Question to DXO pure-raw users

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
I shoot in Raw. Import into CP1 1st. Referenced files on an external SSD. Locate in finder..right click and open with DXO. Process and 'open' with CP1 (without transferring original Raw files). Import window opens in CP1. I import all DNG files. They are put in the same place as their original Raw file.
There is more to my workflow, but this is the how I get to PP the DNG files I want.
I have recently changed my shooting to Nikon's Raw HE*.
 
Member's gallery
Ralph said:
Yes. After running through DXO You save as DNG and then import into any photo app you want. Don’t save as JPEG.
Click to expand...
That's the raw Bayer <=> raster bitmap conversion I'd avoid doing more than once because you need to interpret the image each time you do that (details below). Moreover, if those conversions are done by two different tools, I doubt it's consistent. I think that once you're in raster bitmap, you should stay there and avoid other tools that prefer working on Bayer. If you must do it, you should at least take a 16-bit colour format and avoid lossy compression, but expect those files to be quite big. So indeed, don't save as JPEG, but 16-bit TIFF should be fine.

That being said, I'm not 100% sure but I think that most of the colour adjustments, cropping, geometry transforms, etc, are performed on raster bitmap, so it should be safe if you stick to those operations once you're in raster. Tools like Rawtherapee and Darktable make it visible, but other tools like Adobe's hide that from the user, so it's less obvious. There are normally just a few operations that are performed on the raw format before demosaicing; for example, if I understand well their confusing website, DXO's denoising is done on raw.

Doesn't DXO PhotoLab have all the necessary tools anyway? When I briefly tried it, it lacked a proper vectorscope for colour grading (which not everybody uses), but otherwise seemed to have all the necessary features.


PS: Since I'm not sure everyone is familiar with the details: raw Bayer is the 2x2 RGGB (or variant) pixel arrangement in DNG, NEF, ... Raster bitmap is the classic image with RGB pixels like in JPEG (8-bit colours), PPM, PNG, TIFF (8 or 16-bit colours), ... Transforming one of the R, G, G, B single-colour pixel to one full RGB pixel - demosaicing - requires some interpretation based on the surrounding pixels, and there are many different algorithms for that, as there are many different sensor colour filters for those R/GG/B colours, meaning they're not exactly the same RGGB colours on different cameras. That's why going back & forth can't be too good, in my opinion.

1743238921246.png

left: raw RGGB Bayer, right: raster RGB bitmap​
 
Member's gallery
Unscript said:
That's the raw Bayer <=> raster bitmap conversion I'd avoid doing more than once because you need to interpret the image each time you do that (details below). Moreover, if those conversions are done by two different tools, I doubt it's consistent. I think that once you're in raster bitmap, you should stay there and avoid other tools that prefer working on Bayer. If you must do it, you should at least take a 16-bit colour format and avoid lossy compression, but expect those files to be quite big. So indeed, don't save as JPEG, but 16-bit TIFF should be fine.

That being said, I'm not 100% sure but I think that most of the colour adjustments, cropping, geometry transforms, etc, are performed on raster bitmap, so it should be safe if you stick to those operations once you're in raster. Tools like Rawtherapee and Darktable make it visible, but other tools like Adobe's hide that from the user, so it's less obvious. There are normally just a few operations that are performed on the raw format before demosaicing; for example, if I understand well their confusing website, DXO's denoising is done on raw.

Doesn't DXO PhotoLab have all the necessary tools anyway? When I briefly tried it, it lacked a proper vectorscope for colour grading (which not everybody uses), but otherwise seemed to have all the necessary features.


PS: Since I'm not sure everyone is familiar with the details: raw Bayer is the 2x2 RGGB (or variant) pixel arrangement in DNG, NEF, ... Raster bitmap is the classic image with RGB pixels like in JPEG (8-bit colours), PPM, PNG, TIFF (8 or 16-bit colours), ... Transforming one of the R, G, G, B single-colour pixel to one full RGB pixel - demosaicing - requires some interpretation based on the surrounding pixels, and there are many different algorithms for that, as there are many different sensor colour filters for those R/GG/B colours, meaning they're not exactly the same RGGB colours on different cameras. That's why going back & forth can't be too good, in my opinion.

View attachment 110005
left: raw RGGB Bayer, right: raster RGB bitmap​
Click to expand...
All I can tell you is I start with DXO my photos turn out well. Affinity photo also states that you should start with DXO, then proceed with affinity editing.
 
Member's gallery
Ralph said:
All I can tell you is I start with DXO my photos turn out well. Affinity photo also states that you should start with DXO, then proceed with affinity editing.
Click to expand...
That makes sense, at least if you're using the other Affinity personas than Develop. I quite like Affinity Photo, but it's relatively limited when it comes to processing raw files. They're working on that, I think.
 
The cool thing about dxo is that is does the lens corrections and denoising on the raw as part of the demosaicing process. So one would turn off lens corrections in Lightroom, etc.
 
Member's gallery
What I have found when using DXO and then CP1 is that once DXO does their lens correction; it is no longer available in CP1.
I am ok with that since DXO has developed the most comprehensive lens correction algorithms for my Nikon lenses.
CP1 basically limits their correction for Z lenses to what is baked into the Raw file.
 
Member's gallery
jbk2forum said:
What I have found when using DXO and then CP1 is that once DXO does their lens correction; it is no longer available in CP1.
I am ok with that since DXO has developed the most comprehensive lens correction algorithms for my Nikon lenses.
CP1 basically limits their correction for Z lenses to what is baked into the Raw file.
Click to expand...
I have found the same but I think that's because DxO exports a DNG file and in the metadata it must indicate that it already has implemented lens correction.
 
Member's gallery
JP Onstwedder said:
I have found the same but I think that's because DxO exports a DNG file and in the metadata it must indicate that it already has implemented lens correction.
Click to expand...
You may be right. I can export as Tiff and I assume it will be the same. Once DXO does the lens correction, there is no need to do more with CP1. Does it work the same way if one uses PS?
 
Member's gallery
From my experience.
When using DxO lens correction, opening the DNG in ACR, I will find lens correction OFF automatically.

Another point to remember;
Setting lens correction to Soft is the best idea. Any setting higher, will add good old fashioned un-mask sharpening. Then it is impossible to add additional sharpening in ACR, because it will look awful. Besides, DxO sharpening is very fake and looks unnatural oversharpened in areas of the image.

I can demonstrate it if necessary.
 
Member's gallery
JoelKlein said:
I believe that DxO should be consider updating the list, because the word ‘Soft’ is misleading.
Click to expand...
The DxO PureRaw manual says that the 'soft' setting is the equivalent of a sharpness setting of zero in DxO Photolab yet it still seems to produce some sharpening effect in PureRaw. Is that just the other lens corrections at work?

Edit: I'm new to PureRAw having only just purchased a licence
 
Member's gallery
tigger4t said:
The DxO PureRaw manual says that the 'soft' setting is the equivalent of a sharpness setting of zero in DxO Photolab yet it still seems to produce some sharpening effect in PureRaw. Is that just the other lens corrections at work?

Edit: I'm new to PureRAw having only just purchased a licence
Click to expand...
Probably.
I asked Thom Hogan, he advised me to contact DxO directly, I waited a long time to get a clear answer from DxO, and they confirmed my assessment. I remember posting it here somewhere in this forum.
 
If one looks at the image after dxo in lightroom and turns sharpening to one, then hold alt while clicking the radius slider, you can see what dxo did to the edges during lens correction.

That's something I like about Photolab. The lens softness tool is on sliders rather than categories, and there are sliders for sharpness, detail, and bokeh. With the loupe view you can see the results real time. There is a separate unsharp mask tool, but dxo recommends leaving that off if there is a module for that lens, since the sharpness slider in lens correction is already sharpening.
 
Member's gallery
For what it’s worth, I’ve used pure raw for a few years now and always turn lens softness off and just use the lens corrections. I find it works better that way. Having said that, after an image is ran through this program, I never go above 8-10 on sharpness inside Lightroom ever on any image. I have an import preset to zero all of those sliders when I bring images into Lightroom off the SD card . I never get anywhere near the default 40 in Adobe and find that works much better. I truly think pure raw is one of the best programs there is on the market and I’ve had nothing but great luck out of it. There were a few snafu with version three that I was able to get resolved, but all in all it’s just a great program and can’t imagine not having it. Topaz on the other hand as a program that I most likely will not renew again because I think they have really Did themselves a disservice by trying to combine all those programs. I just don’t think any version of it has ever worked as good as Denoise standalone.
 
Member's gallery
sh1209 said:
For what it’s worth, I’ve used pure raw for a few years now and always turn lens softness off and just use the lens corrections. I find it works better that way. Having said that, after an image is ran through this program, I never go above 8-10 on sharpness inside Lightroom ever on any image. I have an import preset to zero all of those sliders when I bring images into Lightroom off the SD card . I never get anywhere near the default 40 in Adobe and find that works much better. I truly think pure raw is one of the best programs there is on the market and I’ve had nothing but great luck out of it. There were a few snafu with version three that I was able to get resolved, but all in all it’s just a great program and can’t imagine not having it. Topaz on the other hand as a program that I most likely will not renew again because I think they have really Did themselves a disservice by trying to combine all those programs. I just don’t think any version of it has ever worked as good as Denoise standalone.
Click to expand...
Well, As per Thom Hogen, DxO lens profiles are the best in the business, and even converting RAW files are superior, because Adobe’s conversion are meant for speed for the cost of conversion quality.

I still feel that putting extra sharpening in the same drop down with correction, is a disservice. It should be in its own box.

Regarding Topaz, It is a fantastic tool to work with files within photoshop. By now the combined photo ai toolset is mature.
 
Member's gallery
JoelKlein said:
Well, As per Thom Hogen, DxO lens profiles are the best in the business, and even converting RAW files are superior, because Adobe’s conversion are meant for speed for the cost of conversion quality.

I still feel that putting extra sharpening in the same drop down with correction, is a disservice. It should be in its own box.

Regarding Topaz, It is a fantastic tool to work with files within photoshop. By now the combined photo ai toolset is mature.
Click to expand...
I found it just turning lens softness off gives a good result and you really hardly ever need any sharpening in Lightroom classic or your photo editor whichever one you use maybe in the future they will further refine it
 
Looking at some youtube previews of the new pureraw, I like that they have added sliders to the tools rather than just dropdown categories. Especially on the lens correction, now you can dial in any amount and see the impact on the screen.
 
Member's gallery
Looks like users of PL 8.0 will need to pay to upgrade to PL 8.5 in order to get the PureRaw 5 features.
I'll wait to hear back from PR 5 users who upgraded from PR 4 before I make my decision.
 
Member's gallery
jbk2forum said:
Looks like users of PL 8.0 will need to pay to upgrade to PL 8.5 in order to get the PureRaw 5 features.
I'll wait to hear back from PR 5 users who upgraded from PR 4 before I make my decision.
Click to expand...
DxO Photolab 8.5 update was just released, free of charge, as promised in earlier postings on their forum.
I've installed it, no problems....
cheers,
Alex
 
Member's gallery
AlexY said:
DxO Photolab 8.5 update was just released, free of charge, as promised in earlier postings on their forum.
I've installed it, no problems....
cheers,
Alex
Click to expand...
Interesting Alex. I looked on their website and they explicitly said that it was a paid upgrade. When do you purchase 8.0?
Jon
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top