My RAW Processing Workflow

mackguyver said:
and I'm happy to expand on the why for any of the specific adjustments

It's indeed helpful, unfortunately too late for me as I've figured out a lot for myself before you posted it :-o

For specific enhancements that might be elaborated, imho the highlight & shadow controls of ACR might be a good point. That's because there are 2 times 3 different ways to adjust these, and I find each shot requires different options. As ACR's process version 2012 is "intelligent", it's not easy to predict what a slider does anyway because it always depends on the settings above in the ACR hierarchy:

  • highlights / shadows
  • whites / blacks
  • tone curve

Btw one annoying habit of ACR vs DxO is that if you recover highlights, often saturated color borders appear on edges - example: tree branches that reach into the sky get a blue border. The only way I know around this is to de-saturate that color (or probably wait for LR6).
 
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mnclayshooter

I love shooting - clay pigeons and photos!
Oct 28, 2013
314
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Minnesota, USA
I have a question that I've been struggling to find a good answer to...

I use very nearly the same process as you've described.. Thanks by the way!! It confirmed that I was "winging-it" the "right" way. :)

My question is this: I use LR 5.7 (just upgraded - still have the same issue)...

I get the image looking the way I want it to look in LR. Export using sRGB and jpg... my exported JPGs frequently have a red-ish or almost magenta cast to them.

My monitors are calibrated every 2 weeks with an i1Display 2.

I use ACDsee PRO for viewing frequently, which is color-managed. When I print using my printer or sending out to a print shop, everything looks as it should. When I upload to a website, I get the reddish cast. Example websites: facebook or the Capture Minnesota (a local PBS production for MN photographers to "capture Minnesota" and share).

What secrets are there for website color-management. I assumed that sRGB should be the right output. I'm not sure how to post an example of what I'm seeing. I can say this... I know for certain that using Firefox or Chrome yields very different results than IE for viewing... with Firefox or Chrome being much more accurate than IE. I might be seeing things, but I think that Firefox tends to show the images sharper too.

Anyone have any thoughts on it?
 
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mnclayshooter said:
What secrets are there for website color-management. I assumed that sRGB should be the right output.

It is. Do you have a wide-gammut monitor? When rendering sRGB on that, you need to be extra-careful - afaik a reason why pure web-devs prefer a high-quality sRGB monitor.

mnclayshooter said:
I'm not sure how to post an example of what I'm seeing. I can say this... I know for certain that using Firefox or Chrome yields very different results than IE for viewing... with Firefox or Chrome being much more accurate than IE.

You can enable color management in some browsers, too. Chrome seems to be broken atm, IE seems to work by default, for Firefox see this link and try again: http://ntown.at/2013/12/28/firefox-color-management

Test web pages: http://www.gballard.net/psd/go_live_page_profile/embeddedJPEGprofiles.html and http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/graphics/colorprofiles/default.html
 
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mnclayshooter

I love shooting - clay pigeons and photos!
Oct 28, 2013
314
0
Minnesota, USA
Thanks both of you, and others...

I do have a wide-gamut monitor... possibly that is the issue. I hadn't even considered it.

I'll keep troubleshooting, I've tried some of those online tests, but haven't hit on the solution yet.

DominoDude said:
Need to test your ICC handling in various browsers?
http://www.color.org/version4html.xalter

That page could have some other useful information as well.
Marsu42 said:
mnclayshooter said:
What secrets are there for website color-management. I assumed that sRGB should be the right output.

It is. Do you have a wide-gammut monitor? When rendering sRGB on that, you need to be extra-careful - afaik a reason why pure web-devs prefer a high-quality sRGB monitor.

Test web pages: http://www.gballard.net/psd/go_live_page_profile/embeddedJPEGprofiles.html and http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/graphics/colorprofiles/default.html
 
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mnclayshooter

I love shooting - clay pigeons and photos!
Oct 28, 2013
314
0
Minnesota, USA
It dawned on me... just post a screen shot. While not perfect... it does show the difference.

This is the exact same website (hosting one of my photos) with IE on the Left and Firefox on the right.

It really shouldn't be that different. Yet, it is.

Edit: This article seems to explain it - or at least identifies that there is, in fact, a difference, even in color-managed browsers. http://cameratico.com/guides/web-browser-color-management-guide/
 

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DominoDude

Certified photon catcher
Feb 7, 2013
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mnclayshooter said:
It dawned on me... just post a screen shot. While not perfect... it does show the difference.

This is the exact same website (hosting one of my photos) with IE on the Left and Firefox on the right.

It really shouldn't be that different. Yet, it is.

Edit: This article seems to explain it - or at least identifies that there is, in fact, a difference, even in color-managed browsers. http://cameratico.com/guides/web-browser-color-management-guide/

That seems rather typical. And equally annoying... I have had similar problems earlier with two screens, and when I had to change monitor. It always took a while before I managed to get it right or at least less obvious.
You found a good page there! I ran through the test myself to re-check my own values and to see if the images looked as hoped. (It was almost perfect; just a little nudge and then it's fully ok for me.)
 
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Hi all, my first post here at CR but reading very useful information in this forum for a time. Thanks all!!

I found this post very helpful, and liked to ask you for further info on noise reduction using ACR. My postprocessing technique isn't still very refined but, while being happy with the overall look of my pictures I achieve (exposition, color, WB, contrast...), I'm still not satisfied with my noise processing skills. When manually adjusting noise with ACR, I find myself far away from the results I achieve with Canon DPP noise reduction default settings, but prefer to work with ACR for some other reasons.

So, I would very much appreciate any tip/advice/general consideration on this topic.

Thank you!!

Rubén
 
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Hi Rubén,

I'm glad you found the post and everyone else's contributions helpful. When you sharpen in ACR, it affects the Noise adjustments and vice versa, so you typically need to go back and forth to get them right. When sharpening, I try to keep the Radius low and use the Detail slider and then a bit of the main sharpness adjustment. The only exception is when the photo is a bit out of focus and then I'll go for a higher Radius.

Also, the Masking slider in the Sharpness settings is your best friend in terms of reducing noise. Hold down the CTRL or Option key when you use it and try to make everything except the details black. I typically set it around 50% give or take about 20%.

I find that the default (camera profile) Color Noise settings for noise are usually fine, so I tend to focus on the Luminance slider and some of the finer adjustments. If you adjust it to the point where fine detail starts to disappear and then back off a bit, that's usually pretty close. You might need to go back and forth between the Sharpen and Noise palettes to get it just right.

Another thing that is helpful, especially if you are printing, is to zoom our to 50% when you sharpen and adjust noise. That's a pretty accurate preview of how it will look on paper.
 
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