I want to make clear my discussion pertains to in-camera lens correction for JPEG output. My attachment sample is for chromatic aberration, but my point also applies to vignetting and geometric distortion.
Canon lens designers, with their Computer Aided Design (CAD) software, know exactly how a theoretical lens design performs regarding various aberrations. The lens design process involves numerous compromises to get to a marketable product.
One important lens design consideration is how easy it is to manufacture. A follow on from this is how consistent is unit to unit performance.
The in-camera lens correction software algorithm uses a ‘model’ of the lens to modify the internal RAW sensor data for JPEG engine output. Any ‘deviation’ of a particular lens being corrected from the model of that lens will result in a sub optimal corrected result.
My attachment is an EF 17-40mm f/4 L lens at 17mm and f/4. Top is software correction off and bottom is chromatic aberration correction on. The left and right sides are magnified crops of the left and right sides of an image of two framed photos – the frame is black and the matte board is white.
The uncorrected image clearly shows evidence of chromatic aberration with magenta and green fringing along the photo frame edges. However, on the corrected image, the magenta and green flip sides, albeit with a better result than non-corrected.
My conclusion is that my copy of the EF 17-40 doesn’t conform to the software model exactly. It’s overcorrected, so my copy is ‘better’ than the model, ha ha.
I understand post processing RAW gives one more flexibility regarding corrections, but my workflow is mostly JPEGs. In that regard, I’m greatly appreciative of in-camera software corrections.