has to be taken very seriously !) and, mostly, your beautiful works of art.

Gabriele
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bjanes

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« Reply #11 on: May 09, 2007, 09:16:21 am »

Quote
How about the Richardson-Lucy sharpening?

Bill
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=116487\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Anyone?
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roine

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Raw Therapee
« Reply #12 on: May 09, 2007, 01:28:09 pm »

Hello

An interesting question is to have a workflow in LR in two parts due to the problem with external program creating different file format.
Flow:
1.   Raw to tiff or jpg in whatever You use for convert in a own database for all Your raw
2.   Catalog the just created original tiff/jpg in a work-filedatabase as a original and work with this as a original

This seems to spare You from many problems in LR and give You the choice to convert with whatever tool You prefer, You have two databases, one for Your RAW files and one for Your edited files.

Roine
« Last Edit: May 09, 2007, 01:28:57 pm by roine »
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boffellid

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« Reply #13 on: May 09, 2007, 02:36:51 pm »

Anyone?

My first post here as well, and not really Lightroom related.
I cannot comment on Lucy-Richardson in RawDeveloper, since I am a Windows user. However, Lucy-Richardson is not technically a sharpening method (does not create halos) but rather a deconvolution algorithm: it tries to estimate how much the image was blurred during capture and to mathematically reverse the process, a process first developed for astrophotography (http://astrim.online.fr/image_restoration.htm).

Deconvolution methods can dramatically improve an image (and also create ugly artifacts when overused).  They used to be very slow because very computing intensive, but are becoming more popular now.  The free program Image Analyzer (http://meesoft.logicnet.dk/Analyzer/) has deconvolution methods available: quite effective, but settings are not intuitive and it takes a lot of playing around to get satisfactory results. And it is not a Photoshop plugin.

The most effective deconvolution program I found is FocusFixer (http://www.fixerlabs.com/New_Website/pages/focusfixer.htm), a commercial Photoshop plugin with which I have no association other then being a satisfied user. It is fast and very easy to use. It can improve images from any digital camera (digital capture is a blurry process). I found it particularly useful to increase perceived sharpness in in captures from digicams where in camera sharpening cannot be turned off (which I find normally difficult to sharpen in post-processing).

Hope this helps,
Dario
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Schewe

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« Reply #14 on: May 09, 2007, 11:58:30 pm »

Quote
Schewe,

sorry to have missed introduction and apologies for the missing C.

About myself:

I an a mechanical engineer, live in Rome, Italy, photography is for me is a passion more than a hobby.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=116542\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Well, now that we know who the heck you are...welcome to LL...

At least you shoot with the "good" cameras (all the best shooter do)...
{I'm kidding}

As for RT...don't know...I suppose I could download it on my PC (primarily Mac) and give it a try...but raw convertors are starting to get as thick as flies. For every one who gets bought (like RSP) it seem several pop up in their place.

At a certain point, I think it's useful to quit trying every new toy that looks shiny and get really, really good using one tool. And Camera Raw 4 (and maybe some new surprises just around the corner) will be, I think pretty much the "best of breed" in terms of raw processing image quality and controls. (of course, I'm biased)

Quote
Frankly to qualify a proposal to try and a few tips for first approach as "blatant evangelizing" is a shade too much: why use such less then gentle terms: shouldn't courtesy be part of the forum etiquette ?)

Etiquette...you want etiquette? You're talking to the wrong guy bud...I ain't got no "coots". You may as well come to terms with that right now...and evangelizing sure sounds like what you were doing in the beginning-you know, before you told us a little something about yourself.
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