Processing Challenge!

[Phil and Karen]

Nice shot of a Robin...

Hi Toermalijn,

Cheers! Appreciated.

Phil

 

[Phil and Karen]

A lovely shot Phil. Thank you for posting it to let us play with it

Here are a couple of edits. Just trying to go for a natural look.

HI arrow501,

Cheers! Appreciated.

Thank you for your time and efforts and for posting the two fine results for comparison.

I think people will find this very interesting (plus I believe it's the first use of SILKYPIX!).

Phil

 

[Phil and Karen]

OOB. (Out Of Bounds)

Hi Gary,

Thank you for your time and efforts - a sublime and eye-catching outcome. Very nice.

Phil

 

[Phil and Karen]

Hi Pixel Poetry,

Thank you for your time and efforts - I like the imaginative treatment. Nice result.

(However, for some reason I've just had to go and put a warmer jumper on... :-D ).

Phil

 

[Phil and Karen]

Hi ggbutcher,

Wow, now that’s what I call getting your head under the bonnet and fiddling about with the mechanics! I think it’s safe to say this is the first example we’ve had of this workflow.

Many thanks for your time and efforts - a fascinating path you’ve taken and fine outcome.

(I wonder if, one day, I’ll understand what you’re talking about… :-D - mighty impressive!).

Cheers.

Phil

I started out shooting JPEGs and damaging them in Picasa. Long story short, I wanted a better outcome and it led me to this. Now, I'm a programmer by trade so writing programs isn't daunting, but all this color stuff sure is.

I learned a LOT writing rawproc, and found that raw processing is really not as heady as it looks. I also leveraged some very good image processing libraries, libraw to open raw files, LittleCMS to do color management, lensfun for lens corrections, and exiv2 for (some) metadata. Oh, and librtprocess, the mighty fine demosaic algorithms of RawTherapee packaged by their developers for others to use.

https://github.com/butcherg/rawproc

Hi ggbutcher,

Fascinating. Thanks for the link too.

(Before my body decided it was done with the concept of work, I did a little programming using ArcObjects for our GIS system. It was fun, but I was a child wandering amid adults).

Phil

 

[Phil and Karen]

Hi Mark,

Thank you for your time and efforts and for posting the result (looks good from here!).

All contributions are most welcome.

Phil

 

[RayGuselli]

My try

Ray

--
VISIT MY WEBSITE HERE...HOPE YOU LIKE

Ray Guselli

Explore Ray Guselli’s 2,426 photos on Flickr!

www.flickr.com

 

[Phil and Karen]

Hi Ray,

Many thanks for your time and efforts - appreciated! Nice to see some blue sky thinking...

:-D

Cheers.

Phil

 

[RayGuselli]

Thanks Phil....and perhaps without the OOB background...

Ray

--
VISIT MY WEBSITE HERE...HOPE YOU LIKE

Ray Guselli

Explore Ray Guselli’s 2,426 photos on Flickr!

www.flickr.com

 

[Phil and Karen]

Thanks Phil....and perhaps without the OOB background...
Ray

Hi Ray,

Cheers! We could do with a similar sky replacement treatment down here this morning...

:-D

Phil

 

[RayGuselli]

Oh dear Phil....same up here in Cumbria...gloomy and wet...LOL

Best wishes and keep safe

Ray

 

[Robin Bennett]

Love this, Ray. Wish i had your talent! I am trying to find a good tutorial for lightroom since I finally got over the hurdle of being scared of photoshop. LOL

Any recommendations for lightroom tutorial to start with?

 

[RayGuselli]

Thank you so much for your very kind words Robin...really appreciated.

I am really sorry but I have never used or attempted Lightroomonly use Photoshop....

I hope others here can help but I am afraid I have no idea at all about it.

Best wishes as always

Ray..

 

[Phil and Karen]

Love this, Ray. Wish i had your talent! I am trying to find a good tutorial for lightroom since I finally got over the hurdle of being scared of photoshop. LOL

Any recommendations for lightroom tutorial to start with?

Hi Robin,

+1 :-D

With regards to your request - if it's of any help, the YouTube channels I subscribe to are -

Lr & PS -

Anthony Morganti

Matt Kloskowski

Christian Möhrle

(Anthony and Matt also offer various Lr and PS courses - though I've not tried any of them).

PS -

PHLEARN

photoshopCAFE

Photoshop Training Channel

I have no links to any of the above, but I have learned from and been inspired by them all.

Phil

 

[CrisL]

Thanks for this nice test

I far prefer your Edit 2 , I see in Edit 1 typical colors artifacts from Topaz stuff that for some reasons I cannot see in your in Edit 2 ?

I apply my current favorite workflow applying DXO-PL5 with Deepprime luminance =50 + ON1 photoRaw with ON1 NoNoise medium values for denoising and sharpening.

Despite the colors difference easy to arrange I think mine is very competitive with your edit 2 with less noise or artifacts when you zoom on some parts

Just confirming I am very happy with my current workflow.

Nice to hear if I am right or not ?

DXO PL5 deepPrime + ON1 PR with NoNoise

 

[Night Pixel]

Luminar Neo



--
**** REDACTED ****

 

[mangurian]

1. Luminar Neo AI selected preset - no tweaking
2. Topaz DenoiseAI - with mask
3. Topaz SharpenAI - with mask

 

[CrisL]

1. Luminar Neo AI selected preset - no tweaking
2. Topaz DenoiseAI - with mask
3. Topaz SharpenAI - with mask

And what is your appréciation on that?

 

[CrisL]

Luminar Neo

And what is your appréciation on that?

 

[Phil and Karen]

Hi ChrisL,

Firstly, many thanks for your time and efforts - and the first use of On1 - much appreciated!!

I really like the outcome - I think many people will be impressed and interested to see it.

Thank you for reviewing my edits (1 and 2) and your comments. I’ve got so many versions of this image kicking around on my system at the moment I think I may be losing it. :-D

I used Topaz DeNoise AI and Sharpen AI for both Edits - the key workflow difference being at the start of the process with DxO used in Edit 1 (in particular for the main NR duties - Topaz being used for NR 'polish' and sharpening) and Lr in Edit 2 (where I used it for Colour NR and Topaz for luminance NR and sharpening).

Edit 1 - Lightroom Classic (import raw file) -> raw file via plug-in -> DXO PhotoLab 5 Elite (initial processing, inc. lens corrections, colour rendering and DeepPRIME NR) -> export as DNG -> Lightroom (tweaks, crop, but no NR or sharpening) -> plug-in -> Topaz DeNoise AI (minimal NR - not colour NR - and light sharpening) -> Lightroom -> plug-in -> Topaz Sharpen AI (sharpening and minimal NR to the subject only using a graduated mask) -> Lightroom -> (final tweaks and export).

Edit 2 - Lightroom Classic (initial processing, inc. lens corrections, colour profile and colour NR only, no sharpening) -> plug-in -> Topaz DeNoise AI (NR - but not colour NR - and minimal sharpening) -> Lightroom -> plug-in -> Topaz Sharpen AI (sharpening and minimal NR to the subject only using a graduated mask) -> Lightroom -> (final tweaks and export).

Results (IMHO) -

In terms of the colour rendering, Edit 2 got a warmer treatment somewhere along the line - this could have been me trying to do something different. Detail retention/ enhancement-wise I’d give it to Edit 1 (though, this could be due to variations in my settings), with regards to NR I prefer Edit 1 and there’s definitely more background colour ‘splotchiness’ apparent with Edit 2 (whether this was partly down to me popping the warmth, or Lr handling the Colour noise treatment I’m not sure. Possibly Topaz - but that was used in both workflows).

To confuse things further (if that’s possible) I’ve done another Edit - a variation of Edit 2, but with Topaz handling all NR - including colour NR. I used a different NR Model and I also applied slightly more aggressive sharpening this time around. Edit 3 is presented below -

Edit 3: The sound you can hear is my brain melting down...

My overall conclusion? - Any similarities between my edits are purely coincidental... :-D

Phil