Can I get LrC to better render Z8 colors?

If you would like to post, you'll need to register. Note that if you have a BCG store account, you'll need a new, separate account here (we keep the two sites separate for security purposes).

Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
I've been looking at doing this but haven't been able to get a photo to match the embedded JPG closely enough to turn it into a profile. Do either of the threads you linked discuss a way for doing this, or do you have another suggestion for how to get a custom profile figured out?
Click to expand...
It really sounds like Lightroom isn't reading the camera profile if the raw editor settings don't closely match the jpeg image. It's pretty easy to test if camera profiles are being properly applied during raw conversion by temporarily setting your in-camera image control to one of the more extreme settings and see if that is applied during import.

For instance I just went out to the yard and shot the following image with my Z9 Image Settings set to Monochrome. Here's what the image looks like on import into LR with the LR Global Preferences set to Camera Settings:

import1.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

It's easy to see that LR did honor the in-camera profile settings and render the image in monochrome.

You might do a similar test to make sure the camera profile is being correctly read as the image is imported into LR, just pick some very obvious Image Control setting in the camera and see if the image in LR is adjusted accordingly. If all that works properly then yeah, something like careful camera calibration and setting a custom profile would work but I'd start by making sure the camera profile is being read by LR.
 
Member's gallery
bleirer said:
Something is not adding up. A jpeg generated in camera is generated from the raw using the camera settings. The Lightroom rendering using camera settings ought to be similar, and to my eye they are in fact similar for the example you gave.
Click to expand...

The image on the right is clearly more vibrant to me, but in a sort of artificial, overdone way. The one on the left has more balanced colors and a subtle but noticeably better contrast in the details.
bleirer said:
It sounds like you are describing a white balance issue and you are purposely setting the white balance to some setting that doesn't match your light. But in that case the in camera jpeg would also be processed with the same as shot white balance. Outdoors, "auto" usually does fine on most cameras maybe with some small tweaking. Or maybe shoot a neutral card so you can use the eyedropper to see how different the auto is to the eyedropper.
Click to expand...

In the DSLR days, it was extremely common for Nikon shooters to say that you should just set the white balance to cloudy for any outdoor photo even if the lighting was not actually cloudy. It was widely believed that this yielded the best white balance results. With mirrorless, a lot of people are now saying you should use the daylight WB in this same way for the best results. A smaller group claims natural light auto is best. I had usually used auto, but had been having trouble with the white balance looking off and being unable to quite correct it in post, so I started to try setting it to daylight as many suggest. If I look at the camera display or the jpeg that the camera embeds in the raw files, this has indeed yielded good results. However, in Lr it doesn'took the same, even using the camera settings profile.
 
Member's gallery
When I look at the Lr color profile it matches the camera: "camera vivid" if I set the camera on vivid, "camera standard" if I set the camera on standard, etc.
 
Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
That was the default and so it's how everything has been on import. I've tried changing it to the appropriate camera matching color profile (which is Camera Vivid for the example I shared; usually I have had the camera on neutral or standard but I was experimenting with vivid). I have of late been starting my editing by changing "as shot" to "auto." Why? Well, I had been reading a lot of users saying that for their Z8/9 their best results are to set the WB to daylight - which is similar from the old tried and true standard of people setting their Nikon WB to cloudy - so I thought I'd give it a try. In the EVF, it looks great. On the back LCD of the camera, it looks great. When I'd import to LR, with "Adobe color" and WB "As Shot" everything had a horrible sickly yellow/green tone, like you were looking at the photo through a glass of yellow Easter egg dye. Setting it to "Auto" would get something that looked a heck of a lot better.

I think the point is that suffice it to say I'm aware of this control and setting it to the appropriate camera profile doesn't get things to look like the camera actually does.
Click to expand...
See this article on LRc and Nikon camera choices. If it isn’t looking right to you it could be your monitor. Assuming you are using the Nikon profiles and understand from the article what happens.
 
Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
In the DSLR days, it was extremely common for Nikon shooters to say that you should just set the white balance to cloudy for any outdoor photo even if the lighting was not actually cloudy.
Click to expand...
That was true for the early generations of Nikon DSLRs but since at least the D3/D4 era Auto WB has worked very well.

Different folks have different preferences these days but personally in the latest Nikons I start with Auto-Daylight but adjust as needed for changing light conditions and don't hesitate to use a fixed value in Kelvin or doing a WB Preset for difficult lighting conditions. There is no, one size fits all WB as folks shoot in very different lighting and have different ideas of what looks good much in the same way many outdoor photographers used 81b warming filters in the film days but others didn't like that warmed look very much and took other approaches.
 
Member's gallery
Palouse said:
Yup, Camera Vivid at work. Try Standard or Neutral.
Click to expand...
Note that both images are in vivid, but the left one, which I think looks alright, is Nikon's jpeg while the right, which is overdone, is Adobe's imitation of Nikon's vivid.

I have done this with standard, neutral, etc. and in each case Adobe's "camera standard" or "camera neutral," etc., look different from Nikon's. Adobe's own "Adobe standard" or "Adobe neutral" also look different, but that's fine: they're not meant to look like what the camera produces.

Put differently, if I process in Nikon's NX Studio and choose Vivid it will look fine, like the image on the left. The same raw file processed with Lr's camera color profile looks like the overdone image on the right. Unfortunately, NX Studio lacks a lot of the tools that Lr has which are very helpful in editing, but Lr seems incapable of quite matching Nikon's good looking colors even with manual edits.
 
How I understand white balance is you are telling the camera or the software what you think the light is doing. If set to cloudy or set to a higher Kelvin like 6500 you are saying the light is cool (bluer) and the camera adjusts by warming the image trying to get back to the middle. If you do this on a sunny day is will warm the image (more toward the orange/yellow) which can be nice if your aesthetic prefers it to be warm-leaning.


In software how I get it works is that moving the temp slider left lowers the red channel white point at the same time it raises the blue channel white point. Moving the temp slider right raises the red channel white point while lowering the blue channel white point.

Moving the tint slider to the left lowers the combined red and blue white points but raises the green white point. Moving the tint right raises the combined red and blue but lowers the green white point. Since it is only white point it affects highlights more.

So one could do that in curves as well using the separate RGB curves. In Photoshop if you open curves and hold alt while pressing auto you get variations on this to choose from.

Long way of saying auto gets it right often, or close. But clicking on a neutral target is the best way to verify. Doesn't have to be white, just neutral.
 
Member's gallery
A couple of thoughts, not sure how these settings might be applied to NEF vs JPEG.

Active D-Lighting? I know that Active D-Lighting does change the exposure a little, not sure how it might alter NEF vs JPEG
Color Space settings? Not sure how much impact that could have

Maybe some other settings that might be applied to the embedded JPEG but will not be imported into LrC.
 
Member's gallery
MartyD said:
A couple of thoughts, not sure how these settings might be applied to NEF vs JPEG.

Active D-Lighting? I know that Active D-Lighting does change the exposure a little, not sure how it might alter NEF vs JPEG
Color Space settings? Not sure how much impact that could have

Maybe some other settings that might be applied to the embedded JPEG but will not be imported into LrC.
Click to expand...
Good thoughts. Unfortunately I already had them and checked. I always have Active D-Lighting off and, yep, I did remember to turn it off with this camera, too.
 
Member's gallery
I would experiment with a grey card (use it to match WB as a starting point). Just for an experiment / to test. What are your JPG Picture Controls set to? You can match them in Lr with camera profiles BUT, they don't quite match up (I tried this with monochrome and it's just not the same). But as others have said, with more info in RAW you can certainly match the accompanying JPG files by hand. Are you utilizing all controls in Lr (beyond the Basic panel)?

Another thought / what I do. Shoot RAW + JPG (Fine*) always. Choose your battles. Meaning - if you like the JPG - why not just use the JPG? Mix & match your file types. If you always shoot both, you can choose later. Use RAW for shots with a lot of dynamic range, portfolio images / favorites. I keep a lot of family snapshots that don't require the additional info in RAW files. Personal memories / moments that don't need to take up that much drive space. Ideal for "shoot & share" situations and it saves a load of time (5-10 edits vs fine-tuning RAW files, prior to sharing).

RAW has its purpose, JPG has its purpose and they are both useful.

Lastly, if you want a much easier match, the use Nikon's free NX Studio app in your workflow. You can apply Picture Profiles with great accuracy (plus skin smoothing and similar). Hope this helps in some way!


SCoombs said:
I always do raw. However, I am finding that no amount of changing WB in Lr or editing while working on the raw can get the colors right, while the camera's embedded jpg always looks right and much, much better than anything I can get Lr to output.
Click to expand...
 
Member's gallery
First I use Datacolor SpyderCHECKR 24 to make colour corrections for each camera/lens combination. This creates Lightroom presets for the HSL sliders. The colours will be optimal, even with different camera manufacturers. To apply them, use Lightroom filters and select all pictures with a particular camera/lens combination.

I also use SpyderX Elite to calibrate my monitor(s).
 
MikePapple said:
First I use Datacolor SpyderCHECKR 24 to make colour corrections for each camera/lens combination. This creates Lightroom presets for the HSL sliders. The colours will be optimal, even with different camera manufacturers. To apply them, use Lightroom filters and select all pictures with a particular camera/lens combination.

I also use SpyderX Elite to calibrate my monitor(s).
Click to expand...

I'll just add on that the Spyderchecker gives very similar results to the color checker passport previously mentioned. The only difference is the color checker passport makes a profile that you drop down ftom the camera profile section in lightroom (leaving HSL panel unchanged) while as you said the Spyderchecker adjusts the HSL panel and leaves the profiles alone.
 
Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
Is it possible to get more LrC to render/read/whatever colors more accurately to the Z8's in camera color than it does? I have been spending an inordinate amount of time lately trying to get white balance and color correct in my editing as it's felt pretty off from what I remember photographing and in sorting this out I have discovered the world on color profiles and all of that - one aspect of processing I was not too familiar with. I have tried using LrC's camera color profiles, but they're still pretty far off to me. Here is one random photo showing the difference between the embedded preview (right) and what LrC says is matching the camera (right). If I further edit the photo myself from here I can get it a bit closer - largely by changing the hue of greens to be more yellow and playing with exposure - but it's still different enough that I prefer the color of the original even if the phoo is worse for not having been processed.

View attachment 68836View attachment 68837
Click to expand...
I feel your pain. Many of my images shot with my Z8 appear overly saturated and just off. It seems different than how LrC rendered images from my D850 and Z7. It's been driving me a bit crazy. I bought a datacolor package and calibrated my monitor to no avail. My monitor was actually pretty accurate already. I 've taken the advice offered by some of the generous posts in this thread and have some work to do as soon as I find time to create custom camera profiles with the Sypder Checkr24. Still I wonder why I have this problem with the Z8 but not with my other Nikon cameras.
 
Member's gallery
I use Light Room Classic on a Mac Studio M1 Max and a 27" Apple Studio Display calibrated with a Spyder X Elite.

I changed my Preferences, Presets Global to Camera Settings from Adobe Default. With the Z9, and some other camera bodies this brings in and applies not only the Picture Control settings but also most of the rest of the EXIF data including high ISO noise reduction settings etc..
 
Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
Is it possible to get more LrC to render/read/whatever colors more accurately to the Z8's in camera color than it does? I have been spending an inordinate amount of time lately trying to get white balance and color correct in my editing as it's felt pretty off from what I remember photographing and in sorting this out I have discovered the world on color profiles and all of that - one aspect of processing I was not too familiar with. I have tried using LrC's camera color profiles, but they're still pretty far off to me. Here is one random photo showing the difference between the embedded preview (right) and what LrC says is matching the camera (right). If I further edit the photo myself from here I can get it a bit closer - largely by changing the hue of greens to be more yellow and playing with exposure - but it's still different enough that I prefer the color of the original even if the phoo is worse for not having been processed.

View attachment 68836View attachment 68837
Click to expand...
Adobe always takes time to catch up with new cameras.
Nikons' own software does a good job until then ... 🦘
 
Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
Is it possible to get more LrC to render/read/whatever colors more accurately to the Z8's in camera color than it does? I have been spending an inordinate amount of time lately trying to get white balance and color correct in my editing as it's felt pretty off from what I remember photographing and in sorting this out I have discovered the world on color profiles and all of that - one aspect of processing I was not too familiar with. I have tried using LrC's camera color profiles, but they're still pretty far off to me. Here is one random photo showing the difference between the embedded preview (right) and what LrC says is matching the camera (right). If I further edit the photo myself from here I can get it a bit closer - largely by changing the hue of greens to be more yellow and playing with exposure - but it's still different enough that I prefer the color of the original even if the phoo is worse for not having been processed.

View attachment 68836View attachment 68837
Click to expand...
There are actually 3 different images that LRc displays and they can all have different color spaces. The embedded jpeg appears in the import dialogue and is in either sRGB or Adobe 98 depending on camera setting. The preview shown in Library module is a different file to the embedded jpeg and is generated by LRc in Adobe 98 (unless you don't create previews in which case it is the embedded jpeg) and the rendering shown in the Develop module is different again and is in Prophoto. So the image on the left you are trying to match, where are you viewing it and what actually is it?
 
Member's gallery
Alistair said:
There are actually 3 different images that LRc displays and they can all have different color spaces. The embedded jpeg appears in the import dialogue and is in either sRGB or Adobe 98 depending on camera setting. The preview shown in Library module is a different file to the embedded jpeg and is generated by LRc in Adobe 98 (unless you don't create previews in which case it is the embedded jpeg) and the rendering shown in the Develop module is different again and is in Prophoto. So the image on the left you are trying to match, where are you viewing it and what actually is it?
Click to expand...
It's the preview in the Library module and Lightroom puts a little label on it that specifically says "embedded jpeg." I have never taken the time to have LR create previews.
 
Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
It's the preview in the Library module and Lightroom puts a little label on it that specifically says "embedded jpeg." I have never taken the time to have LR create previews.
Click to expand...
If I understood your question correctly you were interested in how to get better color when you process the raw image in the develop module which is only related to the embedded jpeg preview in that it is showing the .jpg with your adjustments in camera. It has no impact on how you can develop raw files in LRC.

I posted above the way I have found to make it work the best to process your raw images in LRC to show your in camera settings. If you use this method, make no changes in LRC and check it against what you see when you open the same raw image in NX Studio they should be pretty much the same.
 
Last edited:
Member's gallery
SCoombs said:
It's the preview in the Library module and Lightroom puts a little label on it that specifically says "embedded jpeg." I have never taken the time to have LR create previews.
Click to expand...
Great, that narrows it down to 2 different images. Is the embedded jpeg sRGB or Adobe 98 (i.e. what is your camera set to?).
 
Member's gallery
This thread's a bit old, so you might very well have solved your problem at this point. I certainly agree that you must calibrate your monitor and per Karen's suggestion to create a custom profile for your camera(s) and set that as the import default is a good one. I did that for a long time. However, I found that LR tended to oversaturate the images (to keep up with Capture One maybe? Don't know).

Recently I found this on Tony Kuyper's site: https://tonykuyper.wordpress.com/20...a-new-beginning-in-light-room-and-camera-raw/

I have been using them for a few months now and so far I am really liking it. May work for you, may not. But might be worth a try. All is costs is some time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top