Hi,
I've been seeing a red tinge in files from my 5D M2, esp when opening shadows. Am I alone in seeing this red color in canon files?
No, you are not alone. It is a well know thing the red canon cast (try to google it, you'll see). I myself try to profile an EOS 5D MkII for the same reasons (did you see the ongoing thread
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=49616.0)?That said, from my experience, all brands have some cast. Nikon, for me tends to be yellowish/golden. The digital middle format cameras are maybe a bit better off with the supplied ICC profiles, at least the ones I used till now. The Red of my Canon is very bothering.
I picked up the x-rite passport, expecting to make a camera profile to correct the red issue. After reading posts here it seems that camera profiles are quite difficult to make, and the passport software is not really up to the task.
I experienced the same, and have posted about this gray card/white balance problem here (
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=47189.0). I guess you have already calibrated and profiled your monitor.
I prefer to work with Capture One, because I work with skin tones. Regarding portraits made with the 5DM2, I find the default rendering by Lightroom worse. So I had to turn to the use of ICC profiles, because that's the only thing Capture One accepts (for whatever reason). The problem is, that building ICC profiles is a difficult task it appears. The easy way, in most cases absolutely satisfying, is to tweak the existing profile (whether in Lightroom through a preset, or in C1 or PS/Camera Raw). My additional problem is that there is an issue with C1's color editor in my configuration (Win7x64), as the RGB values make no sens (This problem was fixed in the last update to version #5, but reappeared now in #6).
I understand that the supplied profiles are a compromise in order to serve most situations. But when you need a profile for a specific situation, a custom made, or tweaked one, will be better. As mentioned in the other thread, while you tweak here you untweak there. That's why I now go for profiling.
Any suggestions on how I should proceed to try to correct this problem with the passport? Is it a futile attempt without more sophisticated software, color charts?
Let's see what the others have to say! When building an ICC profile the 24 patches on the classic colorchecker will maybe not be enough. Whether we will need something like this
http://www.basiccolor.de/basiccolor-dcam-target/, which is a card like the colorchekcher SG, but with an additional black light trap, we'll see. The whole thing, without a software to use it, goes for only 514.293 USD (as of todays rate). The basic software for it, basICColor Input, is comparatively cheap, for only 395.610 USD. BTW, my trial copy came without a help file.
Nonetheless, as a start, I immediately got a more pleasing profile (unfortunately with crushed blacks), with just the colorchecker and that basICColor Input software.
regards
nino
