ACR Adaptive Color profile sample.

I'm one of those that shoots the ColorChecker and profiles my cameras, then profiles my monitors too. So, when the Adaptive Color profile feature came in Camera Raw I paid little attention. A quick test and I said, "Nah." Can't be as good as all that work I put into custom profiles.

But I recently tried again on some difficult wide dynamic range shots. Some scenes in Italy where the narrow streets cast deep shadows down low while shafts of bright sun strike up high. I was amazed how the Adaptive Color profile recovered the highlights and maintained the shadows - much easier and even better than I could do with the Highlights, Whites, Shadows, and Exposure sliders on my own custom profile. Below is one sample. First image is no adjustments on my custom profile. Second is with the Highlights and White sliders to the max. Third in the Adaptive Color profile.

Yes I have been mentioning this exact thing for a whole now. I just posted this example a few days ago. I have been using it since it was available in LrC.













--
Funny how millions of people on an internet platform where they can communicate instantaneously with people on the other side of the world using incredibly powerful handheld computers linked to orbiting the satellites hundreds of miles in space don’t believe in science. Neil deGrasse Tyson

I believe the Adaptive profile does some local masking At least it seems quite obvious with my landscape shots, where the sky "exposure" is reduced. But it is quite subtle.

--
Kind regards
Kaj
http://www.pbase.com/kaj_e
WSSA member #13
It's about time we started to take photography seriously and treat it as a hobby.- Elliott Erwitt

Kaj E said:

I believe the Adaptive profile does some local masking At least it seems quite obvious with my landscape shots, where the sky "exposure" is reduced. But it is quite subtle.

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It must to accomplish that.

Kaj E said:

I believe the Adaptive profile does some local masking At least it seems quite obvious with my landscape shots, where the sky "exposure" is reduced. But it is quite subtle.

Click to expand...

It does do some local masking. For a full understanding of how this feature works under the hood, the Adobe blog about it is a must-read.

https://blog.adobe.com/en/publish/2024/10/14/the-adobe-adaptive-profile

It doesn't always work, but when it does, it cuts down on editing time, and it does cut down the number of manual masks needed.

graybalanced said:

Kaj E said:

I believe the Adaptive profile does some local masking At least it seems quite obvious with my landscape shots, where the sky "exposure" is reduced. But it is quite subtle.

Click to expand...

It does do some local masking. For a full understanding of how this feature works under the hood, the Adobe blog about it is a must-read.

https://blog.adobe.com/en/publish/2024/10/14/the-adobe-adaptive-profile

It doesn't always work, but when it does, it cuts down on editing time, and it does cut down the number of manual masks needed.

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Correct. It does fail at times but it will get better. Thanks for the link.

Thanks for the article. Interesting how it works.

Thanks for the link. Interesting read!

Wow, that's really flat. I'd want to pump some contrast back into it. I also don't like how it accentuated some details in the highlight area - doesn't look natural.

--
Event professional for 20+ years, travel & landscape enthusiast for 30+, stills-only.
http://jacquescornell.photography
http://happening.photos

Jacques Cornell said:

Wow, that's really flat. I'd want to pump some contrast back into it.

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Of course, it's just an alternative starting point for now. No automatic AI model can know hoe you intended the image to look.

--
Kind regards
Kaj
http://www.pbase.com/kaj_e
WSSA member #13
It's about time we started to take photography seriously and treat it as a hobby.- Elliott Erwitt

Redcrown said:

I'm one of those that shoots the ColorChecker and profiles my cameras, then profiles my monitors too. So, when the Adaptive Color profile feature came in Camera Raw I paid little attention. A quick test and I said, "Nah." Can't be as good as all that work I put into custom profiles.

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Your custom profile (the top photo of your three) is the best by a country mile. It's not even a competition; it's not close.

Highlights are supposed to be bright. Shadows are supposed to be dark. The difference between them is supposed to be meaningful and illustrative. This is a feature of photography, not a bug!

When pixels in highlights and pixels in shadows start to approach the same luminosity values (or, hilariously, when they get reversed) your image ceases to make sense.

This is the reason all the hip kids are now shooting old point-and-shoot cameras rather than their phones, why you can't currently find a Canon powershot in stock at a reasonable price to save your life--because by default smartphones flatten images into semantic nonsense, whereas the old point-and-shoots didn't really play that game. They let highlights be highlights, and shadows be shadows. Audiences want highlights to be highlights and shadows to be shadows. Show us the light that actually fell when you were there!

Your custom profile, by the way, looks great. Effort well spent. Lean into it. Your first instinct about the adaptive profile--at least, as it stands right now, in this early period of its release--was right on the mark; its "recovery" efforts are far too aggressive, it turns images into soupy flat nonsense.

MimiVivi said:

Redcrown said:

I'm one of those that shoots the ColorChecker and profiles my cameras, then profiles my monitors too. So, when the Adaptive Color profile feature came in Camera Raw I paid little attention. A quick test and I said, "Nah." Can't be as good as all that work I put into custom profiles.

Click to expand...

Your custom profile (the top photo of your three) is the best by a country mile. It's not even a competition; it's not close.

Highlights are supposed to be bright. Shadows are supposed to be dark. The difference between them is supposed to be meaningful and illustrative. This is a feature of photography, not a bug!

When pixels in highlights and pixels in shadows start to approach the same luminosity values (or, hilariously, when they get reversed) your image ceases to make sense.

This is the reason all the hip kids are now shooting old point-and-shoot cameras rather than their phones, why you can't currently find a Canon powershot in stock at a reasonable price to save your life--because by default smartphones flatten images into semantic nonsense, whereas the old point-and-shoots didn't really play that game. They let highlights be highlights, and shadows be shadows. Audiences want highlights to be highlights and shadows to be shadows. Show us the light that actually fell when you were there!

Your custom profile, by the way, looks great. Effort well spent. Lean into it. Your first instinct about the adaptive profile--at least, as it stands right now, in this early period of its release--was right on the mark; its "recovery" efforts are far too aggressive, it turns images into soupy flat nonsense.

Click to expand...

Opinions vary. The point is recovery followed by additional editing. I keep reading about time saving tools in other apps. This is just one. The first edit has blown out areas. No details. There is nothing wrong with it. There have been several posts where members how well it recovered - when that was what they needed. I wish I had of kept a link to a moon shot someone posted soon after that profile was released. How much easier it was to preserve detail in the moon and balance the rest of the shot.

I applied that profile to about 500 files from a marathon charity shoot. The previous time I used a non AI profile and Auto. I processed them in about 1 ½ hours. This year with Adobe Adaptive it was way faster. Great skin tones, contrast, no blown highlights, etc.

MimiVivi said:

Your custom profile (the top photo of your three) is the best by a country mile.

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That's my opinion, too. But if we learn anything from this forum, it's that opinions can vary. Widely. On almost everything.

ishwanu said:

MimiVivi said:

Your custom profile (the top photo of your three) is the best by a country mile.

Click to expand...

That's my opinion, too. But if we learn anything from this forum, it's that opinions can vary. Widely. On almost everything.

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Sure. That's why we have a forum to express them. I'll share a few more, why not? Nobody's forcing anyone to click on them!

To my mind, the big problem with the "great flattening" (and odd re-contrasting) the adaptive profile executes is that it then demands your post-production efforts reconstruct the semantic distinction between dark-and-light that your image originally captured.

"Reconstruct" is the key word, here. When I post-produce, I personally find the most efficient and the most effective route to a final photographic product is not a reconstruction effort; it's one in which I am enhancing a starting point that already communicates the meaning and the point I had in mind when I clicked the shutter button. I do not want to be reconstructing meaning from a starting point that ditches the semantic relationships I captured--that's a truly odd place to be in a photographic process. The whole point of the photographic exercise was to "capture" those relationships of light with light in the first place, not to flatten what I captured and then pixel-paint it back in afterward from imagination. Photography is "light writing" literally (Photo = light Graphy = writing). Hey, here's an opinion for photographers that I know will be hilariously controversial: why don't we let the light write, eh?

So many people (including Adobe, apparently) think it's important to "recover detail" at the expense of disrupting meaningful distinctions between the light and dark luminosities the camera captured, even if the detail to be "recovered" isn't even the central subject of the image. That's nuts in my opinion. Distinctions of light and dark are the bones of every photograph. Our eyes and brains evolved over billions of years from the primordial ooze to follow the light out of the dark. Photographs that don't clearly distinguish highlights from shadow literally confuse the way our eyes and brains are wired. Audiences look at a photo in which the sky is darker than the ground and don't know what to do with it. Surreal abstract expressionism, I guess?

And there's a corollary to all of this: it's okay to blow out highlights and block shadows. It's totally OK. Particularly when those blown highlights and blocked shadows communicate that those areas of the image are not the subject, and they lead the viewer's eyes TO the subject. Impactful, meaningful photographs don't need infinite detail in every quarter of the histogram; they need direction and structure of light and dark that communicates meaning. And as photographers, our whole art--the whole kit and kaboodle--is saying something with distinctions of light and shadow. Obliterating that as a "starting point" is nuts!

In my humble opinion.

Have a good one out there, friends. :-D

MimiVivi said:

ishwanu said:

MimiVivi said:

Your custom profile (the top photo of your three) is the best by a country mile.

Click to expand...

That's my opinion, too. But if we learn anything from this forum, it's that opinions can vary. Widely. On almost everything.

Click to expand...

Sure. That's why we have a forum to express them. I'll share a few more, why not? Nobody's forcing anyone to click on them!

Click to expand...

Sure. I have some as well.

MimiVivi said:

To my mind, the big problem with the "great flattening" (and odd re-contrasting) the adaptive profile executes is that it then demands your post-production efforts reconstruct the semantic distinction between dark-and-light that your image originally captured.

Click to expand...

It just does not just flatten. All files are different. I processed near 500 files for a charity shoot. I'm not going to spend all day on that. Took under an hour. All did was crop and level. Skin tones of all colours came out really nice. Colours of running cloths popped and whites had detail. Not that that was critical but it worked for that. If I wanted some high contrast shots with no concern for all the details then I would have done that.

If it was a wedding I'd be working on them for days. I studied Neil van Nikerk and a few others flash work to maintain whites in wedding dresses, etc was paramount - for that application. Not to say blown out was not good. Just a different look and mood. All depended on the situation.

MimiVivi said:

"Reconstruct" is the key word, here. When I post-produce, I personally find the most efficient and the most effective route to a final photographic product is not a reconstruction effort; it's one in which I am enhancing a starting point that already communicates the meaning and the point I had in mind when I clicked the shutter button. I do not want to be reconstructing meaning from a starting point that ditches the semantic relationships I captured--that's a truly odd place to be in a photographic process. The whole point of the photographic exercise was to "capture" those relationships of light with light in the first place, not to flatten what I captured and then pixel-paint it back in afterward from imagination. Photography is "light writing" literally (Photo = light Graphy = writing). Hey, here's an opinion for photographers that I know will be hilariously controversial: why don't we let the light write, eh?

So many people (including Adobe, apparently) think it's important to "recover detail" at the expense of disrupting meaningful distinctions between the light and dark luminosities the camera captured, even if the detail to be "recovered" isn't even the central subject of the image. That's nuts in my opinion. Distinctions of light and dark are the bones of every photograph. Our eyes and brains evolved over billions of years from the primordial ooze to follow the light out of the dark. Photographs that don't clearly distinguish highlights from shadow literally confuse the way our eyes and brains are wired. Audiences look at a photo in which the sky is darker than the ground and don't know what to do with it. Surreal abstract expressionism, I guess?

Click to expand...

If needed or wanted. Ansel Adams thought recovering detail was important. I've never been confused looking at his work. I went to one of his shows and walked up a poster sized print of Moonrise over Hernandez. I jokingly asked if they'd take a cheque. The attendant told me it as priceless. Not many are close to that status.

I was just skimming through Vivian Maier's work and a lot of her photos had very well controlled highlights and shadows. Not that there weren't any without bright highlights, etc.

MimiVivi said:

And there's a corollary to all of this: it's okay to blow out highlights and block shadows. It's totally OK. Particularly when those blown highlights and blocked shadows communicate that those areas of the image are not the subject, and they lead the viewer's eyes TO the subject. Impactful, meaningful photographs don't need infinite detail in every quarter of the histogram; they need direction and structure of light and dark that communicates meaning. And as photographers, our whole art--the whole kit and kaboodle--is saying something with distinctions of light and shadow. Obliterating that as a "starting point" is nuts!

Click to expand...

I sure did not want to blow out that lamp with that underexposed shot I posted. Saved me a lot of time. DXO users have said this here for years. Adobe can do it but I get finished results much faster. So Adobe can't add tools for this purpose? When I used DXO I thought ClearView made my files look like cartoons. I had to boost LrC Dehaze sometimes to 70 to match those results. I keep reading about how great it is and maybe it is. It's been a few years and perhaps they have refined it.

MimiVivi said:

In my humble opinion.

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It was appreciated.

MimiVivi said:

Have a good one out there, friends. :-D

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--
Funny how millions of people on an internet platform where they can communicate instantaneously with people on the other side of the world using incredibly powerful handheld computers linked to orbiting the satellites hundreds of miles in space don’t believe in science. Neil deGrasse Tyson

Apologies, after making the OP I moved on to remote areas where I had real poor Wi-Fi. So posting in forums was too difficult. I'm home now, and thanks, I really appreciate all the comments, especially MimiVivi. I try to get accurate color and tone first, then move on to "pleasing". I wear prescription eyeglasses, and use flip-up sun shades. When in these Italian "hill towns" I'm flipping those sun shades up and down constantly. So, in this and many cases, I'm judging the sun lit highlights thru the sun shades and the lower shadows without. The Adaptive Color profile gave the best render of what I saw that way. Sure, without the sun shades the highlights would look much brighter, even blown out.

I could have got there with my normal profile by rendering multiple versions and using some fairly difficult and complicated luminosity masks. But the Adaptive Color profile saved a lot of that work. For what it's worth, here is my final version. But even it will probably get redone, since in the field I'm working on a laptop with a small good but not great screen. Also, for what it's worth, the Adaptive Color profile worked for me on only a small percentage of images.

Adaptive Color is really just the Auto button but for RAW files only right now. I'm not sure why they put it under the color profiles when it's really just another version of Auto giving you a place to start like Auto does.

mfinley said:

Adaptive Color is really just the Auto button but for RAW files only right now. I'm not sure why they put it under the color profiles when it's really just another version of Auto giving you a place to start like Auto does.

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I think it is more than just Auto. Link to greybalanced's post.

Zeee said:

mfinley said:

Adaptive Color is really just the Auto button but for RAW files only right now. I'm not sure why they put it under the color profiles when it's really just another version of Auto giving you a place to start like Auto does.

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I think it is more than just Auto. Link to greybalanced's post.

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/68477669

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Seems like a version of Auto to me. According to adobe they say you can duplicate Adaptive Color manually by yourself using the tools in the development module, the basic slider adjustments, curve adjustments, color, local masking etc... the only difference is it's being done for you instantly and according to Adobe you can use the image as is at that point of use it for a starting point for tweaking it further to your liking. This is basically the same as workflow as auto. Auto makes less adjustments than Adaptive color and you end up in your workflow the same, using it as is or continuing with more adjustments, seems the difference is Adaptive color is way more robust, like a Super Auto.

"An AI model analyzes the photo and adjusts tones and colors to make them look just right. The effect is as if the AI had changed Exposure, Shadows, Highlights, Color Mixer, Curves and other controls for you, although the actual controls stay in their original neutral position. Some adjustments are global and some are local.

For many photos the Adobe Adaptive profile directly produces a rendering that is good enough for sharing or publishing. Of course, the photographer may have something slightly different in mind. In those cases they can fine-tune the images using all the controls available in Camera Raw and make the pictures lighter, darker, or more colorful, or add effects like vignetting. Usually this takes significantly less time than starting with another profile and adjusting everything by hand."

mfinley said:

Zeee said:

mfinley said:

Adaptive Color is really just the Auto button but for RAW files only right now. I'm not sure why they put it under the color profiles when it's really just another version of Auto giving you a place to start like Auto does.

Click to expand...

I think it is more than just Auto. Link to greybalanced's post.

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/68477669

Click to expand...

Seems like Auto to me. According to adobe they say Adaptive Color can be mimicked manually by yourself with the basic slider adjustments, curve adjustments and some masking, the only difference is it's being done for you and according to Adobe you can use the image as is at that point of use it for a starting point for tweaking it further to your liking.

"An AI model analyzes the photo and adjusts tones and colors to make them look just right. The effect is as if the AI had changed Exposure, Shadows, Highlights, Color Mixer, Curves and other controls for you, although the actual controls stay in their original neutral position. Some adjustments are global and some are local.

For many photos the Adobe Adaptive profile directly produces a rendering that is good enough for sharing or publishing. Of course, the photographer may have something slightly different in mind. In those cases they can fine-tune the images using all the controls available in Camera Raw and make the pictures lighter, darker, or more colorful, or add effects like vignetting. Usually this takes significantly less time than starting with another profile and adjusting everything by hand."

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Perhaps. Curios why they would create that profile. The Auto sliders never maxed out so you still had control to tweak. Why does Adobe suggest to have Adaptive Color in a particular development while Auto doesn't matter.