janet Smith
pro member
Hi Jan,
Your analysis of this photo is spot on, as I have wrestled with the questions you've posed. I have tried dimming down the bright light, cloned it out and also tried a crop as well. In the end, I have decided to leave it in as such. The reason being; it is a very unusual position for a strong light source like that to be visible in a picture. As such, it makes the looker to rethink their frame of mind and it also provides clues to the unusual situation going on in this scene. And it feels better to me personally, which is no unimportant reason ;-)
As you wrote, it is amazing to have these results using the modern cameras and the raw conversion software. DxO is a very powerful raw converter, which I use as my main converter along with the Capture One for images with potential (or with lens/noise problems, especially when using the 17mm end of the 17-40). For occasional conversions or for the web, I use LR/ACR most of the time. DxO is easy to use, much like LR, but one has to learn to work with it properly to get the best results out of it (like any other application). For example, my harbour photos of Antwerpen were almost HDR like (a huge dynamic range involved) thanks to a creative way of converting single frames using DxO. Also, DxO compensates for the lens softness (if your lenses are supported, but most EF lenses are for the 5DII) using a deconvolution algorithm, which is my main preference for capture sharpening. And denoising algorithms of DxO are very powerful, as can be seen in these images. I have tried converting them using Capture One as well, but the results were nowhere near. Mind you, C1 works miracles for most images and it may provide a somewhat cleaner image than DxO if a sharp lens is used and the exposure of the picture is correct. Please ask away any questions you might have
First question:
How do DxO and C1 compare to DPP, do you think they're both better than DPP? The 24 - 105 lens that I have seems to suffer from CA which DPP is quite helpful in correcting.
I'd like to refine my workflow before my next trips to the Hebrides, so now could be a good time to try before I get really busy.....