Struggling with skin tones - Rx100 - LR6 &/or CO8

Hello

Recently bought a RX100M3 and not liking the colors from it so much. I'm used to olympus colours (which skin tones where great) and not finding Sony one that pleasing.

However, I using CO8 I can tweak them to the way I like but for the life of me, carn't get my skin tones correct. I find the sony renders them a muddy brown and skin looks kind of plastic. LR does a better job & better rendering of Hair. CO8 even using the colour skin tone tool eventually make them look reasonable, but no way am I doing this for every photo I take.

Might try to manually set WB (using the white cup technique) and see if this has a better effect. Otherwise little unsure of my RX100, which I'm other wise very much enjoying.

Any hints tips?? Thx!

jh3rd said:

However, I using CO8 I can tweak them to the way I like but for the life of me, carn't get my skin tones correct. I find the sony renders them a muddy brown and skin looks kind of plastic. LR does a better job & better rendering of Hair. CO8 even using the colour skin tone tool eventually make them look reasonable, but no way am I doing this for every photo I take.

Click to expand...

If you have something like a ColorChecker card you could take a shot of it and try to tweak the colour profile for your camera in the Advanced tab of the Color Editor in CO8. From my testing it looks like there is a problem with the rendition of the red colour in my RX100 -- I sampled the CCP red patch in the Color Editor, checked the "View Selected Color Range" option, narrowed down the selection by dragging in the white selection dots inside the colour wheel, modified the Smoothness setting to the value of 8 and modified the Hue to (-15) to get rid of the yellow in the red. Then you can make a preset out of that and apply it to your images when importing. Alternatively you could make an ICC profile out of your tweaked colour setting.

If you don't have a ColorChecker Passport you can do the following: go to the Advanced tab of Color Editor, pick the following red from the colour wheel: R133, G71, B45. Then do what I wrote above. The changed values for the red should read: R139, G67, B62 -- as you can see, the red as interpreted by the CO8 colour profile lacked blue, the adding of which takes it away from yellow and pushes it towards magenta on the colour wheel.

--
Marcin
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sankos/

jh3rd said:

LR does a better job & better rendering of Hair.

Click to expand...

On low ISO files try modifying the default NR, which is too heavy for my preference in CO8. The defaults are at 50, but if you take down the Luminance NR to 5, Color to 25, and Single Pixel to 1 you'll see more detail. Also, I believe in applying sharpening and NR locally and both LR and CO8 allow you to do that.

Then why bother with a camera where it seems you have to jump through hoops to get it to work. At this point not like digital cameras are a new technology.

If it was the camera could it be defective. If not defective are their others with like complaints

At minimum you should be able to take the camera out of the box and in auto mode and assuming good light get a tack sharp image assuming you got focus confirmation

I would never ever make an excuse for a camera I really wanted, just bought and results are not good whatever it is. I would return the camera get my money back and look elsewhere for a plan B

If not one will be frustrated and disappointed only to sell the camera for half of what was paid in the used market when you could have returned right away and maximized the full potential of the money you laid out from the start.

Just because you research a camera and pull the trigger on it does not always make it the best choice in the end
I am talking any camera from any manufacture

ryan2007 said:

Then why bother with a camera where it seems you have to jump through hoops to get it to work. At this point not like digital cameras are a new technology.

Click to expand...

Well, some of it is camera-related in my case, but some of it is raw-converter-related. My RX100 lens has a complex colour cast that is sometimes negligible but sometimes very apparent, but then I can work around that when developing the affected raws. It's not a deal-breaker for me though I'm not happy about having to correct that. When it's raw-converter-related, again you have an option to switch to another converter (which means having to invest new money and more significantly more time into learning it) or try to work around it. For raw shooters it's part of the photographic process to try and glean as much of the file as you can but I realise this is not everybody's cup of tea.

The OP talked about the "Olympus colors" so the obvious route would be to buy an Olympus compact camera for that but what if Olympus doesn't have a 1-inch sensor, advanced compact camera? You buy an RX100 and make it work for you, that's how I see it.

sankos said:

jh3rd said:

However, I using CO8 I can tweak them to the way I like but for the life of me, carn't get my skin tones correct. I find the sony renders them a muddy brown and skin looks kind of plastic. LR does a better job & better rendering of Hair. CO8 even using the colour skin tone tool eventually make them look reasonable, but no way am I doing this for every photo I take.

Click to expand...

If you have something like a ColorChecker card you could take a shot of it and try to tweak the colour profile for your camera in the Advanced tab of the Color Editor in CO8. From my testing it looks like there is a problem with the rendition of the red colour in my RX100 -- I sampled the CCP red patch in the Color Editor, checked the "View Selected Color Range" option, narrowed down the selection by dragging in the white selection dots inside the colour wheel, modified the Smoothness setting to the value of 8 and modified the Hue to (-15) to get rid of the yellow in the red. Then you can make a preset out of that and apply it to your images when importing. Alternatively you could make an ICC profile out of your tweaked colour setting.

If you don't have a ColorChecker Passport you can do the following: go to the Advanced tab of Color Editor, pick the following red from the colour wheel: R133, G71, B45. Then do what I wrote above. The changed values for the red should read: R139, G67, B62 -- as you can see, the red as interpreted by the CO8 colour profile lacked blue, the adding of which takes it away from yellow and pushes it towards magenta on the colour wheel.

Click to expand...

I've used ColorChecker Passport to create a custom profile for my RX100M3. It's made a huge difference; it provides much more accurate colors than do any of Lightroom's builtin profiles.

is there any way I could try your profile to see if it helps matters? (How would I install it also, on mac)

Thx!

ryan2007 said:

Then why bother with a camera where it seems you have to jump through hoops to get it to work. At this point not like digital cameras are a new technology.

If it was the camera could it be defective. If not defective are their others with like complaints

At minimum you should be able to take the camera out of the box and in auto mode and assuming good light get a tack sharp image assuming you got focus confirmation

I would never ever make an excuse for a camera I really wanted, just bought and results are not good whatever it is. I would return the camera get my money back and look elsewhere for a plan B

If not one will be frustrated and disappointed only to sell the camera for half of what was paid in the used market when you could have returned right away and maximized the full potential of the money you laid out from the start.

Just because you research a camera and pull the trigger on it does not always make it the best choice in the end
I am talking any camera from any manufacture

Click to expand...

Not exactly sure what your talking about? but...

example pics of the rx100m3 I've seen looked good & all the pictures I've taken are sharp, nice light and darks etc. Only the colours with my processing seem to be off. It was the same with my Em-5, took a few weeks for me to ask around and get some alternative camera profiles that I was happy with. exactly the same here...

sankos said:

jh3rd said:

However, I using CO8 I can tweak them to the way I like but for the life of me, carn't get my skin tones correct. I find the sony renders them a muddy brown and skin looks kind of plastic. LR does a better job & better rendering of Hair. CO8 even using the colour skin tone tool eventually make them look reasonable, but no way am I doing this for every photo I take.

Click to expand...

If you have something like a ColorChecker card you could take a shot of it and try to tweak the colour profile for your camera in the Advanced tab of the Color Editor in CO8. From my testing it looks like there is a problem with the rendition of the red colour in my RX100 -- I sampled the CCP red patch in the Color Editor, checked the "View Selected Color Range" option, narrowed down the selection by dragging in the white selection dots inside the colour wheel, modified the Smoothness setting to the value of 8 and modified the Hue to (-15) to get rid of the yellow in the red. Then you can make a preset out of that and apply it to your images when importing. Alternatively you could make an ICC profile out of your tweaked colour setting.

If you don't have a ColorChecker Passport you can do the following: go to the Advanced tab of Color Editor, pick the following red from the colour wheel: R133, G71, B45. Then do what I wrote above. The changed values for the red should read: R139, G67, B62 -- as you can see, the red as interpreted by the CO8 colour profile lacked blue, the adding of which takes it away from yellow and pushes it towards magenta on the colour wheel.

--
Marcin
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sankos/

Click to expand...

Thanks for this, I'll give it a go

jh3rd said:

is there any way I could try your profile to see if it helps matters? (How would I install it also, on mac)

Click to expand...

Try these files:

Sunny, through light clouds, with polarizer.dcp

RX100M3_OfficeLighting-1.dcp

On Windows, these files reside in:

C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\CameraRaw\CameraProfiles

On the Mac, according to x-rite, they'll be in:

/Users/<username>/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Camera Raw/Camera Profiles/

I'm using the "Sunny, through light coulds, with polarizer" profile as my default profile. I created the other one today in my office without the polarizer. For my office lighting, I'm using 5500K 90+ CRI CFL bulbs. I took a quick look at some images using this and other profiles and saw little difference between them. I think the Sunny... profiles might be slightly warmer, but not by much.

Hope this helps...

KBKB said:

jh3rd said:

is there any way I could try your profile to see if it helps matters? (How would I install it also, on mac)

Click to expand...

Try these files:

Sunny, through light clouds, with polarizer.dcp

RX100M3_OfficeLighting-1.dcp

On Windows, these files reside in:

C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\CameraRaw\CameraProfiles

On the Mac, according to x-rite, they'll be in:

/Users/<username>/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Camera Raw/Camera Profiles/

I'm using the "Sunny, through light coulds, with polarizer" profile as my default profile. I created the other one today in my office without the polarizer. For my office lighting, I'm using 5500K 90+ CRI CFL bulbs. I took a quick look at some images using this and other profiles and saw little difference between them. I think the Sunny... profiles might be slightly warmer, but not by much.

Click to expand...

Here is an example using several different profiles. You'll probably need to click on an image and then cycle through them to see the differences.


OOC JPEG (scaled to 1080 high in GIMP)



[ATTACH alt="RAW file using profile "Adobe Standard" "]1048587[/ATTACH]
RAW file using profile "Adobe Standard"

[ATTACH alt="RAW file using profile "Camera Standard" "]1048588[/ATTACH]
RAW file using profile "Camera Standard"

[ATTACH alt="RAW file using profile "Camera Portrait" "]1048589[/ATTACH]
RAW file using profile "Camera Portrait"

[ATTACH alt="Raw file using custom profile "Sunny, through light clouds, with polarizer" "]1048590[/ATTACH]
Raw file using custom profile "Sunny, through light clouds, with polarizer"

[ATTACH alt="PPW Edit #3 (starting with "Sunny, through light clouds, with polarizer" and Clarity, Saturation, and Vibrance set to 0. Blacks were increased so as not to clip.) I have two other PPW edits, but I think this is the best one. "]1048592[/ATTACH]
PPW Edit #3 (starting with "Sunny, through light clouds, with polarizer" and Clarity, Saturation, and Vibrance set to 0. Blacks were increased so as not to clip.) I have two other PPW edits, but I think this is the best one.

jh3rd said:

Hello

Recently bought a RX100M3 and not liking the colors from it so much. I'm used to olympus colours (which skin tones where great) and not finding Sony one that pleasing.

However, I using CO8 I can tweak them to the way I like but for the life of me, carn't get my skin tones correct. I find the sony renders them a muddy brown and skin looks kind of plastic. LR does a better job & better rendering of Hair. CO8 even using the colour skin tone tool eventually make them look reasonable, but no way am I doing this for every photo I take.

Might try to manually set WB (using the white cup technique) and see if this has a better effect. Otherwise little unsure of my RX100, which I'm other wise very much enjoying.

Any hints tips?? Thx!

Click to expand...

I use a 77mm Expodisc to set a custom white balance. You hold it over the end of the lens and do the setting.

Speaking of plastic skin... here's Expodisc vs AWB on the RX100M3. Model supplied by my daughter.


Expodisc Custom WB


AWB

KBKB said:

jh3rd said:

is there any way I could try your profile to see if it helps matters? (How would I install it also, on mac)

Click to expand...

Try these files:

Sunny, through light clouds, with polarizer.dcp

RX100M3_OfficeLighting-1.dcp

On Windows, these files reside in:

C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\CameraRaw\CameraProfiles

On the Mac, according to x-rite, they'll be in:

/Users/<username>/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Camera Raw/Camera Profiles/

I'm using the "Sunny, through light coulds, with polarizer" profile as my default profile. I created the other one today in my office without the polarizer. For my office lighting, I'm using 5500K 90+ CRI CFL bulbs. I took a quick look at some images using this and other profiles and saw little difference between them. I think the Sunny... profiles might be slightly warmer, but not by much.

Hope this helps...

Click to expand...

Super! Thanks for this, I'll give it a go.

Skin colors absolutely are the most difficult. Trained eyes see the difference. So many in the general public do not, so perhaps the pressure is not on to focus on this area of camera performance. For those who see such differences, every cam has to be customized to suit their tastes, which means an element of subjectivity in the result is inevitable.

Good luck on your search. You have gotten some good suggestions. Hope they work for you. You might post your results if you eventually do find a setting that pleases.

Little up date.

- I've tried the camera presets (thank you very much) but they where still not to my liking.(Sorry!)

- I've just tried to apply this threads presets http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3737526

and this definitely improves the skin tones.

- I've also ordered a DataColor SpyderCheckr 24 and will make some profiles when I get it.

Will update this thread when/if things improve more.

Ok, received my SpyderCHECKR 24 and just had chance to use it on a very cloudy day.

In my eyes this thing dramatically improves the colour to something much more realistic. My next task is to play a little more and create some presets (and get some proper portraits for skin tones) for some standard lighting situations, which if I figure out how to am willing to share.

By the way, the SpyderCHECKR 24 was £33.60 from dpsb.co.uk excellent value.

Check out the pics below and please comment. (P.s I have pulled back the shadows and highlights a little in LR & straightened the pics (RAW), but otherwise the same. (This pic was only taken for colour check and nothing else


crops, Original out of cam JPEG, LR standard RAW, Cloudy Day profile


Out of cam JPEG


Standard RAW LR


CLOUDY DAY LR profile

jh3rd said:

Ok, received my SpyderCHECKR 24 and just had chance to use it on a very cloudy day.

In my eyes this thing dramatically improves the colour to something much more realistic. My next task is to play a little more and create some presets (and get some proper portraits for skin tones) for some standard lighting situations, which if I figure out how to am willing to share.

By the way, the SpyderCHECKR 24 was £33.60 from dpsb.co.uk excellent value.

Check out the pics below and please comment. (P.s I have pulled back the shadows and highlights a little in LR & straightened the pics (RAW), but otherwise the same. (This pic was only taken for colour check and nothing else


crops, Original out of cam JPEG, LR standard RAW, Cloudy Day profile


Out of cam JPEG


Standard RAW LR


CLOUDY DAY LR profile

Click to expand...

I think color and brightness are better in the LR versions. I looked at the LAB values for the skin tones in the first image. There are some slight differences, but the numbers all look reasonable.

Here's a PPW edit starting from the out of cam JPEG that you posted.

Thanks for looking, but I'm afraid I think your edit looks awful! (Looks like something out of an 80's disco

With the new profiles I can now start from a neutral base and then edit from there. Waiting for a sunny day so I can profile that and some proper skin tones.

jh3rd said:

Thanks for looking, but I'm afraid I think your edit looks awful! (Looks like something out of an 80's disco

With the new profiles I can now start from a neutral base and then edit from there. Waiting for a sunny day so I can profile that and some proper skin tones.

Click to expand...

Do you have a calibrated monitor, for color and brightness? Except for KB's edit, they all look underexposed, and the color is off.

canonvaggio said:

Do you have a calibrated monitor, for color and brightness? Except for KB's edit, they all look underexposed, and the color is off.

Click to expand...

Yes I agree with you, they are underexposed. Was just initially trying to see the colour changes. Will take some better photos and spend more time processing when have more time. As for colour being off, apart from it not being as saturated, I disagree about colour being off (in my eyes look much more natural). (don't have a calibrated monitor, but having said that, previous camera has edited fine on this monitor (Em-5)