Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Digital Image Processing => Topic started by: plugsnpixels on May 12, 2022, 01:04:26 am
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Within this last hour, Topaz released an update to Gigapixel AI (https://www.topazlabs.com/gigapixel-ai/ref/5/), version 6.1.0 and you need to see what it now does!
I've been beta testing this version and have been extremely excited about the greatly improved Face Recovery feature. Prior to this feature being added, the only other place you could get this level of facial enhancement was with one of the expensive subscription-based online genealogical services.
Attached are a couple of quick examples of old family photos being enhanced at 4X. I'll be working on a blog post with more examples and details soon.
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That photo of my great-grandmother was taken about 1905 and was printed on some tiny 2"x3" photo paper and stored in a little cardboard vignette frame along with several other poses.
In this example I used Gigapixel to enlarge my scan 6X and Photoshop to colorize it (Neural filter), then Topaz Studio to add a vignette and bit of Clear.
Viewed at 100%, it's a far cry from the gritty original!
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Attached are a couple of quick examples of old family photos being enhanced at 4X. I'll be working on a blog post with more examples and details soon.
Yes, really impressive.
Old family album images, images needed for larger printed output than anticipated, even an image capture from a movie of your favorite moviestar or scene. Most of them will benefit greatly.
Cheers,
Bart
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Thanks Bart, this is my favorite Topaz app – besides enlarging it also does a bit of cleanup, so it overlaps with DeNoise and Sharpen.
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Very impressive results.
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Thanks Eric, I've been experimenting with more old family photos... No end to the fun!
This is the daughter of the girl in color above, from 1931.
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I'm not seeing a sale on the new Gigapixel AI release yet but a 15% coupon (http://plugsandpixels.com/discounts.html) is always available off any Topaz app or product.
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How well does it work on non-people subject matter....landscapes?
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How well does it work on non-people subject matter....landscapes?
Fair question for the LL audience! While the face enhancement is the big news this time around, of course landscapes are the main topic here.
Here are a few circa-2003 4-megapixel scenics being improved at 4X by Gigapixel (split among posts as I wanted to keep the JPEG quality high). You can see that Gigapixel AI is also doing a bit of the work of DeNoise AI and Sharpen AI. I did these screenshots on a 2020 M1 MacBook Pro.
Of course your camera is better and your results will look even better ;-)
I tend to use the Low Resolution and Very Compressed options the most, though you need to compare models on each photo (you can view 4 results at a time).
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Another also from 2003, non-DLSR.
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And another from 2003, non-DLSR.
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One more...
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Somebody in the UK (https://sketchbooky.wordpress.com/2022/05/14/gigapixel-6-1/) just posted a blog in response to my blog, wondering if Gigapixel could upscale a small image pulled off of eBay as well as it did the faces I showed.
I have many such images and maybe this one passes as a scenic, so I'll answer his challenge and show the original plus 4X results here:
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I tend to use the Low Resolution and Very Compressed options the most, though you need to compare models on each photo (you can view 4 results at a time).
Yes, a lot depends on the source image. I tend to take relatively Low-ISO shots, and then i can reduce the (auto-detected) 'image default' amount of noise reduction in GigaPixel to very low values. This will make Gigapixel work even harder to find details. After all, some of the noise (shot-noise) is part of the recorded image itself. This also prevents a too 'plastic' look, and it minimizes hints of edge halo (if any).
Depending on the image, if there is mixed content such as vegetation and architecture, one can also create multiple upscales and then blend them with masking in Photoshop / Affinity Photo.
Cheers,
Bart
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Yes, a lot depends on the source image. I tend to take relatively Low-ISO shots, and then i can reduce the (auto-detected) 'image default' amount of noise reduction in GigaPixel to very low values. This will make Gigapixel work even harder to find details. After all, some of the noise (shot-noise) is part of the recorded image itself. This also prevents a too 'plastic' look, and it minimizes hints of edge halo (if any).
Depending on the image, if there is mixed content such as vegetation and architecture, one can also create multiple upscales and then blend them with masking in Photoshot / Affinity Photo.
Cheers,
Bart
Very good points Bart! I usually do my examples at default values to show what an app is capable of even without further tweaking, but your suggestions are great and I'll experiment with them.
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**Topaz just announced a $20 off sale on Gigapixel 6.1, starting tomorrow (5/19) and good through 6/2.**
Visit Topaz' website (https://www.topazlabs.com/gigapixel-ai/ref/5/) to get the discount, or better yet, visit the Plugs 'n Pixels Discounts page (http://plugsandpixels.com/discounts.html), use the Topaz link and coupon code there and get an additional 15% off!
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Wow. Thought the portrait looked a little “ air brushed”, but this landscape capability is really impressive. I have a client who has shot a lot of nice street scenes, architecture in the past hand holding medium format film cameras and many are just too soft to make big prints from, but this looks like it could save them.
Is there a free trial version available?
John
One more...
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Wow. Thought the portrait looked a little “ air brushed”, but this landscape capability is really impressive. I have a client who has shot a lot of nice street scenes, architecture in the past hand holding medium format film cameras and many are just too soft to make big prints from, but this looks like it could save them.
Is there a free trial version available?
John
Sure, just go to their Downloads page (https://topazlabs.com/downloads/ref/5/) and grab any app to try.
Another approach is to go in this way (https://www.topazlabs.com/gigapixel-ai/ref/5/#) to request a trial.
As for the "air brushed" look, you have control over the amount of treatment to apply.
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That is mind blowing. I’m wondering if this is trickle down AI research from the cinema world. I’ve seen very similar demo on YouTube one time from special effects lab in California cleaning up resolution of details of scenes in AI created landscapes. Thank you a lot for posting!
John
quote author=plugsnpixels link=topic=140784.msg1240901#msg1240901 date=1654883184]
Sure, just go to their Downloads page (https://topazlabs.com/downloads/ref/5/) and grab any app to try.
Another approach is to go in this way (https://www.topazlabs.com/gigapixel-ai/ref/5/#) to request a trial.
As for the "air brushed" look, you have control over the amount of treatment to apply.
[/quote]
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You're welcome! Gigapixel has long been my favorite Topaz app (it helps rescue my decades of stock photos shot with "technology-challenged" cameras) and the recent addition of the face recovery feature helps with my genealogical hobby (I've gathered tons of old family photos).
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I have Gigapixel and like it, but the comparison should be between up-rez with Photoshop (or super resolution in LR) vs up-rez with Gigapixel. In many cases I don't see a difference, but sometimes Gigapixel is clearly better. This is for landscape images.
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I have Gigapixel and like it, but the comparison should be between up-rez with Photoshop (or super resolution in LR) vs up-rez with Gigapixel. In many cases I don't see a difference, but sometimes Gigapixel is clearly better. This is for landscape images.
Thanks John, back in December (http://plugsandpixels.com/blog/i-laugh-at-adobes-super-resolution-please-read-asap/) I did such a comparison, see if that is what you were looking for.
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Thanks John, back in December (http://plugsandpixels.com/blog/i-laugh-at-adobes-super-resolution-please-read-asap/) I did such a comparison, see if that is what you were looking for.
It may work well for architecture, but for typical landscape images I find it to be better than Super Resolution about 20-25% of the time. Often there are too many artifacts, but in some cases it does a great job.
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Am I doing something wrong here? I understand that a watermark is necessary on the free trial version, but, the image is so obscured that I can't see an A/B comparison in Photoshop of the same image using Super Resolution and Gigapixel. Kind of negates the whole purpose of a free trial.
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Benny, can you show us what that watermark looks like?
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Benny, can you show us what that watermark looks like?
Both are crops of raw image with zero edits. No mark, Super resolution from Lightroom. Marked image, Gigapixel, 2X.
There is a profile issue here I can't figure out yet. I work in Adobe RGB, which the Super Rez image from Lightroom is. Gigapixel seems to give me it's own profile.
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Both are crops of raw image with zero edits.
There is a profile issue here I can't figure out yet. I work in Adobe RGB, which the Super Rez image from Lightroom is. Gigapixel seems to give me it's own profile.
First, if indeed, you fed the product a raw, it's not in Adobe RGB (1998). But yeah, this product is pretty brain dead out of the gate in terms of color management. As you can see, there's an option after saving from an actual raw (this was a DNG of Mr. Schewe), you can select the following for saving the image's color space. I selected Preserve Source Profile just to see what it would come up with. Now, look at the processed incorrectly previewed image (left), which ended up in ProPhoto RGB compared to the original properly color managed and previewed in Lightroom Classic. Not even close. That it 'thinks' a DNG's source color space is ProPhoto RGB is pretty hilarious. It isn't of course.
So before you even futz with waiting for this product to download all kinds of files to even work in demo mode, then try to see the results with the watermark, be aware its ideas about color management is odd at best and wrong at worst.
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Here's another fun one: Open a proprietary raw (mine was a CR2), and use these settings below. If you think you'll end up with a CR2, nope.
If you think the color appearance of this processed DNG and the original as seen in ACR/LR match, nope again. Off by a mile color wise.
Needs more beta testing?
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The save with another profile option doesn't exist in trial mode. I'm not spending money to go further.
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The save with another profile option doesn't exist in trial mode. I'm not spending money to go further.
I'm using the trial, it shows up for me. You'll see the watermark on the Schewe shot.
Not that it works as it should based on my experience outlined today.
Agreed, not worth the money if the behavior with raw data is as I've experienced. At least Adobe's Super Resolution (https://blog.adobe.com/en/publish/2021/03/10/from-the-acr-team-super-resolution) works with respect to proper color management.
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Thanks Andrew, I'm going to pass on your comments directly to the engineers and press them on this.
So in the meantime I guess we're left with either proper color management and poor results or improper color management and better results!
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Thanks Andrew, I'm going to pass on your comments directly to the engineers and press them on this.
Well seems they need better beta testers! And less sales and marketing people. ;)
So in the meantime I guess we're left with either proper color management and poor results or improper color management and better results!
That's a poor guess. Ugly, incorrect color rendering isn't ever acceptable. Now if this product refused to deal with raw data, only rendered images in a tagged color space, AND they honored that color apparence, you might have a point. But you don't based on two people here who tried feeding it raw data. Utterly unacceptable results. I don't expect their proprietary raw processing to match another's proprietary raw processing. That they do such a piss poor job of rendering, then try to pass off that they are giving you back the original raw (they are not) or that they are preserving as they tell us, the Source Profile of a raw only shows, "JUST OUT OF BETA TESTING: Topaz Gigapixel AI 6.1 (need to see!)" is more like JUST OUT OF BETA TESTING: Topaz Gigapixel AI 6.1 (needs a lot more beta testing!)
IF they need help, they can ask, but in the meantime, I'd tossing all this software gunk below off my Mac.
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It would be fun to see you among the beta testers if you were interested. Your expertise in this area would go a long way.
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Ugly, incorrect color rendering isn't ever acceptable. . . . I don't expect their proprietary raw processing to match another's proprietary raw processing. That they do such a piss poor job of rendering . . .
I was using Topaz Gigapixel for quite a while before Adobe introduced its own machine-learning technique for increasing resolution. The Topaz results never struck me as entirely satisfactory, but after trying several online alternatives it seemed like the best compromise.
Not so much anymore.
I have only a limited understanding of the design of neural networks, and I'm certainly no expert on color management, but my impression is that when fed a raw file, Gigapixel emits a completely rendered image (i.e., with respect to color, output-format-referred) even when you specify a DNG container as the destination file format, while Lightroom and Photoshop produce a DNG file that is still scene-referred so you can still make color adjustments without producing artifacts.
I still use both products, but as they continue to mature—I presume both software manufacturers are continually updating the "learning sets" they use to train their neural networks—I'm experiencing less need for Gigapixel except when I need to make massive increases in resolution.
The underlying machine-learning techniques are available to everyone, so the ability to manipulate raw RGB data and produce a manipulable output file is an important differentiator. It seems reasonable that Adobe would have an edge here. I suspect that how exactly Adobe manages to preserve the user's ability to manage the colors in the output file is a trade secret. Somebody like Eric Chan could no doubt explain it, but I'm not holding my breath.
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Thanks Chris, that's an interesting take on the issue (the Adobe perspective).
I'm going to keep an eye on this issue as pertains to Topaz apps and try to understand the situation better and communicate the problems and recommendations to the developers.
Beta testers also use Affinity Photo as well as multiple camera models so the import/export issue comes up regularly, so it's not all on me to describe ;-).
As for the quality of Adobe's newer Super Resolution option, in my tests I was just not seeing any decent results – maybe my older crap photos were just too much for it! Obviously the better the input, the better the output...
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Thanks Chris, that's an interesting take on the issue (the Adobe perspective).
Just to avoid any misimpression: I'm not expressing an "Adobe perspective." I have no involvement with Adobe except as a consumer purchaser of their products. Same for Topaz.
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No problem, but if they've got something proprietary going on that others cannot interface with, that might be part of the issue here.
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No problem, but if they've got something proprietary going on that others cannot interface with, that might be part of the issue here.
What does that mean?
They (everyones) raw processing is proprietary.
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... my impression is that when fed a raw file, Gigapixel emits a completely rendered image (i.e., with respect to color, output-format-referred) even when you specify a DNG container as the destination file format, while Lightroom and Photoshop produce a DNG file that is still scene-referred so you can still make color adjustments without producing artifacts.
I have the same impression.
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I have the same impression.
All one has to do is examine a DNG from Gigapixel in RawDigger. It's a Linear DNG (RGB not RGBG) data.
http://www.barrypearson.co.uk/articles/dng/linear.htm
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All one has to do is examine a DNG from Gigapixel in RawDigger. It's a Linear DNG (RGB not RGBG) data.
http://www.barrypearson.co.uk/articles/dng/linear.htm
Well, that does not seem to me as enough evidence. Linear DNGs out of DxO Pure Raw are RGB but not color space encoded and you can still apply a DCP Profile in LR / ACR. RawDigger still shows "Photometric Interpretation: Linear Raw" in the Gigapixel AI's DNG.
The first impression I had from the DNGs out of Gigapixel AI was that they were already color encoded, because you could not choose a DCP Profile in LR / ACR.
I tested an old image taken with a Nikon D300, processed from NEF into Gigapixel AI then analyzed the EXIF from the resulting DNG.
I think I have found a bug in Gigapixel AI. The field "Unique Camera Model" had "NIKON CORPORATION" (same as "Make") instead of "NIKON D300" (as in "Camera Model Name") as shown in the first image attached (I compared Linear DNGs out of DxO Pure raw to see what info they had in this field).
I used a HEX editor to change the information in the file, so that now the EXIF shows "Unique Camera Model" as "NIKON D300" as shown in the second image attached, and then when I opened the image in ACR, I was able to choose a DCP profile for the image. The third image shows a snip of ACR where I can select the DCP Profile.
So, in order to solve this bug, all Topaz Labs has to do is to change the way it handles this specific EXIF field.
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Well, that does not seem to me as enough evidence.
Evdience of what? The data out of the product is not RGBG, it's processed.
The first impression I had from the DNGs out of Gigapixel AI was that they were already color encoded, because you could not choose a DCP Profile in LR / ACR.
This is simply a CR2 'opened' then processed in Gigapixel, it isn't the same raw data, it isn't saved as they tell us, as CR2. That part of the dialog used is a lie.
So, in order to solve this bug, all Topaz Labs has to do is to change the way it handles this specific EXIF field.
What bug? First, they tell us what they are doing which isn't what they are doing. They are not providing back the original data and when asked to provide a non DNG/"Raw" in the original color space which isn't possible, they give me ProPhoto RGB. What they are doing may not be a bug at all, simply a big fat lie in the save dialog.
The rendering from raw to DNG is awful; that may not be a bug, just really piss poor rendering.
Bottom line; they tell us they are going to provide something based on the settings they don't and can't. And what they provide in terms of color and tone processing of the raw, when viewed is butt ugly. Bug? Or just sloppyness.
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I did some more tests and the results do not look god, so I guess you are right, it does not do a good job with raw files. I'm thinking that it is actually on purpose that they changed the EXIF value so you cannot choose a DCP profile.
It works ok for rendered files.
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. . . if they've got something proprietary going on that others cannot interface with, that might be part of the issue here.
As Andrew has already pointed out, everyone's demosaicing algorithms are proprietary. Adobe's, Topaz's, DxO's, Iridient's—you name it.
I've done some more poking around today and, as far as I can tell (the usual disclaimers apply about my lack of demonstrable technical expertise in this area), when Topaz Gigapixel is used to enlarge the pixel dimensions of a raw camera capture into a DNG file, what you get is a fully-rendered image, comparable to a TIFF. In other words, the DNG file format is just the container for image data that might otherwise be encapsulated into a TIFF or even a JPEG.
All perfectly legitimate, as far as I know, because you can stuff any image data into a DNG container. But that means color information and, I believe, at least some tonal information have been "baked into" the output.
By contrast, Adobe's "enhance" (i.e., "super resolution" enlargement) emits a linear DNG with EXIF data that inform the post-processing program how subsequently to treat the file as though it was still a raw camera capture.
[Nikon NEF source]
$ exiftool (https://exiftool.org/) DSC_5288-Enhanced.dng | egrep CFA
CFA Repeat Pattern Dim : 2 2
CFA Pattern 2 : 0 1 1 2
CFA Plane Color : Red,Green,Blue
CFA Layout : Rectangular
CFA Pattern : [Red,Green][Green,Blue]
[Fuji X-Trans source]
$ exiftool _XT43050-Enhanced.dng | egrep CFA
CFA Repeat Pattern Dim : 6 6
CFA Pattern 2 : 1 1 2 1 1 0 2 0 1 0 2 1 1 1 2 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 2 0 2 1 2 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 2
CFA Plane Color : Red,Green,Blue
CFA Layout : Rectangular
CFA Pattern : [Green,Green,Blue,Green,Green,Red][Blue,Red,Green,Red,Blue,Green][Green,Green,Blue,Green,Green,Red][Green,Green,Red,Green,Green,Blue][Red,Blue,Green,Blue,Red,Green][Green,Green,Red,Green,Green,Blue]
(The same metadata can be extracted with a commercial product, RawDigger (https://www.rawdigger.com/).)
This difference between the semantics of the Topaz and Adobe output files doesn't have any inherent implications with respect to the quality of the neural network processing, which is presumably dependent on the particular algorithms used by the respective software manufacturers and—to an even greater extent, I suspect—the particulars of their machine-learning training sets.
But it does mean that after the demosaicing has been performed, you can treat the Adobe files as though they were still raw, which can be a significant benefit where color accuracy, or just getting the final image to look the way you want, is concerned.
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Thank you once again Chris for your efforts here!
Between you and Andrew I am understanding that Gigapixel renders its results and wraps them in the DNG envelope (if one chooses that option) without the original RAW data that the user may want or need for further work in a RAW-friendly editor. Depending on the desired end use, I am going to assume this may or may not be an issue, and certainly isn't for those salvaging JPEG or TIFF sources, yes?
I'm also curious how other developers (ON1, Exposure, Skylum, Serif, etc.) are handling this workflow.
While we await the Gigapixel engineer's comments on the matter, I return to my original premise:
IMO and in my own testing, aside from the color profile issue, Gigapixel is giving superior upscaling results when compared to Adobe's Super Resolution and even ON1's new Resize feature.
I just did some tests using a CR2 image I shot YESTERDAY (usually I am scraping around in my almost 50 years' worth of rough image files for examples ;-) ). Here's what I got (images attached):
Adobe "Super Resolution". Very little control is offered and the results "don't seem" to be very good in either the preview or the exported DNG. Original details are more "natural" but still mushy. I don't understand how this different from their older methods.
ON1's new Resize at 6X (much better than Adobe in terms of clarity but some finer details are lost).
Topaz Gigapixel at 6X. Offers 5 different upscaling models (4 shown) along with full control of magnification factor, noise removal, etc.
Gigapixel result exported as DNG and reopened in Camera RAW: The colors don't seem garish (?). I left all values at default.
Here (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TgVfP74RcQdy5r3vyju7oISGLx6IAHCl/view?usp=sharing) is my original CR2 file for those interested in testing my results.
So again, as I see it, we are dealing with two topics here: Color management and output quality. Adobe gets one right and not the other, Topaz the opposite.
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For some reason Gigapixel's funky DNG output looks better in Photoshop than its JPEG output, regardless of JPEG color setting chosen.
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Between you and Andrew I am understanding that Gigapixel renders its results and wraps them in the DNG envelope (if one chooses that option) without the original RAW data that the user may want or need for further work in a RAW-friendly editor. Depending on the desired end use, I am going to assume this may or may not be an issue, and certainly isn't for those salvaging JPEG or TIFF sources, yes?
My main beef, outlined in two replies to BP is that the save dialog doesn't do what it says it's going to do. Part of what it says it's going to do in a raw workflow is not possible.
Where is the written manual for this product? I couldn't find one but I can't say I looked exhaustively for it (nor should I have to)?
What is the recommended workflow for say a Lightroom Classic or Camera Raw user who's working with raw (DNG) data to and from this product? That might help explain what the product is doing and why but nothing it states would change a Save dialog that isn't at all accurate in what it states it will do.
Adobe "Super Resolution". Very little control is offered and the results "don't seem" to be very good in either the preview or the exported DNG. Original details are more "natural" but still mushy. I don't understand how this different from their older methods.
This is but ONE process in a long process of rendering raw data. A process that thus far, outside sizing up an image, Gigapixel gives absolutely NONE.
Gigapixel result exported as DNG and reopened in Camera RAW: The colors don't seem garish (?).
Is that a statement or a question?
In a rendered workflow, the raw to rendered processing is conducted, you can't put that toothpaste back in the tube. That is OK, you've rendered the raw as you desire. This is a process Gigapixel doesn't provide any control over for the user. On the other hand, TIFF you send Gigapixel looks like the TIFF you get in terms of color and tone, color space, etc. This thus far absolutely isn't the case when I or BF (and presumably you) send a raw to the product and that's an issue.
IF the product either can't honor the color appearance from a raw converter (which is nearly an impossible task that even Adobe can't do from say a camera-generated JPEG which of course comes from raw), then not only shouldn't the product lie and confuse users as to what it's going to with raw data, it simply shouldn't accept raw data. Of course, it does. So the 'issue' is twofold:
1. A Save dialog that is a lie. I've outlined two lies earlier.
2. At least an initial workflow where it does a very poor job with no control over the rendering the raw it allows you to feed it. Above and beyond it's AI upsizing!
So what do the designers expect raw users to do before the product comes into use?
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So what do the designers expect raw users to do before the product comes into use?
Gigapixel is not a dedicated Raw converter, but it offers the possibility of opening Raw files (I think it uses the LibRaw engine/library). So for the best (and predictable) results, offer it a TIFF for input. The TIFF can come from one's preferred Raw converter (best is unsharpened, because sharpening artifacts will be upsized and become more visible).
Cheers,
Bart
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Gigapixel is not a dedicated Raw converter, but it offers the possibility of opening Raw files (I think it uses the LibRaw engine/library).
That makes it a raw converter. Not a very good one IMHO; yours?
There is no reason it has to convert raw data. Or so poorly. Lots of products only process rendered images!
Nothing above also justify the lie told in the Save dialog I've outlined. Why Bart does it do this?
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Why Bart does it do this?
I don't know.
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I don't know.
Worth repeating here:
"JUST OUT OF BETA TESTING: Topaz Gigapixel AI 6.1 (need to see!)" is more like JUST OUT OF BETA TESTING: Topaz Gigapixel AI 6.1 (needs a lot more beta testing!)
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There is no reason it has to convert raw data. Or so poorly. Lots of products only process rendered images!
And of course that is exactly what happens when you invoke Topaz Gigapixel from Lightroom's Edit In dialog. Or, for that matter, when you invoke Photoshop or any other pixel editor or converter. Lightroom transfers a rendered file for Gigapixel to process. This allows you to edit the image the way you wish without modifying the original raw file ("parametric editing"), then use Gigapixel to enlarge it. That workflow makes more sense to me than using the Topaz product as a raw converter. Once the rendered image completes the round-trip, you can then make any further adjustments that may be appropriate since processing a photograph through a neural network may modify some of its attributes in ways that are impossible to anticipate in advance.
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And of course that is exactly what happens when you invoke Topaz Gigapixel from Lightroom's Edit In dialog. Or, for that matter, when you invoke Photoshop or any other pixel editor or converter. Lightroom transfers a rendered file for Gigapixel to process. This allows you to edit the image the way you wish without modifying the original raw file ("parametric editing"), then use Gigapixel to enlarge it. That workflow makes more sense to me than using the Topaz product to as a raw converter.
Yes it does. Yet the product allows us to open a raw and then it provides a Save dialog that's a lie, which is my beef and answer to BP:
There is a profile issue here I can't figure out yet. I work in Adobe RGB, which the Super Rez image from Lightroom is. Gigapixel seems to give me it's own profile.
This is a mess by Gigapixel's own (unnecessary) design.
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Andrew, as for the quality of beta testers that you've mentioned twice, perhaps you can join in! It wouldn't take any extra time – you could say the same things there you are saying here (copy and paste even), the main difference being the devs who can do something about it will see your valuable comments directly.
I'm pretty clear on the RAW discussion as concerns Topaz's handling of the files and agree some different approach and perhaps clarification needs to be done. But what about everyone's opinion of the quality of the upsizing as compared to the other apps? That's a separate discussion we can have while we're here.
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It’s not clear to me why people are resizing the Raw files. I open my Raw files in ACR and make as many adjustments as I can there and open them as Smart Objects into Photoshop. I have no idea what resizing I’ll need until I’ve cropped the image and decided what output size i want. Gigapixel is the second to the last item in my workflow. Output sharpening is the last step and with the way I use it at least, Gigapixel works really well.
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Thanks Daverich, that's a good point.
So I don't know whether people would feel slighted if they were not able to open RAW files in Topaz apps at all! Probably...
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Trickle down from Hollywood.
https://youtu.be/ixgFtjfO_7Q
I was using Topaz Gigapixel for quite a while before Adobe introduced its own machine-learning technique for increasing resolution. The Topaz results never struck me as entirely satisfactory, but after trying several online alternatives it seemed like the best compromise.
Not so much anymore.
I have only a limited understanding of the design of neural networks, and I'm certainly no expert on color management, but my impression is that when fed a raw file, Gigapixel emits a completely rendered image (i.e., with respect to color, output-format-referred) even when you specify a DNG container as the destination file format, while Lightroom and Photoshop produce a DNG file that is still scene-referred so you can still make color adjustments without producing artifacts.
I still use both products, but as they continue to mature—I presume both software manufacturers are continually updating the "learning sets" they use to train their neural networks—I'm experiencing less need for Gigapixel except when I need to make massive increases in resolution.
The underlying machine-learning techniques are available to everyone, so the ability to manipulate raw RGB data and produce a manipulable output file is an important differentiator. It seems reasonable that Adobe would have an edge here. I suspect that how exactly Adobe manages to preserve the user's ability to manage the colors in the output file is a trade secret. Somebody like Eric Chan could no doubt explain it, but I'm not holding my breath.
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It’s not clear to me why people are resizing the Raw files. I open my Raw files in ACR and make as many adjustments as I can there and open them as Smart Objects into Photoshop. I have no idea what resizing I’ll need until I’ve cropped the image and decided what output size i want. Gigapixel is the second to the last item in my workflow. Output sharpening is the last step and with the way I use it at least, Gigapixel works really well.
I didn't consider this, and it seems to work. My workflow out of Lightroom is the opposite: Super Rez first, all edits afterwards. Bypasses this stupid profile problem. Gawd, the processing is slow, though. Like, go make a little lunch slow.
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Depending on if you know or not from the get go, you need to upsize the original raw or not, it makes a lot of sense to do this first and apply as many parametric edits on top than after. Just the new masking features alone will suffer or benefit from doing this step first.
If you don't know you'll resize up, then Daverich's approach makes sense since you're never getting a free lunch here in terms of quality data (SuperRez, AI, Gigapixel or otherwise). You may find you have to at a later date so yeah, you do it then and hope for the best.
If you know from the start, you've got to shoot an 8x10 transparency, you do that. If you can.
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I didn't consider this, and it seems to work. My workflow out of Lightroom is the opposite: Super Rez first, all edits afterwards. Bypasses this stupid profile problem. Gawd, the processing is slow, though. Like, go make a little lunch slow.
Benny, what type of computer are you using? On the Mac side, moving to M1/2 makes a huge difference over Intel, whether you're using Handbrake to crunch videos, Gigapixel to enlarge images or anything else.
An even more serious computer than usual is getting to be a necessity these days... Certain art-type AI apps require high-end graphics cards, for example (I'm thinking of NVIDIA Canvas for one).
I did a Maya test render test awhile back, comparing a 2020 M1 MacBook Pro, 8 gigs RAM with a 2013 Mac Pro (trashcan) with 32 gigs RAM, 2 video cards, etc. The total render time was literally only seconds apart!
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Computational enlargement techniques like Adobe Enhance/Super Resolution and Topaz Gigapixel don't interpolate extra pixels the way traditional digital enlargement techniques do. They create a new high-resolution image based on visual attributes the neural network identifies in the low-resolution image. Depending on the sophistication of the neural network, and the extent and variety of the set of images that was used to "train" it, you may get a near-perfect enlargement for a particular source image or one that contains noticeable artifacts. So whether you perform the enlargement before editing it or afterwards, a close (even 1:1) inspection of the resulting "rebuilt" picture is advisable, in my experience, because post-enlargement modifications sometimes significantly improve the final picture.
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Benny, what type of computer are you using? On the Mac side, moving to M1/2 makes a huge difference over Intel, whether you're using Handbrake to crunch videos, Gigapixel to enlarge images or anything else.
An even more serious computer than usual is getting to be a necessity these days... Certain art-type AI apps require high-end graphics cards, for example (I'm thinking of NVIDIA Canvas for one).
I did a Maya test render test awhile back, comparing a 2020 M1 MacBook Pro, 8 gigs RAM with a 2013 Mac Pro (trashcan) with 32 gigs RAM, 2 video cards, etc. The total render time was literally only seconds apart!
Well, that's nice, and, yeah, lots of great M1 reviews, but, I just dropped some major coin on a used trashcan recently, and I'm not moving up until I have to, i.e., I can't load the latest Mac OS and, therefore, keep up with Photoshop updates. Have you seen the state of the stock market lately? I'd rather save for that new 40 mp Fuji H2 rumored for, whenever. Then there's traveling to cool places to shoot...
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Computational enlargement techniques like Adobe Enhance/Super Resolution and Topaz Gigapixel don't interpolate extra pixels the way traditional digital enlargement techniques do. They create a new high-resolution image based on visual attributes the neural network identifies in the low-resolution image. Depending on the sophistication of the neural network, and the extent and variety of the set of images that was used to "train" it, you may get a near-perfect enlargement for a particular source image or one that contains noticeable artifacts. So whether you perform the enlargement before editing it or afterwards, a close (even 1:1) inspection of the resulting "rebuilt" picture is advisable, in my experience, because post-enlargement modifications sometimes significantly improve the final picture.
Be useful to see such near-perfect enlargement. Take say a 24MP/48MP capture, sample it down to 4MP or even 12MP, use such a product to get it back to the same size and show the results.
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I just dropped some major coin on a used trashcan recently. . . . i.e., I can't load the latest Mack OS and, therefore, keep up with Photoshop updates.
Eh? MacOS 12.X installs and runs fine on a 2013 Mac Pro.
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Eh? MacOS 12.X installs and runs fine on a 2013 Mac Pro.
Not the one collecting dust in the corner of my room. Sob.
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Be useful to see such near-perfect enlargement. Take say a 24MP/48MP capture, sample it down to 4MP or even 12MP, use such a product to get it back to the same size and show the results.
Interesting experiment.
You definitely would not get a byte-by-byte correspondence between the original source and downsampled-upsampled destination files, so I presume the idea would be to make a 1:1 visual inspection of the two files and decide whether there were any objectionable visible differences. Does that make sense?
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Interesting experiment.
You definitely would not get a byte-by-byte correspondence between the original source and downsampled-upsampled destination files, so I presume the idea would be to make a 1:1 visual inspection of the two files and decide whether there were any objectionable visible differences. Does that make sense?
Does not have to be byte for byte; just show no visible difference. Or very little compared to another upsizing method.
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Well, that's nice, and, yeah, lots of great M1 reviews, but, I just dropped some major coin on a used trashcan recently, and I'm not moving up until I have to, i.e., I can't load the latest Mac OS and, therefore, keep up with Photoshop updates. Have you seen the state of the stock market lately? I'd rather save for that new 40 mp Fuji H2 rumored for, whenever. Then there's traveling to cool places to shoot...
Curious why you did that-? I support a bunch of those in Visual Arts (higher ed) and while they've held up 24/7 for 9 years (only a couple have failed with graphics glitches), even Apple has lost interest in them.
And yes, I do believe they can handle Monterey, but I'm about to post a separate thread about that...
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because post-enlargement modifications sometimes significantly improve the final picture.
This may not be exactly what you are referring to but what I like most about doing "artsy" post treatments is: It doesn't matter what the quality of the original was, art effects cover all sins...
I originally took this scenic photo in 1985 in Switzerland in B&W on 35mm! Colorized it online and artsified it with Dynamic Auto Painter (http://plugsandpixels.com/blog/for-photo-to-art-fans-dap-7-just-released-save-20/).
And relevant to our current discussion, I upscaled it with their companion app, AI Photo & Art Enhancer (https://order.shareit.com/cart/add?vendorid=200277176&PRODUCT%5B301019094%5D=11&affiliateid=200019699) (I haven't written about this one yet, just got ahold of it). This app seems to be the next best thing to Gigapixel, sometimes better, sometimes not (my tests using the building photo were from a 1985 35mm slide scan).
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Be useful to see such near-perfect enlargement. Take say a 24MP/48MP capture, sample it down to 4MP or even 12MP, use such a product to get it back to the same size and show the results.
I thought this was an ingenious experiment, so I decided to accept the "Rodney Challenge."
I used a rather unsuccessful street photograph I made a few years ago in Kyoto as the test subject because it represents a situation where I would feel a need to increase the dimensions of an image file; it also has a variety of visual elements, including people and objects of various kinds, that I thought would be a good test of the ability of the computational enlargement methods to recreate different shapes. I was on the other side of a busy downtown street with a lens that didn't have enough reach for my distant subject: a video photographer who had been shooting a group of young women wearing kimonos just outside the door of a busy storefront, presumably as an advertisement for the store. I didn't have time to cross the street and move closer (as it was, I was a few seconds too late to get the picture I wanted), so I had to crop very aggressively in post. I wouldn't have had enough pixels for anything larger than, say, an 8x10-inch (A4) print.
One of the attached files is the full-size image, exported directly from Lightroom. I then reduced the linear dimensions of the image by half as a source for the other three attachments—in other words, the reduced file had one-fourth the pixels of the original. One of the three remaining attachments was enlarged to the original image size through interpolation by Photoshop; I selected Photoshop's default Automatic enlargement method. Yet another of the attached files was enlarged using Lightroom's computational Enhance method. The final attachment was enlarged using Topaz Gigapixel's computational method. I made no further adjustments to the any of the images following enlargement, so what you see here are JPEG exports of exactly what the respective software products emitted.
I can spot some differences among the various versions, but if I didn't know which was which I think I would find it difficult to identify the original, much less which of the enlargements was done through pixel interpolation and which through computational methods, whether I view the entire images or zoom in and examine them at 1:1.
I've given the files generic names in order to give those reading this thread an opportunity to take the Challenge. I'll report their identities tomorrow.
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I thought this was an ingenious experiment, so I decided to accept the "Rodney Challenge."
Can you gang them up, into one TIFF (san's JPEG) and maybe place on something like Dropbox so we can download and view them in one way inside say Photoshop? TIA.
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Thanks Chris, great test image!
I downloaded each and used Preview (with all in one group) to scroll among them.
I am going to guess:
A/D = PS and LR or LR and PS
B = Original
C = Gigapixel
The main takeaway here is, the better your original, the less help it needs.
In my own case, I have a lot of old crap that is of no good use unless it gets a major overhaul. This example is an early-'90s 35mm negative film scan, treated in a slightly older version of GP.
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Can you gang them up, into one TIFF (san's JPEG) and maybe place on something like Dropbox so we can download and view them in one way inside say Photoshop?
Are you concerned about JPEG artifacts and want to see TIFFs instead? If not, you can just click on the thumbnails to launch the website's image viewer and save the full-resolution files to whatever device you are using to view the forum thread. I don't think there will be any perceptible visual difference between the full-resolution JPEGs and the corresponding TIFFs.
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Are you concerned about JPEG artifacts and want to see TIFFs instead?
Mainly I'd prefer to see then all ganged up.
Secondly sure, I'd prefer to see a TIFF without unique JPEG compressions from each original.
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Mainly I'd prefer to see then all ganged up.
Secondly sure, I'd prefer to see a TIFF without unique JPEG compressions from each original.
You can download a composite containing all four images here (https://www.ChrisKern.Net/tmp/filesABCD.tif). From top to bottom, they are fileA, fileB, fileC, fileD.
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You can download a composite containing all four images here (https://www.ChrisKern.Net/tmp/filesABCD.tif). From top to bottom, they are fileA, fileB, fileC, fileD.
Cool, makes viewing at 100% and syncing multiple views in Photoshop easier.
FileD looks the worst to me; needs some sharpening for sure compared to the others.
The others are more similar with differences seen in 'grain' (noise) with FileC looking like there is less of it than others, making me wonder if it isn't Gigapixel. It looks fine and in some respects 'better' with less grain/noise but somewhat processed appearing.
File A and B look the most 'natural' to me with B looking a tad sharper on this grain. My guess is it may be the original and A interpolated enough to soften it just a little. Now I wonder if a very little bit of capture sharpening after sizing (if so) might bring it back closer to B.
C and D look too 'smooth' without the lack of this grain, they appear processed at least to me. C being the worst offender. B is my preferred image.
None are 'bad' and I suspect they would all print just fine and each may need its own degree of post capture sharpening and output sharpening for an ideal output.
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One of the attached files is the full-size image, exported directly from Lightroom. I then reduced the linear dimensions of the image by half as a source for the other three attachments—in other words, the reduced file had one-fourth the pixels of the original. One of the three remaining attachments was enlarged to the original image size through interpolation by Photoshop; I selected Photoshop's default Automatic enlargement method. Yet another of the attached files was enlarged using Lightroom's computational Enhance method. The final attachment was enlarged using Topaz Gigapixel's computational method.
The file identifications are
FileA is the Lightroom Enhance enlargement;
FileB is the original (i.e., full-size) image;
FileC is the enlargement by Topaz Gigapixel;
FileD is a traditional Photoshop enlargement.
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You know, another little annoyance that loading this software into my computer has given me is that, anytime I directly double click on a raw file somewhere deep in the library, now, the default program is Gigapixel that opens the file, not camera raw, as before. Cmon, people, don't do that. Don't screw around with my little workflow. I'm busy. Now I have two choices, just to dump Gigapixel in the trash, or play computer detective and fix it so that Gigapixel doesn't intrude on my life like that. which is not making me happy. I hate being IT guy. The same thing happened with a third party software that I loaded a while ago, Boris FX Optics, which is a fun filter for effects, but, that's all it is, a side show, so, I had to tamp it down until it learned it's place I'm my world.
These companies think they are going to break the back of Adobe, and, ain't happening. Like it or not, Adobe rules. Monopoly power. Just stop with the games and learn your place in the world.
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Benny, I can't answer whether Gigapixel caused this or not, but on your Mac, make a 2-second adjustment ("Get Info" on a Raw file and change the default app back to whatever you want, as shown here with a different example).
If after doing so it happens again, then we have something to report.
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That's kind of ridiculous. I'm not going to add a "two second" step to a very simple procedure just to accommodate this intrusion into my system. Bet Bye Gigapixel, because nowhere in your preferences do you allow me to disable this annoyance.
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I just checked my own stash and saw the default for CR2 being an older Topaz app, so it's not specifically a Gigapixel issue.
I'll ask the devs about this and see what's up.
PS: I took 2 seconds and changed it to Photoshop 2022 ;-)
Update: I have asked the devs and will report back.
I'm curious if you ever dragged a RAW file directly into Gigapixel? Perhaps this is what resets the file association (?). Let's see what others say.
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. . . make a 2-second adjustment ("Get Info" on a Raw file and change the default app back to whatever you want. . . .
That's kind of ridiculous. I'm not going to add a "two second" step to a very simple procedure just to accommodate this intrusion into my system.
Many software installers do this. As part of the installation process, they set one or more file type associations to correspond to the application program they are installing. Nothing unique about the Topaz installers. Yes, it's an annoyance, and it really shouldn't happen, but it is indeed simple for the user to reset the association to whatever he wants.
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Let's see what others say.
It's quick and simple to alter, at least on a Mac, the "default" application that a certain file type will be called upon to open.
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Thanks guys.
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That's kind of ridiculous. I'm not going to add a "two second" step to a very simple procedure just to accommodate this intrusion into my system. Bet Bye Gigapixel, because nowhere in your preferences do you allow me to disable this annoyance.
You were just provided with simple directions on how to spend two second’s disabling that annoyance for good. You seem displeased that the process isn’t actually within Gigapixel.