I agree, Piers, that the final end-result is always a "processed" image
in some form of another, whether now or 100 years back.
But in testing, if one is using Velvia to assess the colour rendition
of a lens,
one must compare the result to other tests also sing Velvia.
I have no problems with image processing (and of course do a great
deal of this
myself in my darkroom), but Photozone is a comparative *lens testing*
site,
and although their methodology isn't exactly fully scientific (they do
at least clearly claim that results are not cross-system comparable) I
would
prefer, to some reasonable degree, see the "RAW" lens performance.
Even though the
RAW from many cameras are processed to some degree or another by the
camera, for the
purposes of lens testing, it's assumed that it's a geometrically un-
processed grid
of pixels, through which we can assess the performance of a lens.
I'd have a big problem if certain RAW files had optimizations applied
to correct
flaws of the lenses, *for the purposes of a lens testing website*. So,
yes, a Nikon
D3 can correct for chromatic abberation in-camera, it does not do so
in a RAW file,
and for the purposes of lens testing, doing so would be a mistake.
Of course, if they were just testing cameras (such as DPReview) then I
think the
system as a whole could (and should?) be considered.
I thus concede that what matters to the consumer is the performance of
the 'system'.
But when I read up on lens performance, I want to see the RAW
information. And I
really, really hate sneaky "hiding of facts"...
Dawid
On 23 Sep 2009, at 2:00 PM, Piers Hemy wrote:
> I take your point, Dawid, but what (philosophically) is the difference
> compared to, let's say, choosing to use Velvia instead of Kodachrome
> (for
> characteristic colour rendition), or using a compensating developer to
> enhance edge contrast (and thereby increasing apparent definition), or
> raising one edge of the easel to correct for perspective distortion
> on the
> negative? None of these are generating information from nothing, but
> all are
> exploiting such information as is available to the utmost, to
> produce a
> result beyond what came out of the camera. Isn't it what we have
> been doing
> for decades? Of course, we choose to do the manipulation - as
> opposed to
> the system manufacturer deciding what manipulation to incorporate!
> Is that
> the difference?
>
> --
> Piers
--
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