DXO7 is available for download- works great but WARNING

[jamesn]

So-  I'm experimenting with the brand new DxO7 on my 2006 Mac Pro (7 GB RAM- all hard drives are mechanical).

I tried re-processing the batch of 50 Canon CR2 files that I processed into jpegs just yesterday using DXO 6.6.  I'm shooting a Canon 7D which delivers 25 - 30MB RAW files.  The DxO 6.6 set for complete processor access delivers an average of 4 finished jpegs every 180 seconds (so an average time per jpeg works out to 45 seconds).

The new DXO7 does the same job in 88 seconds for an average time of 22 seconds.  FANTASTIC

Here's what's not fantastic- I tend not to read a lot of documentation.  My way of working with DxO is to process RAW files into jpegs and then import those jpegs into Aperture 3.2 and go from there for small improvements like leveling horizons, slight extra color corrections if the global correction done when I batch process the files with DxO needs tweaking.

At the point of the import of the jpegs into Aperture and when I'm ready to process a new batch of photos I open DxO- note that there's thumbnails of the existing photos processed last time showing in the DxO browser so I click "remove from project" , get the message that the existing photos will be removed and go bye bye- BUT- that doesn't really affect me with DxO 6.6 because I never hold onto any of the extra metadata generated by DxO and the CR2 files remain unchanged in the folder of the hard drive where I keep them.

BIG CHANGE- DxO 7 doesn't treat each batch as a separate project- so when I did my usual "remove files" the ORIGINAL CR2 files got removed from my hard drive and were deposited directly into my "TRASH CONTAINER".  What was left in the folder where the original CR2 files had been located were a bunch of 8Kb files like this:

IMG_1889.CR2.dop 10-20-30      Today 10:17 AM

Fortunately I did what I usually do when attempting to reprocess files (I was going to change the defaults with the new DxO 7 to include extra unsharp masking along with the lens corrections for my Canon 17-40 f/4.0L lens).  I, of course, couldn't do it cause nothing came up when clicking on the folder from my hard disk where the CR2 had resided before I elected to remove the files.  I feel lucky that I checked it out and didn't elect to empty the trash at some point before trying this.

I THINK THIS IS VERY DANGEROUS BEHAVIOUR-  I    assume it must be covered in the documentation so I guess I'm going to have to do some reading.  I thought I should give a warning.

[quismond]

Thanks for the warning.

Have you noticed any improvement in image quality as well compared with V6?

[RFPhotography]

This seems very odd behaviour.  I suspect there's a setting that can be changed so that the original Raw files aren't deleted. 

[jamesn]

I haven't used it enough to make any judgments on improvements.  The output is at least as good as with 6.6 and, of course, it comes twice as fast which is a real improvement. DXO seems incredible in the way it can take ISO 1600 files and produce files with almost no noticeable grain at any normal enlargement size.  The Canon 7D is capable of producing exceptional files but I noticed that the RAW files need to be sharpened more aggressively than did the files from my Canon 20D. In addition to the automatic setting DxO gives the lenses that I use I add an additional 206 setting to the unsharp mask settings.  That seems to reliably produce a nice sharp jpeg for me.  I need to do a lot more experimenting with basic settings.

[BernardLanguillier]

DxO is slowly, but surely, taking an increasingly important place in my worflow as well.

Once you have gotten used to having perfectly straight lines in your images the slighest amount of distorsion becomes painful to the eye does it not?

We are close to a level where using a camera/lens combo that is not supported by DxO becomes a serious liability.

Cheers,
Bernard

[andyptak]

Have they moved to 16 bit processing yet?

Thanks

[BernardLanguillier]

Have they moved to 16 bit processing yet?

What makes you think they were not 16 bits?

They have been able to generate 16 bits tiffs for many generations.

Cheers,
Bernard

[ixania2]

DxO is slowly, but surely, taking an increasingly important place in my worflow as well.

Once you have gotten used to having perfectly straight lines in your images the slighest amount of distorsion becomes painful to the eye does it not?

We are close to a level where using a camera/lens combo that is not supported by DxO becomes a serious liability.

Ive just compared dxo7 to c1: dxo is remarkably worse on demosaicing. Ok, straight lines, thats a different game. Dxo is even worse in most situations than raw developer 193, especially regarding skin (compared to both c1 and rdev). V7 is really much more faster than v6, cut in half, though.

[quismond]

What makes you think they were not 16 bits?

They have been able to generate 16 bits tiffs for many generations.

Cheers,
Bernard

I guess he means there is not (yet) a 64-bit version:

http://www.focus-numerique.com/test-1326/logiciel-dxo-optics-pro-7-1.html

(at the bottom in "Points faibles")

[quismond]

Ive just compared dxo7 to c1: dxo is remarkably worse on demosaicing. Ok, straight lines, thats a different game. Dxo is even worse in most situations than raw developer 193, especially regarding skin (compared to both c1 and rdev). V7 is really much more faster than v6, cut in half, though.

It would be possible for you to post any sample images (or crops) from your tests to show the difference?

Thank you in advance.

(I use LR3, RD 1.9 and DxO, just starting with the last one)

[Lost]

I downloaded a trial of DXO 7 and ran a test on several images. One of these (a high-contrast 5DII image) had some nasty shadow banding and purple blotches when processed in Lightroom 3.5. But DXO gave a much better result, with reduced banding and no colour blotching in the pushed areas.

For most other images that I tried, I found that I could generally tweak the Lightroom settings so that I couldn't really see much difference between Lightroom and DXO - even with the geometry and sharpness corrections and a not-too-brilliant 16-35mm zoom.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to tell if this is simply because I am more familiar with Lightroom than DXO, so I would be interested to know how people find DXO compared to other raw converters.... it seems a lot of money to pay for something that only works noticeably better better on a very small subset of images.

[rickk]

I've used DxO occasionally since it was first available for the Mac OS. The interface and relatively slow processing kept me from using it routinely. However, for some images that were "sub-optimal" after my best efforts in ACR, DxO processing did wonders. So, it was a very worthwhile tool to have available. I just obtained the version 7 upgrade yesterday, and it appears to be a big step forward. I might start using it much more often.

Regards,      Rick

[BernardLanguillier]

Ive just compared dxo7 to c1: dxo is remarkably worse on demosaicing. Ok, straight lines, thats a different game. Dxo is even worse in most situations than raw developer 193, especially regarding skin (compared to both c1 and rdev). V7 is really much more faster than v6, cut in half, though.

Raw developer is in my book the best raw software on OSX in terms of conversion quality so I am not that surprised. I do indeed prefer the demosaicing of C1 Pro that I use as my main converter, but the gap between C1 Pro and DxO has been closing I find.

I will probably keep using C1 Pro for landscape images that I intend to include in a large pano... and will use DxO for most other images since the one click result is excellent most of the time.

Cheers,
Bernard

[ixania2]

It would be possible for you to post any sample images (or crops) from your tests to show the difference?

Thank you in advance.

(I use LR3, RD 1.9 and DxO, just starting with the last one)

this red carpet pic is not really sharp but a typical surrounding for my kind of work: fast pace, tungsten, moving people, and shows the typiscal differences seen in any picture of this kind.
this was taken from a distance with canon 1ds mk3 and 50L, ISO 1000, 1/160 sec, f 6.3

1st comparision: left side is c1.632, right side is raw dev.193
2nd comparision: left side is DXO 7, right side is raw developer 193.
Both not in standard, but developed to my best needs, including noise reduction, sharpening, wb etc.
 


screenshot of 100% crop, out of photomechanic
the head belongs to ... andie mac dowell

[quismond]

Thanks again, ixania2, for the comparison.
I prefer RD 1.9.3 - adjusting (warming) WB of course - even with the more obvious noise in the red background; it's the more natural, film-like rendition IMHO.
Very strange result with DxO 7, I guess it must be on default mode...

[BernardLanguillier]

There appears to be a lot more noise reduction applied to the DxO 7 image, right?

Cheers,
Bernard

[ixania2]

There appears to be a lot more noise reduction applied to the DxO 7 image, right?

Cheers,
Bernard

yes, it appears. but it isn't.
attached on the left the same pic in DXO7 with my kind of noise reducuctionas above. on the right: noise reduction completely off (pay attention to the background).
the same smearing effect on skin as with NR on.

[BernardLanguillier]

Can you provide the raw file?

Cheers,
Bernard

[robgo2]

Raw developer is in my book the best raw software on OSX in terms of conversion quality so I am not that surprised. I do indeed prefer the demosaicing of C1 Pro that I use as my main converter, but the gap between C1 Pro and DxO has been closing I find.

I will probably keep using C1 Pro for landscape images that I intend to include in a large pano... and will use DxO for most other images since the one click result is excellent most of the time.

Cheers,
Bernard

I was a devoted user of DxO Optics Pro 5 until I discovered Capture One.  I have kept up with DxO versions 6 and 7, and I see no reason to go back.  DxO's only advantage is the lens correction modules, which I can easily live without.  With V 7, the image quality is a bit more naturalistic and less amped up than with earlier versions, but still, it is not pleasing to my eye.  DxO images look good, until you compare them to other raw converters, and then, not so good.

BTW, the best raw converter, IMO, is Raw Photo Processor (RPP), but it is Mac only and is not a full-featured workflow machine, so it will not appeal to many who want an all-in-one image editing program.  I use RPP for converting my best images, which I then finish off in Photoshop.  The results are sensational.  I am also quite familiar with Raw Developer, which is a little gem of a program, but C1 is more suitable for mass image processing and RPP for primo images.  The truth of the matter is that there are quite a few raw converters that perform at a decent level.  One can hone one's skills with any of them to get above average results.  To me, it makes sense to be familiar with 2 or 3 programs and use the one that best suits the circumstances.

Rob