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

[etto1972]

As you may know, in a recent post I expressed my difficult situation being a long time user of Capture One and waiting for the new Hasselblad X1D to arrive.

I said that although I respect Phase One position with their policy of not supporting and profiling camera raws from competitive brands, I am very sad that they intentionally block the converted DNGs from those files.

I showed that with a little trick Capture One 10 is perfectly capable to read and editi all DNG 1.4 files from any of those cameras but
many of you have pointed out if it's really worth doing that rather then switching to LR, assuming that the quality will be clearly lower!

I have placed on my drop box one DNG which can be open also with C1 (this time is a DNG from the Pentax 645Z and the trick is cancelling the word "645Z")
plus I added two full size Jpgs, one exported from LR and the other from C1   

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/az6i8v05u1z9mq5/AADSp5JHhSC_AV8OcrxQNUNua?dl=0








No change in sharpening applied, only Lens correction checked on both software (including diffraction in C1)

I have also added the original Hasselblad fff Raw file and the hacked DNG + the exported Jpg from both software
since several of you asked for it 




I would really appreciate your frank opinion !
..but from I see despite the not being supported the DNGs look pretty good to me

Many thanks for your passion to you all

Ettore

[BobShaw]

frank opinion !

Sorry mate. I think that the camera skills need to improve a lot before you need to worry about software minor variations.
My eyes aren't great and it may look better on your monitor, but nothing seems sharp.
You have perhaps used a long shutter and I'm not sure why.
I would be using the camera's raw converter and exporting a Tif or just use Aperture/Lightroom.

[etto1972]

Sorry mate. I think that the camera skills need to improve a lot before you need to worry about software minor variations.
My eyes aren't great and it may look better on your monitor, but nothing seems sharp.
You have perhaps used a long shutter and I'm not sure why.
I would be using the camera's raw converter and exporting a Tif or just use Aperture/Lightroom.

Bob, those Pentax files are not mine, they were on line
Despite the luck of sharpness, please look at the C1 full Jpg, the rendering its really good!

[ErikKaffehr]

Hi Ettore,

I have checked out the DNG file in Lightroom. I used the embedded colour profile instead of Adobe Standard and I would say the colours are much more similar to C1. Regarding sharpening I perceive the C1 image quite a bit oversharpened. Lightroom applies quite a lot less of sharpening compared to C1, I was increasing it quite a bit.

The image is backfocused and sharpening should not be a repair too for bad focus.

It seems that C1 does a very good job on processing Pentax 645D DNG-s, but I would not see patching EXIF-data as a long term solution, as Phase One may change their method of detection of competing systems in the next release.

Best regards
Erik

[BobShaw]

I didn't see the Hasselblad file before but just downloaded it and ran it through Phocus. All sliders standard except levels and a bit of Recovery on the search light nose. Crop and export a JPG. It is not a great photo still but at least she is not green. I really don't know why anyone uses DNG.

[pentax645z]

I didn't see the Hasselblad file before but just downloaded it and ran it through Phocus. All sliders standard except levels and a bit of Recovery on the search light nose. Crop and export a JPG. It is not a great photo still but at least she is not green. I really don't know why anyone uses DNG.

She is green with the Hasselblad raw open in LR
not with the DNG in C1

[BobShaw]

She is green with the Hasselblad raw open in LR
not with the DNG in C1

To me they are both green, just different shades. (:-) seasick vs rigor mortis
Look at the histogram on the original raw file compared to either of the LR and C1 process methods. They are vastly different so something has been changed and not for the good of skin colour.

[BobShaw]

I just updated my DNG converter from years ago to the latest and converted the .FFF to .DNG and put them side by side. An obvious colour change and brightness change in the DNG conversion visible in both Preview and Phocus.

[etto1972]

The point I am trying to make is one:

Look at the 2 Jpgs I placed in the dropbox

The one from the hacked DNG in C1 look to me better than the one from the original fff raw exported via Lr

Thanks
E

[BobShaw]

The point I am trying to make is one:
The one from the hacked DNG in C1 look to me better than the one from the original fff raw exported via Lr

Ok, so one is bad and one is worse. Neither would be acceptable to a portrait or product photographer from a $10,000 camera, as both processes generate an unexplained colour change.
After that you are just chasing your tail.
Clearly the Phocus software and exporting a Tif is the only way to go to me.

[pentax645z]

Ok, so one is bad and one is worse. Neither would be acceptable to a portrait or product photographer from a $10,000 camera, as both processes generate an unexplained colour change.
After that you are just chasing your tail.
Clearly the Phocus software and exporting a Tif is the only way to go to me.

I agree!
but i would rather blame the incredibly poor ACR engine
Look here, a hacked and unsupported DNG from the x1D looks better in C1 then the original Hasselblad raw in ACR !!!!

[torger]

but i would rather blame the incredibly poor ACR engine

Why? I think it's a profile thing. I have software that can make profiles both for Lightroom and C1 and the look becomes the same. It's not like a green cast is built-in into ACR, it's a result of the profile.

Depending on which workflow you go and conversions you make you either get a profile hand-designed for the camera, or you get something quick-and-dirty. It's comparing apples to pears.

It's true though that DNG profiles, like ACR uses, are principally designed for certain look elements, while ICC profiles like used in C1 is "look-agnostic". This means that if you want to make a look that is not in line with ACR's original idea you must make an over-sized LUT, that's why my DCamProf profiles is about 1 megabyte for ACR, but can do with 250k for C1. Unfortunately it seems (so far) like Hasselblad doesn't take LR support too seriously and doesn't put effort into replicating the Phocus look there. I haven't studied the latest profiles though so I don't know how it is now, but I'd suspect that the X1D is a bit behind schedule...

Another part that is not really convertible between the different formats (Phocus has a proprietary profile format, in addition to user-provided ICCs) is white balance handling. DNG can be dual-illuminant, Phocus is multi-illuminant, while ICC is single illuminant. In odd light this can make a difference, but those images should be flash/daylight and then it doesn't matter.

[ErikKaffehr]

Hi,

A couple owners of production X1Ds have found that rendition in LR is virtually identical between Phocus and LR. It may be that some posters are jumping conclusions based on preproduction images preprocessed in pre production versions of Phocus.

Best regards
Erik

Why? I think it's a profile thing. I have software that can make profiles both for Lightroom and C1 and the look becomes the same. It's not like a green cast is built-in into ACR, it's a result of the profile.

Depending on which workflow you go and conversions you make you either get a profile hand-designed for the camera, or you get something quick-and-dirty. It's comparing apples to pears.

It's true though that DNG profiles, like ACR uses, are principally designed for certain look elements, while ICC profiles like used in C1 is "look-agnostic". This means that if you want to make a look that is not in line with ACR's original idea you must make an over-sized LUT, that's why my DCamProf profiles is about 1 megabyte for ACR, but can do with 250k for C1. Unfortunately it seems (so far) like Hasselblad doesn't take LR support too seriously and doesn't put effort into replicating the Phocus look there. I haven't studied the latest profiles though so I don't know how it is now, but I'd suspect that the X1D is a bit behind schedule...

Another part that is not really convertible between the different formats (Phocus has a proprietary profile format, in addition to user-provided ICCs) is white balance handling. DNG can be dual-illuminant, Phocus is multi-illuminant, while ICC is single illuminant. In odd light this can make a difference, but those images should be flash/daylight and then it doesn't matter.

[torger]

A couple owners of production X1Ds have found that rendition in LR is virtually identical between Phocus and LR. It may be that some posters are jumping conclusions based on preproduction images preprocessed in pre production versions of Phocus.

I haven't looked at it myself, so I don't know. A quick disassebling look on the actual DCP file used for X1D could give some leads on how they've done. But what I do know is that if just the tone curve is matched, the color rendition can differ quite much and they still look "the same" casually side by side, you need to layer them on top and swap back and forth to see the differences, or include some more saturated colors.

Having a suitable contrast/exposure for the subject often has a larger impact of how "good" an image looks than fine details in color rendition.

[torger]

A quick disassebling look on the actual DCP file used for X1D could give some leads on how they've done.

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.

[sandymc]

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.

DNG's can contain anything, including look tables, etc that a DNG camera profile can contain. Very old versions of ACR etc might not be able to read all of that, but a modern version will.

[torger]

DNG's can contain anything, including look tables, etc that a DNG camera profile can contain. Very old versions of ACR etc might not be able to read all of that, but a modern version will.

True. I was referring to the actual DNG file of the portrait of the woman, as generated by Adobe DNG Converter 9.8. As far as I know the DNG converter doesn't embed the Adobe Standard profiles though, but instead just embeds some basic old-school color matrix, but if you load the DNG in Lightroom or other Adobe product it will automatically apply the Adobe Standard profile (as found in CameraRaw support files), if there is one. If you load the DNG in a third-party software that doesn't care to access the CameraRaw support files (or maybe you don't have it installed) and it falls back to the embedded profile you will get very basic color.

The odd thing about Hasselblad and Adobe Camera Raw is that there's only one profile coming with it, "Hasselblad 39-Coated", while for all(?) other supported models there's one profile per camera model. So they're doing something special with Hasselblad files, or in the worst case they don't really provide any sane profiles at all. It's been like that since many years, but I've never seen any answer to the question why there's only one Hasselblad profile, and since I don't use ACR nor C1 regularly I haven't bothered to really find out. To someone that's interested in how Hasselblad renders in Adobe products it is surely something that would be interesting to know.

[sandymc]

True. I was referring to the actual DNG file of the portrait of the woman, as generated by Adobe DNG Converter 9.8. As far as I know the DNG converter doesn't embed the Adobe Standard profiles though, but instead just embeds some basic old-school color matrix, but if you load the DNG in Lightroom or other Adobe product it will automatically apply the Adobe Standard profile (as found in CameraRaw support files), if there is one. If you load the DNG in a third-party software that doesn't care to access the CameraRaw support files (or maybe you don't have it installed) and it falls back to the embedded profile you will get very basic color.

The odd thing about Hasselblad and Adobe Camera Raw is that there's only one profile coming with it, "Hasselblad 39-Coated", while for all(?) other supported models there's one profile per camera model. So they're doing something special with Hasselblad files, or in the worst case they don't really provide any sane profiles at all. It's been like that since many years, but I've never seen any answer to the question why there's only one Hasselblad profile, and since I don't use ACR nor C1 regularly I haven't bothered to really find out. To someone that's interested in how Hasselblad renders in Adobe products it is surely something that would be interesting to know.

Well, LR/ACR are "interesting" as regards what they do on load. My understanding is that LR/ACR will load an internal color profile when they first load an image. They will then overlay a "named" profile, e.g., Adobe Standard or whatever over that if so configured/one is available, etc. But the "named" profile is not required, and need not be complete. But that is only my understanding. So far as I am aware, Adobe have never been very specific on this. I can tell you that the internal profile/"named" profile overlaying that is how AccuRaw handles DCP profiles.

Sandy

[scyth]

As far as I know the DNG converter doesn't embed the Adobe Standard profiles though

people tend to forget that DNG converter is not the only converter... ACR and LR are DNG converters as well... ACR does embed AS profile in converted DNG (if you select this profile in UI)

[scyth]

DNG's can contain anything

including "icc/icm" profiles actually