For all of you Macintosh users shooting RAW files I highly recommend you try the demo of RAW Developer by Iridient Digital. It's a powerful RAW converter with some nice touches. Version 1.8.8 was released this week adding a couple more cameras and squashing a couple bugs. The control this converter allows makes it well worth reading the comprehensive Help section. Iridient Digital is fast to add new cameras. Their list of supported RAW capable cameras is exhaustive.
One of the often mentioned benefits of RAW Developer is the high level of detail this converter can pull out of a shot. I must agree. DNG files are supported and the input profile can use the DNG metadata style camera color rendering. The camera profiles can be tweaked for those wanting advance control. Batch processing is in there too. The workspace layout options allow for plenty of customization. You are not limited to 3 output profiles, like Adobe restricts us to. There are numerous color space profiles included or you can add your own as I do. I use Joseph Holmes' DCam4 RGB color space as my working space and use the DCam Chroma Variants to adjust global saturation on my important shots. It sounds complicated but is extremely simple and addictive. Adobe's workflow would require I export to 16-bit ProPhoto RGB and then convert to the DCam space, one more step. There are a set of Chroma Variants sold for 16-bit ProPhoto use. I just stuck with DCam4 since it works so well for me. See the link below to Joseph's site for more details on the Chroma Variant approach.
RAW Developer includes multiple sharpening methods (R-L seems even better than USM for RAW sharpening), noise reduction controls, and highly flexible black and white conversion options. These tools are winners. The Chromatic Aberration control with RAW Developer is great without any sliders. About the only tool I find missing is the Vignetting slider which I only use as a creative effect for the cropped sensor shots I take. Give it a try! pw
RAW Developer features link
RAW Developer demo link
DCam RGB info link
2 comments:
RAW Developer 1.8.9 was release today. Adds support for 3 additional camera along with a few maintenance tweaks.
http://www.iridientdigital.com/
Raw Developer 1.8.11 was released Dec. 2, 2010 including support for several new cameras and few improvements and fixes.
http://www.iridientdigital.com/products/rawdeveloper_history.html
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