Sony files, what am I missing?

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dtibbals said:
So I clicked on it and see no camera models just adobe color profiles. How do you set it for a specific camera? Since I haven’t had any issues with editing I’m not sure I want to make changes but I’m curious as to if it’s even better.
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You need to Browse in the drop down to see them.
Also remember to check your settings on import - you have a bunch of options, using whatever profile was used in camera, using any other camera profile (override the one used at shooting), using an Adobe profile or using any other profile you want. If you want all your A1 files to default to Camera Standard, or Camera NT that's the easiest way.

I do shoot with Camera NT enabled because the profile used influences the histogram shown (histogram is based on the processed jpg, not raw data, so a contrasty profile will show less dynamic range than there is for example) and I have picked a profile with low contrast.
But on import I am now defaulting to my own profiles created with Color Checker, which are more punchy and more accurate I find.
 
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The greens on the Sony. I feel there is some uniformity to the greens made with Sony stacked camera sensors based on 1000s of images that I have seen of them on Flickr & other medium. It could be a reason why an image looks less life-like (non 3d). I feel the Z9 often outputs the whites as bluish purples often. I wonder if I am right or they are just anecdotal & subjective...
 
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I’m going to experiment with the in camera white balance settings the next time I go out and see what that is straight out of Camera. It could be a something as simple as that that makes editing a little easier
 
Hut2 said:
In my A1 menu> Image Quality> Color Space: AdobeRGB

I honestly have no idea how this affects my RAW files. It was a set it and forget it for me. Maybe default 🤷‍♂️

sRGB or AdobeRGB 🤷‍♂️
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Raw files in Lightroom automatically use a version of prophoto color space for the develop module and Adobe RGB for previews and such. It doesn't matter what is set in camera, Lightroom ignores it. What is set in camera only works if you shoot in jpeg. Converting the colorspace only happens on export if you tell it to convert, or if you go from Lightroom to edit in Photoshop then Photoshop will assign prophoto unless you use the color settings menu to instruct it otherwise, or use the convert to profile menu.
 
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dtibbals said:
So I clicked on it and see no camera models just adobe color profiles. How do you set it for a specific camera? Since I haven’t had any issues with editing I’m not sure I want to make changes but I’m curious as to if it’s even better.
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Click on the little browse icon top right in that area, if your camera has camera specific profiles it will be there. Not all cameras are supported with camera profiles, find your camera in the list below and look at the second column.

 
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Maybe you should just give capture one pro a try with their 30 day trial. I find their color profiles to be exceptional although I'm not sure how well it works with sony files. During my limited time with sony gear (A7R4 /A9) I had trouble getting the colors to my liking. Particularly the greens and yellow to orange transitions. I have also had the exact same 'subjective' opinion regarding the 3d pop/ lack of it but I always thought that was due to the glass.

When I was using Lightroom, i always found adobe color profile/ Nikon landscape or Nikon vibrant profiles to be a bit too saturated. I'd mostly prefer Nikon standard or Portrait or in case of extreme contrast use Nikon flat profile. I'm now using capture one pro and find those color profiles almost match Nikon studio ( which i prefer). After several months of use, I'm now a huge fan of their pro standard icc color profile + film standard curve.

What I've found it that using the most optimal color profile can make or break an image so that's one of the areas i spend a lot of time on.

Isn't adobe RGB vs sRGB setting applicable only if you shoot JPEG? I don't think it does anything to Raw files. That's my understanding.
 
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thelordofthelight said:
Maybe you should just give capture one pro a try with their 30 day trial. I find their color profiles to be exceptional although I'm not sure how well it works with sony files. During my limited time with sony gear (A7R4 /A9) I had trouble getting the colors to my liking. Particularly the greens and yellow to orange transitions. I have also had the exact same 'subjective' opinion regarding the 3d pop/ lack of it but I always thought that was due to the glass.

When I was using Lightroom, i always found adobe color profile/ Nikon landscape or Nikon vibrant profiles to be a bit too saturated. I'd mostly prefer Nikon standard or Portrait or in case of extreme contrast use Nikon flat profile. I'm now using capture one pro and find those color profiles almost match Nikon studio ( which i prefer). After several months of use, I'm now a huge fan of their pro standard icc color profile + film standard curve.

What I've found it that using the most optimal color profile can make or break an image so that's one of the areas i spend a lot of time on.

Isn't adobe RGB vs sRGB setting applicable only if you shoot JPEG? I don't think it does anything to Raw files. That's my understanding.
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My understanding is it’s the amount of colors/gamut the sensor captors. Same as using pro photo RGB in Adobe products but when exporting 95% of labs and social media only display srgb.
 
sh1209 said:
My understanding is it’s the amount of colors/gamut the sensor captors. Same as using pro photo RGB in Adobe products but when exporting 95% of labs and social media only display srgb.
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The sensor captures the same in camera no matter what color space is set. In a raw file each pixel is a number representing the amount of either red or green or blue light, whatever that pixel/photosite was filtering for. The raw converter like Lightroom combines the monochrome pixels into an RGB image and assigns a colorspace. It makes no difference what is set in camera unless shooting jpeg. In that case the camera has the raw converter software built in but even then the first thing the camera makes is a raw file.
 
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sh1209 said:
My understanding is it’s the amount of colors/gamut the sensor captors. Same as using pro photo RGB in Adobe products but when exporting 95% of labs and social media only display srgb.
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From what I've read (and I'm no expert on sensors) the current generation of sensors are all essentially equal, using the same technology at the photosite level, so the same light generates the same values from the actual wells. The A/D converters are essentially the same as well. But the manufacturers make very different choices with how those pixel values are are recorded and a lot of processing goes on even before the values are written to the raw file. So even using Sony Exmor sensors and Nikon-designed sensors fabbed by Sony Exmor processes we end up with very different raw files. No one knows what BIONZ and Exspeed actually do.

On top of that, the demosaicing process is different depending on whose software you're using. (Demosaicing is the step where the values of separate red, green, and blue pixels of a Bayer array are combined into the values of RGB pixels). I even tried using separate open source demosaicing software and they're all different - DxO, CaptureOne, Adobe RAW, Rawtherapee.

I gave up. The process of arriving at even a single set of RGB values has got an incredible number of variables, and that's before even thinking about things like camera white balance (which is advisory anyway and doesn't affect the pixel values in a raw file at all). I ended up back where I started. I accept the raw files form Sony, Olympus, and Nikon as a black box and go from there.
 
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eaj101 said:
From what I've read (and I'm no expert on sensors) the current generation of sensors are all essentially equal, using the same technology at the photosite level, so the same light generates the same values from the actual wells. The A/D converters are essentially the same as well. But the manufacturers make very different choices with how those pixel values are are recorded and a lot of processing goes on even before the values are written to the raw file. So even using Sony Exmor sensors and Nikon-designed sensors fabbed by Sony Exmor processes we end up with very different raw files. No one knows what BIONZ and Exspeed actually do.

On top of that, the demosaicing process is different depending on whose software you're using. (Demosaicing is the step where the values of separate red, green, and blue pixels of a Bayer array are combined into the values of RGB pixels). I even tried using separate open source demosaicing software and they're all different - DxO, CaptureOne, Adobe RAW, Rawtherapee.

I gave up. The process of arriving at even a single set of RGB values has got an incredible number of variables, and that's before even thinking about things like camera white balance (which is advisory anyway and doesn't affect the pixel values in a raw file at all). I ended up back where I started. I accept the raw files form Sony, Olympus, and Nikon as a black box and go from there.
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Definitely makes sense.
 
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Hut2 said:
You're not the first one to think this way. I use AWB Priority set to "Ambience", it's a bit warmer. I think they look good but I always tweek everything anyway. Lossless RAW and/or Lossless RAW Compressed. On my D850 I always thought they were too blue.
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I've been using auto standard and white, also manual Sunny or shade and was constantly twiddling in Capture one . I tried Ambience today for the first time, exported the raws into Capture one , viewed them with WB shot as , well these was a lot better ! Thanks for mentioning Ambient, I'm going to try it for longer and see how I get on
 
Hut2 said:
Ok 5 pages now and I am back to here....lol A custom profile in LRC using this method sounds like it would be the most consistent.
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The camera calibrating profile like color checker are very useful if the same color output is needed for different cameras. For example a wedding photog with secondary shooters using different gear and you want the brides dress and skin tones to be the same in all shots, or product photos where the red of the Coke logo has to be the exact red.

The color checker standardizes the colors based on shooting a card with many accurate and standard color squares and using the included software to create a lightroom profile for each camera/lens combination. Otherwise it is to taste and the differences aren't that dramatic one to another. You notice the differences when you scroll and watch them switch, but it would be hard to look at a photo here and tell what profile was used.

It's also interesting what goes into the making of a profile. You can do it by eye via camera raw. Also Canon has free software for doing it. I've messed with the Canon software. You can start with any regular profile and modify it or work from standard. Part of the profile is a curve, and also different sliders for adjusting each color's hue saturation and lightness and other settings. This is how one can be 'vivid' and another 'portrait' or 'landscape'. Also as previously mentioned it is possible to strip out the curve and return it to linear, but that gets into the weeds even more.
 
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bleirer said:
The camera calibrating profile like color checker are very useful if the same color output is needed for different cameras. For example a wedding photog with secondary shooters using different gear and you want the brides dress and skin tones to be the same in all shots, or product photos where the red of the Coke logo has to be the exact red.

The color checker standardizes the colors based on shooting a card with many accurate and standard color squares and using the included software to create a lightroom profile for each camera/lens combination. Otherwise it is to taste and the differences aren't that dramatic one to another. You notice the differences when you scroll and watch them switch, but it would be hard to look at a photo here and tell what profile was used.

It's also interesting what goes into the making of a profile. You can do it by eye via camera raw. Also Canon has free software for doing it. I've messed with the Canon software. You can start with any regular profile and modify it or work from standard. Part of the profile is a curve, and also different sliders for adjusting each color's hue saturation and lightness and other settings. This is how one can be 'vivid' and another 'portrait' or 'landscape'. Also as previously mentioned it is possible to strip out the curve and return it to linear, but that gets into the weeds even more.
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I agree with everything you’re saying but to my eye it seems like a Nikon raw file imported into LRC with the Adobe color profile is closer out of the gate than most files. Fuji to me is the worst but I suppose most of it is subjective. I’m sure with time I’ll develop a good baseline starting point with the Sony files. The first few images I took with the A1 sorta threw me for a loop when I started editing them. The same might be said if a long time Sony shooter purchased a z9.
 
sh1209 said:
I agree with everything you’re saying but to my eye it seems like a Nikon raw file imported into LRC with the Adobe color profile is closer out of the gate than most files. Fuji to me is the worst but I suppose most of it is subjective. I’m sure with time I’ll develop a good baseline starting point with the Sony files. The first few images I took with the A1 sorta threw me for a loop when I started editing them. The same might be said if a long time Sony shooter purchased a z9.
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It's easy to confuse color spaces with profiles. Made worse because export software asks one to click to 'imbed profile.' But in that sense it means the srgb, Adobe RGB, prophoto colorspace profile. In Lightroom profiles you set in the develop module are the same idea as 'picture style' in Canon cameras, or 'picture control' in Nikon, or 'picture profile' in Sony. That is what is simulated in the Lightroom profile section. It doesn't matter what is set in camera upon import, it doesn't alter the raw file and it can be changed in lightroom with no loss of quality.

Color space is independent of picture style and for raw files what is set in camera is ignored beacuse the develop module used prophoto no matter what the camera is set for.

Try it. Set the camera to Adobe RGB and shoot, then use the exact camera settings and scene ecxept switch to srgb in camera. Look at the two pictures in Lightroom with exactly the same settings. They will be identical because they are both now prophoto color space..
 
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bleirer said:
It's easy to confuse color spaces with profiles. Made worse because export software asks one to click to 'imbed profile.' But in that sense it means the srgb, Adobe RGB, prophoto colorspace profile. In Lightroom profiles you set in the develop module are the same idea as 'picture style' in Canon cameras, or 'picture control' in Nikon, or 'picture profile' in Sony. That is what is simulated in the Lightroom profile section. It doesn't matter what is set in camera upon import, it doesn't alter the raw file and it can be changed in lightroom with no loss of quality.

Color space is independent of picture style and for raw files what is set in camera is ignored beacuse the develop module used prophoto no matter what the camera is set for.

Try it. Set the camera to Adobe RGB and shoot, then use the exact camera settings and scene ecxept switch to srgb in camera. Look at the two pictures in Lightroom with exactly the same settings. They will be identical because they are both now prophoto color space..
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I'm referring to the standard adobe profile in Lightroom classic not in camera profiles. I totally understand what you're saying as far as color space settings in camera and I have never noticed any real difference in raw or jpeg honestly. Seems like the reds are more vibrant as far as jpegs whenever adobe rgb is selected. What I'm saying is importing a photo into LRC using the standard Adobe color profile in the tone adjustment section, that Nikon files seem a little better out of the gate. I hope this clarifies what I'm trying to convey.
 
sh1209 said:
I'm referring to the standard adobe profile in Lightroom classic not in camera profiles. I totally understand what you're saying as far as color space settings in camera and I have never noticed any real difference in raw or jpeg honestly. Seems like the reds are more vibrant as far as jpegs whenever adobe rgb is selected. What I'm saying is importing a photo into LRC using the standard Adobe color profile in the tone adjustment section, that Nikon files seem a little better out of the gate. I hope this clarifies what I'm trying to convey.
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It does clarify and maybe we are on the same page after all. I'm just saying with 100% certainty that it makes no difference what profile is used during import into Lightroom. You could set monochrome upon import and switch it anytime to Adobe color or whatever no problem. That profile section of Lightroom is their replacement for the in-camera picture style/picture control/picture profile since Lightroom can't read the exact picture style from the raw file it has to emulate it either with their adobe standard or Adobe color profile or by emulating it with a camera matching profile.
 
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bleirer said:
It does clarify and maybe we are on the same page after all. I'm just saying with 100% certainty that it makes no difference what profile is used during import into Lightroom. You could set monochrome upon import and switch it anytime to Adobe color or whatever no problem. That profile section of Lightroom is their replacement for the in-camera picture style/picture control/picture profile since Lightroom can't read the exact picture style from the raw file it has to emulate it either with their adobe standard or Adobe color profile or by emulating it with a camera matching profile.
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If you don't mind me asking, what profile do you typically assign in LRC?
 
sh1209 said:
If you don't mind me asking, what profile do you typically assign in LRC?
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I use color checker so I start with the profile ive made for that camera and lens. I make one for sunny, one for shade for each camera/lens combo. It's a one time job, then the profile is stored for next time. If I get off that one I scroll through to see what I like.

I haven't tried it, but i am noticing Jan Wegener's set of prosets that he sells in some of his videos. Might be worth a trial.

https://thebirdphotographyshow.com/profiles.htm
 
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dtibbals said:
I must be dense. Did this and no cameras. I clicked on plus symbol and it is trying to open file from computer. What am I missing?
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bleirer said:
I use color checker so I start with the profile ive made for that camera and lens. I make one for sunny, one for shade for each camera/lens combo. It's a one time job, then the profile is stored for next time. If I get off that one I scroll through to see what I like.

I haven't tried it, but i am noticing Jan Wegener's set of prosets that he sells in some of his videos. Might be worth a trial.

https://thebirdphotographyshow.com/profiles.htm
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Thank you I'll check into that
 
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