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Nikon D800 and LR Color Calibration?
- Thread starter ustein
- Start date
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
Try it go shoot something with a lot of color with a passport cc in it try auto and try daylight. You will see a difference in the files. Auto does okay but we need to remember the meter in these cameras see reflected light which subject color can fool it. If it was incident readings it would be far more accurate as it reads the light itself not what's reflected. What happens and a color guru can explain this better than me but if you moving the color in a dramatic way to WB it has a adverse effect. But if your close to the actual light source than to WB it's usually a very minor adjustment. In tungsten light this can have a very adverse effect. I think in tungsten the blue channel can get all whacked.
glenerrolrd
Workshop Member
Lets assume the goal of this post was too get the best color possible out of D800 files . Is that a fair assumption?
We have quite a number of variables that are playing in our color pool . Probably as important as any ..is the type of subject matter you plan on shooting followed closely by the type of light . Get into mixed lighting or even studio and IMHO thats a different game than most are playing . Not irrelevant just adds a wrinkle to the discussion .
As best I can determine every camera has a color signature ...isn t that why they create the color gamut charts ? The last one I saw indicated that the D800 sensor over saturates reds and under saturates blues . And not all reds and blues but specific shades . Greens don t show as being much off.
The lens also imparts a color tint ..the best glass looks the cleanest (maybe not the best ) . A Noctilux produces very clean whites . Some of the older Nikon glass had a definite yellow tint .
Contrast and exposure affect your perception of color ..so these have to be pretty close . Didn t we use to underexpose Kodachrome to get greater saturation. Is it just lighter or darker ? or can you really see the shade . can t you see this in skin tones if the exposure isn t right how do you ever know ....is it too yellow or too dark ?
Ok ..now lets all use different raw developers just to make it interesting .
This is exactly where the S2 was 2 years ago . Couldn t get a raw conversion that I liked out of LR . Now I can get a good one at any ISO and I doubt I could have created the presets . The trick was that the S2 was exposing to the right about 1/2 EV or maybe a little more . This creates the brilliant highlights just below burn out (you may not like this as the margin for error is less). Then the presets pull the entire tone curve down lights,darks and shadows almost evenly maybe a little more on the shadows . Leica RED tends to be a little bright and toward the magenta side ..a small tweak here fixed it .
It would seem and am just putting out a hypothesis ....that getting great color out of the D800 is absolutely possible but it requires an understanding of the color response and establishment of a process based on calibration and raw conversion presets .
I don t believe that you can completely eliminate the color signature of the system but you can produce good color for most applications with any of the major systems .
We have quite a number of variables that are playing in our color pool . Probably as important as any ..is the type of subject matter you plan on shooting followed closely by the type of light . Get into mixed lighting or even studio and IMHO thats a different game than most are playing . Not irrelevant just adds a wrinkle to the discussion .
As best I can determine every camera has a color signature ...isn t that why they create the color gamut charts ? The last one I saw indicated that the D800 sensor over saturates reds and under saturates blues . And not all reds and blues but specific shades . Greens don t show as being much off.
The lens also imparts a color tint ..the best glass looks the cleanest (maybe not the best ) . A Noctilux produces very clean whites . Some of the older Nikon glass had a definite yellow tint .
Contrast and exposure affect your perception of color ..so these have to be pretty close . Didn t we use to underexpose Kodachrome to get greater saturation. Is it just lighter or darker ? or can you really see the shade . can t you see this in skin tones if the exposure isn t right how do you ever know ....is it too yellow or too dark ?
Ok ..now lets all use different raw developers just to make it interesting .
This is exactly where the S2 was 2 years ago . Couldn t get a raw conversion that I liked out of LR . Now I can get a good one at any ISO and I doubt I could have created the presets . The trick was that the S2 was exposing to the right about 1/2 EV or maybe a little more . This creates the brilliant highlights just below burn out (you may not like this as the margin for error is less). Then the presets pull the entire tone curve down lights,darks and shadows almost evenly maybe a little more on the shadows . Leica RED tends to be a little bright and toward the magenta side ..a small tweak here fixed it .
It would seem and am just putting out a hypothesis ....that getting great color out of the D800 is absolutely possible but it requires an understanding of the color response and establishment of a process based on calibration and raw conversion presets .
I don t believe that you can completely eliminate the color signature of the system but you can produce good color for most applications with any of the major systems .
glenerrolrd
Workshop Member
Auto WB has been working very well in daylight and has been better than using the LR daylight 5500/10 setting . While I am sure this is different in tungsten ,mixed and other lighting scenarios ..in daylight regardless of the time of day ..I use auto WB .
I realize this is different than what is recommended by most working professionals (although they generally recommend cloudy 6500/10) .
Why ? The Auto WB on the D800 tends to run cool daylight might be 4600-4800 and this ,to my eye and others ,produces excellent skin tones . Almost as if the Nikon calibration is set to offset some of the yellow /green bias . Try 4800/20 for skin tone in daylight . You can obviously take many paths to the same result but when I see good skin tones (or the way I like them ) i start there .
I realize this is different than what is recommended by most working professionals (although they generally recommend cloudy 6500/10) .
Why ? The Auto WB on the D800 tends to run cool daylight might be 4600-4800 and this ,to my eye and others ,produces excellent skin tones . Almost as if the Nikon calibration is set to offset some of the yellow /green bias . Try 4800/20 for skin tone in daylight . You can obviously take many paths to the same result but when I see good skin tones (or the way I like them ) i start there .
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
Bottom line in all cases AWB is guessing at the color temp. Every hour of the day the kelvin temp changes. Now what looks good to your eye is not always accurate either. Our eyes make adjustments very easily but does not mean its accurate.
Check out this article
Why I Don't Use AWB | Pixiq
Check out this article
Why I Don't Use AWB | Pixiq
glenerrolrd
Workshop Member
Maybe I should have stated this differently ...try a preset WB of 4800-5000 and 20 magenta as your daylight setting and see if the skin tones aren t better verse 5500/10 .
My goal is a pleasing skin tone without a lot of work as opposed to a accurate to the color chart rendering .
The other part of the debate is “do you want accurate color to a standard color chart or the color temperature you are actually seeing ? “ . Depends on the subject and the photographers intent . I don t want to adjust a nice evening back to mid day . This is the argument for a preset color temperature .
I have tried all the alternatives and prefer the AWB but thats all it is a preference . I can adjust to whatever in LR across the entire shoot but I have a reference to what the camera picked up.
The good news for me is that the Nikon seems to be producing very decent skin tones with little adjustment which was not the case in the D3/D700.
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
This was shot in daylight preset in camera than WB in the second white square, than processed in c1. The WB changed slightly in color temp. This being shot at around 9 am it's still slight lower color temp than a daylight setting. So when WB it corrects it slightly. Now normally we would say it was fine and I agree most daylight temps are just fine but if you want accurate to 10th degree than use a color checker. AWB the issue is its driven off the reflective properties of the subject. Not like here that is read more as the light falling on the subject. Using the WB tool being neutral grey has no color to throw the bias off.
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
Yes Roger we are talking two different things per say. One is pleasing color to your eye and the other accurate color right down to the exact color temp of the scene shot. If you want accurate all across the shoot which is a fairly easy task. Say your shooting a model shoot your passport CC in the first shot than go to town shooting than back in post WB that image and apply to the whole shooting session. I do this on just about ever shoot. Now I may like it slightly warmer than I just apply maybe a 200 kelvin to the warm side.
I think some good advice here is understanding kelvin temps and you work in that process as it's a more accurate device to use when you want to make a adjustment than just hitting some random warm /cool slider if you know what I mean. Make these by kelvin so your more consistent to this shoot on hand or next weeks shoot. I tend to think kelvin which I think is a better adjustment tool to learn for yourself. Accurate and pleasing are many times not the same. But that's okay if it's not critical applications than pleasing to your eye is fine. If you wanted to correct a sunset in accurate mode you probably would not like the image at all as it would look to blue. I'll leave it at accurate may not be art if you know what I mean.
Hopefully that helps.
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
BTW I do agree on the D800 color output as being good out of the gate and yes AWB on these newer cams are far better than previous years as many of those where all over the place. What you don't want is big swings as that can have a adverse effect on some colors. Point here to take home is AWB can be fooled by subject color so just be aware of that. Running daylight preset your always going to be within about 500 max kelvin of accurate at almost any given time of the day outside sunrise / sunset. So its alway pretty close to accurate color.
And key here is also is what you like to see in most cases is more important to your art. No absolute rules here unless your after accurate.
And key here is also is what you like to see in most cases is more important to your art. No absolute rules here unless your after accurate.
This essentially sums it up. There are times (especially for a client's work), that accurate color representation of the subject is critical. Then there are times that pleasing to the eye takes "front and center", as in wedding/portatrit or personal work. For me personally, it depends on these and other factors. Then there are those times in stage productions, where the lighting (both temp. and kind used) is changing by the moment and regardless of the W/B setting, its not going to get it right or even close. Often times show one of these images to those who are knowledgable in W/B, and you'll get 25 opinions what W/B setting should be used. In other words, there is no right or wrong in these particuar images. Use of a color checker in this instance isn't going to help, as "accurate" is often about as far removed from pleasing as one can get.
Since I only shoot RAW, it doesn't really matter how I get to one of these two objectives (accurate vs. pleasing) but often knowing in advance what the final objective is, in terms of W/B, using a particular setting is simply going to save me a lot of time and work.
Dave (D&A)
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
Well said Dave. Most applications will be about pleasing . I just shot a catalog of clothing and in that case it was about accurate. When tethered I shot one shot with the passport cc did my WB and applied the whole shoot to that WB. Here not only am I getting accurate but also protecting myself if the darn printer screws it up which happens a lot and who do they blame, the photographer. LOL
So sometimes accurate is the way to go for things outside our box.
So sometimes accurate is the way to go for things outside our box.
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
Going back to the raw converters here and there profiles embedded in them. I processed that image above in NX2 , ACR and there different profiles and in C1 and got a different blue color sky in all of them. So now we have variables with the converters themselves. So you have to find what works best for you. To me C1 rendered this the best and closest matched my IQ 160 which I consider very good on color. So if your a LR user or ACR than you may have to set a style/preset on import of your images and apply a new profile to your images. Once you set that up than you know what your importing is pretty accurate from your testing.
R
richard.L
Guest
It would be nice if LR could read the PC settings of Nikon camera ...
that way we could be assured that NX2 and LR would understand the camera settings worked out by the photographer.
if each (of 3) calculator gave you a different value for 2*8/5 ... would you trust math, or the calculator maker?
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
Just use the passport in a test shot . Than WB copy setting and apply to one or as many images you want. Very simple process. What I do a lot say I shot 50 images in the same light . I will shoot one with the passport in the frame . WB that image than use the shift key click on the last image , go to edit and copy and apply adjustments. Than a dialog box will come up to select all settings or whatever you want and than okay that. Than deselect by hitting any image in browser side and basically your done. Now many times on that first image I will set sharpness clarity and things like that I want on all of the 50 images. I may do this several times on a whole card as the light changed and than go back and process what I want. C1 can be very fast in workflow once you get the hang of the program. It's a big deal workflow for shooters that shoot lots of images. Many times it could be shooting thousands of images too. I do this at my wives modeling conventions I may shoot 8 thousand images in total so good flow is essential . I also fine tune my WB for stage lights as well so it's dead on the money in camera so I don't have to do this in C1. Plus I shoot on manual exposure and nail it as well so I can avoid those adjustments.
I still am and always will be the thought process of nailing everything I can in camera. Coming from film this is the key learning tool that you can bring into digital that makes life much easier. The I can fix it later thought don't work well with me. Sometimes this old school thinking pays big dividends.
I still am and always will be the thought process of nailing everything I can in camera. Coming from film this is the key learning tool that you can bring into digital that makes life much easier. The I can fix it later thought don't work well with me. Sometimes this old school thinking pays big dividends.
ustein
Contributing Editor
>I still am and always will be the thought process of nailing everything I can in camera.
Of course valid still today. WB is actually somehow only a metadata tag.
For me changing the WB settings in the camera is more likely to call for issues (tungsten at sun or so). I am more an opportunistic shooter and wait for scene to show up and then I don't want to change too many camera settings.
Of course valid still today. WB is actually somehow only a metadata tag.
For me changing the WB settings in the camera is more likely to call for issues (tungsten at sun or so). I am more an opportunistic shooter and wait for scene to show up and then I don't want to change too many camera settings.
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
Very true Uwe it's a tag for your raw converter to understand.
Than you! Yes I did some of that proces shoting the Whiball and applied them to the other by marking them all (from the same sort of light). And yes you are right C1 is just very simple in that way, and it takes 10 seconds to get it done. But I have never used a Colorchecker passport. Thought it would be a complicated proces the get all the colors spot on(?).
Thorkil
Guy Mancuso
Administrator, Instructor
No it's always going to depend on the profile built into the raw converter all you can do is WB. Now with Lightroom it's diffrent you can actually create a profile in the software. For that procees look at X-rite web site. See if I can find that.