Joel W. Wrote:
> I told Ken that Studio 2 out-converts ACR, and if I tell him, he
> thinks it's the truth -- as he should, of course. <g>
>
I buddy here in central Iowa has an E-3 and between him and me, we have
Lightroom, Capture One and Studio2 and a host of DCRAW-based converters to
choose from.
Our findings have been pretty specific and repeatable.
When it comes to pure workflow, Lightroom slam dunks them all. A person can
put up with a lot of image-quality drop-off (and there is) to enjoy the
workflow advantages of this outstanding program. For the natural world
(landscapes), Lightroom's ACR is fine and gives you plenty of controls to
work with. But the KEY factor to remember is that this is NOT a calibrated
system. There is absolutely nothing about Lightroom/ACR that is calibrated
with the E-3. How Adobe comes up with the profile for the converter is
based on as few as FOUR pictures of a Macbeth chart. That's it. So, your
converter's profile is only accurate for pictures of a pigment-ink color
chart--not the natural world.The problem with this is that the spectral
response of a color chart is no where near that of the natural world.
Olympus cameras see farther into UV than most cameras out there and the UV
componant does have an affect on how a camera sees normal things.
When working with mixed flash/ambient lighting of events, portraits, etc.,
Lightroom is a beast to use with E-3 files. You either get the skintones
right and have strange colorcasts or you get the colors right and get
cadaver skin. What my buddy has ended up doing is doing the RAW conversion
in Capture One and importing them into Lightroom for the workflow. Capture
One also has the best tonal seperation of the bunch.
For B&W conversions, Studio2 does the best job of the three, with Capture
One a close second. Lightroom conversions have a distinctive "look" to them
that scream digital. I far prefer B&W conversions in PWP over any of the
three, though.
So, if you shoot Canon or Nikon, I guess ACR is just fine and peachy. If
you shoot landscapes and not people, I guess ACR is just fine and peachy.
If you have all day to tweak and fix, I guess ACR is just fine and peachy.
If you shoot portraits and weddings with an E-3, you're going to spend money
on custom profiles and spend time in post-production converting the awkward
color shots to "Schindlers". Not so fine and peachy. There are plenty of
people saying that Lightroom is just fine for them, but I ask if they've
actually done a serious comparison between Lightroom and Studio2 or Capture
One.
Really, this is no different than film--not all films see the world the same
way, why would converters be any different?
AG
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