rawformat

Comparing RAW converters

For those of you looking about trying to pick a RAW conversion tool, there's a wonderfully detailed comparison article hosted by Steve Hoffmann's Nature and Landscape Photography. It compares Adobe's ACR 3, Bibble Pro 4.6, BreezeBrowser Pro 1.3, Capture One 3.7, Canon's Digital Photo Pro 2 and RawShooter premium 2006.

Hoffmann cautions:

This article is not an in-depth analysis of these six programs.  My goal in putting up this document was to give the reader an overview of each program's features and capabilities and to provide reasonably accurate image comparisons.

I will take the liberty of expressing my opinions now and then.  When considering my opinions you might like to know what I look for first in a RAW converter - Reasonably accurate color and tonal range in the application's default  conversion settings - Speed of conversion - Adequate tools with easy and intuitive workflow for those images that did not turn out as I wanted them to look with the application's default conversion.

Regardless, if you're looking for a good, detailed comparison between the available products, this is a solid guide incuding example images. Check it out.

Another RAW tool

Striclty speaking, Pixort isn't designed to do anything particular to RAW files. According to their web site:

Pixort is an affordable/free tool for reviewing, comparing, sorting and culling photographic image files. It is not yet another photo archiving and organizing tool: it is dedicated to the initiation of a digital photography workflow where a photographer reviews his or her 2000 photos from the vacation or latest wedding assignment.

I'm notorious for not using any real utilities in my workflow - usually I just grab my files with an SD-card reader and windows explorer (especially since windows now lets you thumbnail RAW files), and open them directly with Photoshop or RSE or whatever's appropriate.

That doesn't mean, however, that it's the best option by any means. Especially since I have a habit of taking at least five shots of every picture I want, I should probably look into a good way to browse through my images before jumping into my editing. This app (especially the free version) may be a good choice.

Adobe or Microsoft?

As I've mentioned here before, Adobe is being pretty lazy about bringing out a MacTel version of Photoshop, especially given the relatively poor PS performance with the emulation as things are now (or maybe they've gotten better...anyone know?)

Regardless, Adobe has confirmed that there will be to MacTel version of Photoshop until 2007:

During a March 22 conferece call discussing Q1 2006 earnings, Adobe executives confirmed that there won't be Universal versions of Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, or GoLive until Creative Suite 3. (The suite is currently at version 2.) Company officials said they don't expect to release CS3 until spring 2007.

Unofficial Photoshop Support for Canon 30D Raw

Photoshop hack to support Canon 30D raw:

Antoine Khater tweaks the 20D script created by Thomas Fors. Photshop CS2 doesn't yet support the 30D RAW format, but this hack will allow to open 30D raw files.

Watch That EXIF Data: It Can Reveal Retouching

From the post Fun with EXIF thumbnails by Robert Peloschek.

Peloschek shows how to detect modifications to an edited photo by salvaging the embedded EXIF thumbnail. Particularly a problem for those using "a stupid program like Microsoft Paint for cropping your images."

Spanner: not for your car

Complete Digital Photography has an app called the "Aperture Library Spanner" that lets you tweak the way Aperture stores its library of images.

By default, Apple's Aperture constrains its internal library to a single volume. However, with a little under-the-hood tinkering you can span your library across multiple drives, providing you with far more storage for your Aperture images. The Aperture Library Spanner is a simple app that automatically configures your Aperture library to span multiple volumes.

"Zen and the Art of Aperture"

Creativepro.com has a feature up (has had since early March, actually) about how Aperture has some benefits that have been largely overlooked by the photo editing community:

Many users and reviewers have complained that this library architecture makes Aperture inflexible when working with other apps in a more complicated workflow. I recently had an epiphany that made me believe those complaints aren't just invalid, they're born of ignorance.

It's a fairly long and complete feature that deals with some of the percieved shortcomings in Aperture and how the author Ben Long thinks they might not be disadvantages after all.

Personally, I think his defense of Aperture's "appliance" style photo management is a little off:

Right out of the box, Aperture provides an excellent import facility and good backup and archiving tools. These tools handle the bulk of your housekeeping chores. Many people are paranoid about the long-term implications of putting things in Aperture's library, but it's actually a very open system that lets you extract original images at any time, so there's no need for extra archiving or backup tasks. If you want to back up your images, just tell Aperture to do it.

He's right; I'm paranoid about the long-term implications of putting things in Aperture's library. It's a great system so long as I'm using Aperture, but no matter how you paint it, a setup like that is a clever tool to lock the user in to a certain system.

Yes, you can export original images, but I wonder if that's kind of like the way you can burn CDs with the music you buy fron the iTunes store if you don't like the DRM.

Regardless, it's a good feature, especially if you're looking for ways to expand or refine your Aperture workflow.

Using Actions and Droplets with Adobe Bridge & the Adobe Camera Raw Plug-In

Craigs Actions site provides a step by step overview that walks readers through handling images In Adobe Brige and in making use of the Adobe Camera Raw (ACR)plug-in.

In my experience, Actions are one of the most time-saving and under-appreciated Photoshop features. IMHO, all pro photographers using PS should take the time to become comfortable with automating Photoshop with Actions.

RAW Developer 1.4.6 available

This from the Iridient Digital site. Thanks to Digital Outback Photo for the heads up.

Download the RAW Developer 1.4.6 Demo

The RAW Developer 1.4.6 demo is fully functional and is not time or usage limited, however all exported images will be watermarked. This release is a free update for all currently registered users and should automatically recognized your existing registration information.

New licenses can be purchased for $99.95US securely using RAW Developer itself by selecting "Purchase..." from the File menu or securely online through our web store. All purchases of RAW Developer include at least 15 months of free upgrades, including both major and minor updates. Our official product upgrade policy is now available online here.
System Requirements:

* PowerPC G4 or G5 processor
* Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later
* QuickTime 6.4 or later

System Recommendations:

* Mac OS X 10.4 or later
* 1.0GHz or faster G4 or any G5 processor
* 256MB or more of free system memory, very large images could use more

Release Date: March 10, 2006

RawShooter Essentials 2006 Announced: Still Free-Of-Charge

Pixmantec Announces RawShooter | essentials 2006: Still Free-Of-Charge:

Source: Pixmantec Press Release

Pixmantec Announces RawShooter | essentials 2006: Still Free-Of-Charge

• RSE 2006 Features Faster Workflow, Additional RAW Formats and Now Supports RawShooter | Color Engine
• RawShooter | premium 2006 Free Update is Optimized to Offer Faster Preview and Conversion Speeds using less memory and Supports New Nikon D200 Camera
• RawShooter | Color Engine Upgrade supports Nikon D200, KM-5/7D and Other RAW Camera Formats

Orlando, FL. February 25, 2006 Pixmantec, a leading manufacturer of digital imaging software, continues to provide photographers at all levels of experience and expertise with the latest in RAW Workflow management technology with the introduction of RawShooter | essentials 2006, RawShooter | premium 2006 V1.02 and RawShooter | Color Engine V1.1, all being FREE updates. The software offers many new features, upgrades and is compatible with the most popular digital SLR camera models on the market including newly introduced models such as the Nikon D200, Canon EOS 5D, 1Ds Mark II, and 1D Mark II N, Sony R1 and several other brands and models. RawShooter | essentials 2006 continues to be offered as a forever FREE download via Pixmantecs Website and has set the standard in the industry for quality, speed and certainly affordability.