Bill Pierce
Well-known
I’ve had a couple of requests to outline how I process raw files from the Fuji X Pro and X E1.
As many on the forum have commented, often you can simply use the jpegs instead which are of exceptional quality. (I find I get the most manipulatable jpegs by setting the highlight and shadow tone to minus 2 on the cameras.) But there are plenty of times when color and tonal shifts that you want to make are beyond the limits of the jpeg.
My basic image processing program for the X Pro and E1 files is Lightroom. Hopefully we will see improvements in the way that Lightroom handles the unique Fuji files (perhaps in Lightroom 5, perhaps in Capture One or DxO). But we are fooling ourselves if we think that in many, many cases the Lightroom processing is not adequate. Certainly it is more than adequate for relatively small prints or the web or those pictures whose technical quality is less than optimum because of our limitations, not the camera’s.
When I want to see if I can improve on the results I am getting from Lightroom, the majority of times I turn to the latest Raw File Converter EX (Version 3.2.12.0) furnished with the cameras. I make the tonal and color adjustments I want, but set the noise reduction, noise level and all the sharpness controls to zero. I convert to a 16bit tif and open that file in Lightroom. At that point I use the Lightroom controls to sharpen and fine tune the image.
Now, here comes the final step. I compare the image produced by Lightroom alone and the hybrid Raw File Converter/Lightroom. Is the difference significant? Sometime yes; sometimes no. If there is no significant difference, and I really want to punish myself, I’ll process the raw file in Raw Photo Processor. (In that case, when the file is returned to Lightroom as a tif, the first step in Lightroom will often be noise reduction in Dfine 2.) The whole process can turn into a quest, albeit an informative one. Most important, look at the picture. If what you have done isn’t significant, throw it away and chalk up your efforts to self education.
As many on the forum have commented, often you can simply use the jpegs instead which are of exceptional quality. (I find I get the most manipulatable jpegs by setting the highlight and shadow tone to minus 2 on the cameras.) But there are plenty of times when color and tonal shifts that you want to make are beyond the limits of the jpeg.
My basic image processing program for the X Pro and E1 files is Lightroom. Hopefully we will see improvements in the way that Lightroom handles the unique Fuji files (perhaps in Lightroom 5, perhaps in Capture One or DxO). But we are fooling ourselves if we think that in many, many cases the Lightroom processing is not adequate. Certainly it is more than adequate for relatively small prints or the web or those pictures whose technical quality is less than optimum because of our limitations, not the camera’s.
When I want to see if I can improve on the results I am getting from Lightroom, the majority of times I turn to the latest Raw File Converter EX (Version 3.2.12.0) furnished with the cameras. I make the tonal and color adjustments I want, but set the noise reduction, noise level and all the sharpness controls to zero. I convert to a 16bit tif and open that file in Lightroom. At that point I use the Lightroom controls to sharpen and fine tune the image.
Now, here comes the final step. I compare the image produced by Lightroom alone and the hybrid Raw File Converter/Lightroom. Is the difference significant? Sometime yes; sometimes no. If there is no significant difference, and I really want to punish myself, I’ll process the raw file in Raw Photo Processor. (In that case, when the file is returned to Lightroom as a tif, the first step in Lightroom will often be noise reduction in Dfine 2.) The whole process can turn into a quest, albeit an informative one. Most important, look at the picture. If what you have done isn’t significant, throw it away and chalk up your efforts to self education.
