Perhaps David Grover would comment on:
A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE SOFTWARE
In the past, one of the common complaints I used to hear from Hasselblad owners was that the CaptureOne
performed all kinds of magic on the files before rendering them as “without any adjustments”,
which wrongly lead people to believe that PhaseOne image quality was better than Hasselblad”.
After working with the Hasselblad software (Phocus) for several weeks,
there is no question in my mind that the situation (at least today) is the exact opposite.
There is a heck of a lot more image processing going on in Phocus than in C1
before an image is displayed (with all adjustments set to zero) in default mode.
It is crystal clear to me that before Phocus displays an image at its default settings,
with “no adjustments”, the software has already applied a large number of adjustments
to lead to a specific look in terms of contrast, color, saturation, clarity and sharpness.
The look is what I would call Velvia double plus.
Imagine the overly saturated and contrasty look of Velvia film and then punch it up not one, but two more notches.
This is what you get in Phocus with “no adjustments”.
While some photographers might like this look (I assume that many Hasselblad owners do),
personally I think it is grossly overdone. The shadows are way too dark, to the point of loosing much detail,
the upper mid-tones and highlights have too much contrast at first and too much compression on the high end;
finally, the color is so exaggerated that it is totally unreal.
There is a “Repro” mode somewhat hidden in the software menus,
which needs to be activated each and every time you open the application if you want to use it (!).
It is supposedly meant for people who need high color accuracy, such as folks making reproductions of fine art.
The very existence of this mode confirms that the software defaults to a specific look,
rather than accuracy or any semblance of “no adjustments”.
Repro mode is definitely more tame, the contrast is much more controlled and it brings back shadow and highlight detail.
In fact, the contrast can often be a little too low. But even in Repro mode the colors and the saturation are quite exaggerated.
As mentioned above, I had the advantage of being able to see the actual objects and compare them to the calibrated EIZO display in my computer,
as well as actual prints under controlled lighting conditions with a GTI Graphics print viewing station,
so the reader will have to trust me on the following comments:
The default mode with no adjustments in CaptureOne renders deadly accurate color and contrast in the PhaseOne images,
both, on the screen and in prints.
With the Hasselblad files, I had to turn on Repro mode, modify the contrast curve, desaturate the colors and adjust hues
before I could come close to matching the real objects either on the screen or in prints.
But even after doing all that, the PhaseOne colors still looked more accurate (perhaps a real expert in Phocus could do better than me).
As usual these kinds of tests are fraught with difficulties. The comparison has caused lots of debate here and also over on getdpi.
I don't know Mark personally or really have an insight into what he does, but his comments on Phocus applying multiple factors to an image even though defaults are set to zero, simply does not stack up.
Time and time again if you compare and H product to a Phase product normally our default rendering is slightly lower contrast and slightly lower saturation. No method is 'wrong' it is just the way we have decided to do things.
Therefore for Mark to find the opposite points that something was not quite right with the settings. Furthermore, stating that Reproduction mode needs to be found every time Phocus is started is also not the case which indicates perhaps Mark was not that comfortable in using Phocus and perhaps did not have everything set to default.
Actually describing the image as Velvia++ really does point to an error somewhere.
Reproduction mode was probably also not his best choice for the kind of images he was shooting. Secondly to say colours and contrast are even exaggerated in Repro mode really means something was a miss elsewhere! Mark is welcome to send me one of his files and I can happily look at it.
Nobody should EVER have to desaturate colours in Repro mode. So I really wonder what Mark did!!! There must have been all kinds of funky settings going against each other.
There is also a strange comment that Mark said he left Hasselblad because of the closed system argument... and then goes on to praise that aspect of the camera as being much better than Phase One?
I also just noticed that on some of the comparison shots the P65 is at 91.5%? I would prefer to see both at 100% regardless of any image size differences.
Anyway, I could go on but I am comforted by the fact that many institutions around the world (Tate London, National Gallery, London, Van Gogh Museum, EMMA, Australian Museums / Archives...multiples in the USA) chose Hasselblad Multi Shot systems for a) Color accuracy Repro mode and c) High resolution without artefacting / moire.
With these kinds of tests I would prefer that an experienced Capture One user handle the Phase side of things and an experienced Phocus user handled Hasselblad. They wouldn't even have to be in the same room - maybe a blind test would be better!
Happy weekend to all - I am off out to enjoy the sunshine.
D
