I just wanted to do a quick follow up to my exercise in converters to
see how things currently stack up against Lightroom-CC. In a nutshell,
the conclusion is that Lightroom-CC is the best all-around system for
me at this time.
There are two specific show-stoppers that affected every other system
in one way or the other. The inability to perform panoramic merges
natively is one. Failure to support one or more camera file was the
other. There are ways around nearly every other issue, but these two
proved to be deal-breakers. However, that doesn't mean that each has
strengths, because they do.
These strengths, which can be exploited for specific projects or
images, are great when you need them, but not always worth the hassle.
But in fairness, this really plays in to a person's working methods.
For example, I now do all of my raw conversion directly within
Lightroom. I don't use Bridge, I don't use standard ACR, I don't use
Photoshop, I don't use any other converter to convert files unless
there is no other way to accomplish the task. I love the simplicity
and interactivity that Lightroom gives me not only in bulk image
processing but in individual image processing. The only other program
that really matched my workflow requirement is Capture One.
Capture One would have been my automatic choice. I really REALLY like
the converter and it nails colors a whole lot better than Adobe. You
can bend the colors farther too before the images start to fall apart.
With some problematic files, it definitely fell short of other
converters, but for the 90% rule it fit my visual preference better
than any other converter. I would have found another solution for the
panorama merges if it wasn't for the fact that the E-1, A1 and DMC-L1
files are either not supported or poorly supported. Capture One also
really scuffed things up with film scans too. But Capture One is
certainly the best converter for E-3 files today. For the 6D, Capture
One is head and shoulders above the other converters. It is easier to
match images
SILKYPIX is the one converter that I really want to like and for some
things it really is very very good. For example, flower photography?
No comparison. Microcontrast is beyond that of any other converter.
The latest/greatest version of SILKYPIX is robust, reasonably fast,
and enjoyable to use. But it is all over the boards in its auto
settings (which are typically first step for most of us) and extremely
sensitive to even the smallest of adjustments. It's hard to get
consistency between multiple images in a set. For one-off image
processing, it's very strong. But you do get the feeling that you're
always right on the edge of having the image fall apart.
DXO ended up being a non-starter. It handled E-3 files pretty well and
generally speaking, it did very sell with the 6D files and addressed
many of my color complaints. But like SILKYPIX, I feel like I'm always
on the razor edge. The failure to support anything legacy is a total
deal-breaker.
I did test others, but nothing else is even remotely refined enough
beyond one-off use.
Overall, Lightroom CC is the best game in town. For image
manipulation, I feel like there is broad control to get an image from
blah to good. And broad control to get it from good to great. But it's
difficult to milk it from great to exceptional. Capture One's steps
are a bit different, but it gives enough nuance to get it from great
to exceptional without too much pain. SILKYPIX and DXO I find very
difficult to get from blah to good and good to great. Great to
exceptional is easy, but getting to great is tough slogging.
This is, by no means, the end of the testing. I'll repeat this again
in the future. But for now, I'm satisfied that I'm using the best
all-around tool for the job for me.
--
Ken Norton
ken@xxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.zone-10.com
--
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