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Merrill Support with Iridient Developer

docmoore

Subscriber and Workshop Member
Need more time to trial it...initially the few files I have run do not look as sharp or smooth...and the interface will take some time to grow on me.

Wish RPP would work....

Bob
 

pflower

Member
So far I have only looked at about a dozen images from my DP2M processed in Iridient with the default settings - keeping WB to "As Shot" - and comparing them to those processed in SPP with everything zeroed. Initial impressions are that I am a bit disappointed.

Viewed at 100% there is a very definite and rather surprising loss of detail. The ID files are noticeably less sharp and do not have the detail of the SPP files.

Strange colour casts also appear. Some fairly neutral landscapes (winter trees and branches without much colour) have a very distinct green cast to them. Neutral backgrounds show some magenta splodges when viewed at 100%.

Although the software itself runs well and fast and there are a lot of controls and adjustments that are woefully absent from SPP, I suspect that I shall continue to use SPP to output tiffs for adjustment in Lightroom. Perhaps a much more detailed exploration of its features will cause me to change my mind. But for the moment - probably not the answer I (at least) was hoping for.
 

W.Utsch

Member
I want to second your first impressions. Loss of detail and color casts (magenta in the middle and green to the corners).
My impression is: We have to stick with SPP, which IMO is not so bad, as you can read everywhere.
Even when Adobe will come out with X3F support, i am sure it will not be as good as in SPP.
I am looking forward to the new BW features coming in SPP. Will BW in SPP be better than Silver Efex ???
 

Sapphie

Member
After a brief play, I have to agree. It does have the advantage that it renders the files more quickly, especially to 100%, but SPP wins on pretty much all else, where Sigma clearly know what they are doing. If only there was a way to speed up the full res view ...

Speaking of which, does anybody know of a quick way (perhaps keyboard shortcut) to get to 100% view? After I have set the image to full res, I tend to ctrl-click on the image and select 'Same size' but I can't help feeling we could do with a faster way to get there.

Lee
 

scho

Well-known member
+3 Poor performance. I do hope that Adobe gets it right with LR support, but based on the Fuji fiasco I'm not counting on it.
 

Michiel Schierbeek

Well-known member
I'll second that Quentin.
It takes me less time to get my files the way I like them then with my NEX-7. Even with running two programs SPP and after that TIFF in ACR.

Michiel
 

Quentin_Bargate

Well-known member
Michiel, I think it has become fashionable to rubbish manufacturers' own raw software, but in the case of SPP, it's not justified. I post process in Photoshop anyway and the important thing for me is to get the files far enough along the line ready for Photoshop. SPP does that perfectly.

Quentin
 

kit laughlin

Subscriber Member
I have been using SPP more and more, simply because I have been shooting the DP2 Merrill more. I have made a number of panoramas I have been particularly happy with.

I played with the new Iridient processor too, in Trial mode. For me it simply does not produce the same end result.

Slight detour, and talking about SPP: re. UI: The arrow keys do not seem to work in the colour wheel (I believe they do with PCs); if someone knows how to get the arrow keys to work in this way on a Mac, I will be grateful!

Does anyone know how to reset the X3F files to as-shot, if one has updated the files using the button on the top bar with the same name? I noted that one file I changed (adding a bit of Fill Light, etc.) had all controls zeroed when I re-opened it, and the earlier changes seemed to have stuck, but none of the changes seem to be reflected in the control settings.

I have been using SPP to get the best TIFFs; these I import into either Aperture or Ps for other changes.

Speaking generally about SPP, it's clear it does a LOT of processing to the X3F files behind the scenes; the image noticeably changes as this occurs.

I use a quad-core MacBook Pro; it's relatively quick to use on this, and my experience is as Kirk's: it has not crashed on my machine either.
 
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