ACR vs ?

[madlights]

Was just wondering how many of you on PBase are finding that your own camera's RAW conversion program is doing a better job with color, than Adobe Raw Conversion? I know I have 2 differing cameras, from differing manufacturers, that shoot RAW, and seems to me the proprietary software converts color more truly. Granted Photoshop is very universal, versatile etc...but in RAW color conversion...I don't know from what I've been hearing?...and from a couple of my own tests even. But I'm not sure. Something to think about before converting all a persons files to DNG though...since much proprietary software won't work with DNG. Just wondering what others think.

[dougj]

I prefer Canon's DPP for conversion, the latest version (3.4.1.1) added several improvements and increased the number of lenses for which it can correct aberrations. In terms of color fidelity, DPP seems to do a better job with the reds & yellows. Although DPP can do a direct transfer of the converted file to Photoshop if desired, saving the file in PS is a bit of an annoyance as the default folder is a 'temp' and it takes a lot of mouse clicking to designate a different folder.

I also use ACR due to its seamless integration with PS and the overall performance. If I don't have a lot of yellows or reds, I tend to prefer ACR. I also like ACR for recovery of blown highlights and pulling detail from shadows, I'm constantly fighting this with bird photography. There is a beta version of camera profiles and the DNG editor for ACR 4.5 available via the Adobe Labs website that improves the color renditions. I just installed it but haven't done much in terms of comparisons yet. My initial impressions are good and it looks promising.
http://labs.adobe.com/wiki/index.php/DNG_Profiles

I've tried several other converters - of the ones I've tried each has strengths and perhaps weaknesses. I haven't found one that provides compelling enough reasons to switch. I'm not looking forward to the prospects of converting my RAW files to DNG or another format. I hope Canon & Adobe maintain compatibility with earlier formats.

[madlights]

Thanks Doug..yeah I've found that too...seems DPP does a nice job, but then if a person wants to work on ithe image in Photoshop it's kind of cumbersome-agreed. I wasn't aware of the DNG profile editor, but sure seems interesting and promising. I can't run it on my archaic system (W2kpro and CS) but kind of understand what it's about from a practical point of view, and did some reading about it....and thanks much for the link. It seems strange that even the newest DNG converter won't run on W2K (it says it will, but checked the Adobe forums and saw from the horse's mouth that they were dropping support for Windows 2000) strange business for a converter in a format that was supposed to be somewhat universal, archival, and which seems to mean that anyone with a W2k machine or earlier is out in the cold if they buy a new camera and want to shoot RAW, unless they change operating systems. I think CS3 only works with XP and newer. Someone is working on a DNG converter for Linux I've read, which sounds promising. I've tried various converters also and seem always to come back to Photoshop and ACR. My Olympus camera had a plug in from Olympus for Photoshop that allows an import as if importing from a scanner, and it does a nice job with color. One other converter I really liked (and free) was Raw Shooter Essential which you probably remember, but that's gone, think Adobe bought them out and I heard in the grapevine that some of it was incorporated into Lightroom...sounds plausible but I'm not positive. Thanks

[dougj]

Too bad Adobe is dropping W2K support, that was a decent OS, it's probably due to the cost to do the backward compatibility programing & testing. W2K continues to slowly sink in the sunset, didn't MS already stop the support for this?

I looked at Lightroom when it was in beta, and I just didn't see what it offered that was better than the programs that were available at the time. Now that it's been out for awhile, I understand it's strengths are in workflow and cataloging. Enthusiasts and pros with a lot of photos seem to like it a lot. I used RSE for awhile, not bad once you got used to it, and then Adobe swallowed them as you pointed out. You may be right about RSE & LR, although I understand LR2 RAW conversion is pretty close to ACR, if not the same at this point. I wonder where RSE went? Maybe Adobe is using the RSE engine in ACR, this would make sense as they need to have the same output for an image converted in PS and LR.

Linux seems to be behind the curve with a photo editing program. I hope this changes as I would like to eventually wean myself from MS & Adobe.

Thanks & good shooting...

[bestiakkm]

ACR is very good

[nelu_goia]

My experience showed me that when just using the “fool`s” button, the “Auto”, PhaseOne Capture One PRO and Canon`s DPP are the best, followed by DxO Optics Pro version 5.3 and Adobe Lightroom is the worse.
Now, as I don`t use that button, I use Adobe Lightroom 2 because of its close integration with Photoshop and because of the wealth of available tools.
Anyways, the best the most natural looking colors are out of Canon`s DPP and CaptureOne.
Nowadays most of the raw converters are good so my advice is stick with one of them, learn it and spend your time shooting not trying to decide which one is the best. Don`t repeat my mistake:)
Have fun,
Nelu