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Author Topic: Highlight Recovery in C1  (Read 7635 times)

hubell

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Highlight Recovery in C1
« on: May 12, 2011, 07:19:30 pm »

Notwithstanding the lack of any warning in either the histogram or the blinking warning on the back of my P65, I often find when I open images in C1 that the highlights are clipped. The obvious way to mitigate clipped highlights in Capture One is to use the Highlight Recovery tool. However, it has a significant affect on the global contrast as well as the clipped highlights. The other way described in several tutorials is to pull in the highlight output level in the Levels tool. This "seems" to work better in that it has less effect on the rest of the tonal balance. I am curious what people who really know what they are doing in C1 do to handle clipped highlights.
Thanks.

Bart_van_der_Wolf

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #1 on: May 12, 2011, 07:38:15 pm »

Notwithstanding the lack of any warning in either the histogram or the blinking warning on the back of my P65, I often find when I open images in C1 that the highlights are clipped. The obvious way to mitigate clipped highlights in Capture One is to use the Highlight Recovery tool. However, it has a significant affect on the global contrast as well as the clipped highlights. The other way described in several tutorials is to pull in the highlight output level in the Levels tool. This "seems" to work better in that it has less effect on the rest of the tonal balance. I am curious what people who really know what they are doing in C1 do to handle clipped highlights.
Thanks.

Have you tried switching from a "Film Standard" curve to "Linear Response" curve?
Next step is to adjust "Exposure", only then adjust Highlight response followed by a tweak of the curves.

Cheers,
Bart
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Jack Varney

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #2 on: May 12, 2011, 09:43:46 pm »

Could it be your setting for the Highlight Warning in Preferences?
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Jack Varney

hubell

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #3 on: May 12, 2011, 10:44:24 pm »

Could it be your setting for the Highlight Warning in Preferences?

I have it set for 250. Too low?

hubell

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #4 on: May 12, 2011, 10:51:48 pm »

Have you tried switching from a "Film Standard" curve to "Linear Response" curve?
Next step is to adjust "Exposure", only then adjust Highlight response followed by a tweak of the curves.

Cheers,
Bart

Thanks, Bart. I have tried the Linear Response curve. It does reduce the clipping, but the overall image is VERY dull and requires a lot of work in curves to achieve a good level of contrast. Atthat point, I am probably back at highlight clipping. I should work with it more, however.

pfigen

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #5 on: May 13, 2011, 01:56:17 am »

It would be nice if they added a threshold adjustment to the recovery tools, but since they don't, often the best strategy, and the only I use on almost every image, is to process once for the overall image, and again just for the highlights and and often once more for the shadows. Three quick layers in Ps and they're generally blended together in a much nicer looking image than if you tried to do it in one pass. You also sometimes need to use a different color temp for the highlight recovery if you're anywhere near the maximum. Using the Exposure adjustment can be very effective as well.
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Jack Flesher

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #6 on: May 15, 2011, 01:10:02 pm »

Not sure if this is an issue for you, but know that at default settings the profile in your highlighted output recipe -- not the ones checked for output, but only the one highlighted -- is the "selected" recipe profile C1 uses for image display unless you change that in your preferences.  If that selected recipe is say an sRGB recipe, then for sure you will see clipping where you won't in a ProPhoto recipe.   
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hubell

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #7 on: May 15, 2011, 08:57:52 pm »

Not sure if this is an issue for you, but know that at default settings the profile in your highlighted output recipe -- not the ones checked for output, but only the one highlighted -- is the "selected" recipe profile C1 uses for image display unless you change that in your preferences.  If that selected recipe is say an sRGB recipe, then for sure you will see clipping where you won't in a ProPhoto recipe.   

The only recipe I have created is a 16 bit TIFF recipe with a wide gamut space(Joseph Holmes DCam 4). I don't see anywhere to select a working space for C1.

Jack Flesher

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #8 on: May 20, 2011, 10:57:38 pm »

I don't see anywhere to select a working space for C1.

View>Proof Profile. When you open that dialog, you can select your working space profile -- by default it is set to "Selected Recipe" which means that whatever recipe you have selected is the profile you are viewing under. Note that in any recipe, you can choose your desired profile.
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Kiwigrest

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #9 on: May 27, 2011, 07:27:10 am »

It would be nice if they added a threshold adjustment to the recovery tools, but since they don't, often the best strategy, and the only I use on almost every image, is to process once for the overall image, and again just for the highlights and and often once more for the shadows. Three quick layers in Ps and they're generally blended together in a much nicer looking image than if you tried to do it in one pass. You also sometimes need to use a different color temp for the highlight recovery if you're anywhere near the maximum. Using the Exposure adjustment can be very effective as well.

Hi Peter,

What's your preferred method for blending lights / shadows / mid-tones layers?  I try combining various luminosity masks (as per Tony Kyuper's tutorial) but often find myself resorting to manually painting over those masks to either block or open them up more, which is quite labor-intensive, too time-consuming to be a viable 'recipe' for most shots.

Thank you!
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robgo2

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Re: Highlight Recovery in C1
« Reply #10 on: June 16, 2011, 09:41:39 pm »

I, too, often find that the histogram in C1 is pushed to the right compared to what I see in the camera itself.  As a rule, I correct this by moving the Exposure slider to the left, which will recover all highlights, unless they really are clipped.  I then deal with brightness and shadows in the usual fashion.  The good news is that the highlights are not lost, as long as the original capture was properly exposed.

Rob

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