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12/18/2005 08:07:50 AM · #1 |
Out of curiosity I downloaded Pixmantec RawShooter essentials (free version) this morning and compared it to the USD 100 to EUR 150 Nikon Capture software.
The tests were very limited, I used only two NEF files. The outcome is a bit mixed, at one side RSE is pretty good, but on the other hand is has some dowsides as well. I think it is up to yourself to decide what is important and not. Another thing that becomes very clear is that using your D70 in jpeg only mode is a complete waste of money, check the crops for details.
RawShooter Essentials (RSE) was the most recent version and Nikon Capture (NC or NCa) was version 4.3.2. There is a newer version of Capture available, but it wasn't available yet at my Nikon download center. The 4.4.x version handles blown out highlight recovery a lot better.
First two fullframe conversions, downsized to 640px in height. This one was shot with the Nikkor 70-200 VR @ 200mm. The conversions are basic, just the NEF run trough the programs without altering any setting, except canceling sharpening at saving by RSE. Both files were saved as 8 bit tiff, then resampled in Photoshop 6 and sharpened with an USM setting of 150% on 0.3px. (The crops are unsharpened unless I say so).
Conversion with Nikon Capture
Conversion with RawShooter Essentials
Some things you can notice right away is the difference in color and the contrast of the building vs the sky. The colors of RSE are more greyish, while those of NC are warmer, with more natural green and better shadow to light transitions. Playing with colors and whitebalance can bring the two very close I think, but it is nice when it has a good basis rigth away. NC wins it for me, it applies a better tone curve and creates better colors. Here are the Histograms of both files:
 
NC on the left, RSE on the right.
An irratating feature of RSE was that it doesn't rotate the image itself after opening the file. Another thing to notice is that RSE created an 3036 x 2010px file and NC created the basic 3008x2000 size.
RSE makes a mess of the demosaiqueing of this photo. The brickwork of the houses and the Luxaflex behind the windows are very tough for the D70 to handle, because it has a pretty weak anti-aliasing filter. Therefore you get a lot of moiré at those points. I must say that this photo is one of the more extreme samples.
I also notice that RSE produces a slightly higher sharpness, while the camera was set to soft sharpening. No changes were made to the sharpeness setting in either program.
Nikon Capture has a tool to further surpress the moiré, I can't find it in RSE.
Also, when I work at 100% view, RSE is constantly recreating the file when I move around, NC has it buffered and when it is ready it is 100% ready.
Here are some 100% crops to show the differences.
Notice the banding in the wall of the middle picture? Both these crops also show that the engine in the D70 doesn't make any attempt to tackle the moiré and aliasing problems. Also look at the greens in the background.
While the RSE crop might look sharper it might also be down to how it handles the aliasing, more edgy. When you look at Amstel Bier you think that RSE is sharper, but when you look at the wall and the background there isn't much difference. The image that came straight out of the camera stays way behind in sharpness.
I added this crop becaus of the differences in color. You can see it in the reds and greens of the flowers and the blue of the pants.
It's not all bad. RSE handled the next photo (shot with a 50mm f/1.4) pretty well. I prefer the reds of the NC version. Also the blues in the NC version are more true to the structure in real life.
Something I noticed while working on another photo is a difference in Exposure Compensation values. 2EV+ exposure compensation in RSE is roughly equal to 1.33EV+ exposure compensation in NC. Pushing RSE further towards +3 EV doesn't change a lot. NC is much more sensitive with this. The balance RSE has in those +2 EV compensations is pretty good, but it ain't really 2 EV.
Negative compensation works the same way.
NC also handles high ISO noise a bit better. For some reason the grain is harder and more noticeable in RSE and there is more color noise.
I think that RSE does a pretty decent job, unless you run into trouble with moiré and aliasing. Colors and tone curves can be adjusted by yourself. Nikon Capture does the job better straight away, has far more features and for me it works more natural and logical. For me the money for Capture is worth it, if you are less critical and don't mind a bit of extra work, go for RSE.
Another thing I already knew, but is worth to point some attention to, is the the difference between a D70 jpeg and a D70 converted NEF. The difference is huge and I would never shoot jpg with such results. So shoot NEF, get yourself a copy of a RAW converter and produce better results without doing anything. You don't have to know the programs that much, just running you NEF's trough them and saving high quality tiffs or jpegs makes the presentational quality of your photos better in an instant. It never hurts to try!
Message edited by author 2006-02-16 13:18:11.
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12/18/2005 08:56:33 AM · #2 |
Does Nikon Capture automatically have algorithms to deal with Nikon files? Or is it a true stand-alone RAW converter? Can it also open Canon files?
I think also you can make RSE recognise the type of file and pre-set some settings - can't remember though, as I don't feel the need to do that with the 350.
The moire is interesting: weren't there several comments when it came out about moire problems? I'm wondering if Nikon have corrected that in their software ...
You're entirely correct, I think, in your conclusions though: the colour rendition does seem to be better - warmer, stronger, especially in the greens, and the moire is certainly dealt with better by the nikon software.
e |
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12/18/2005 10:35:26 AM · #3 |
Nikon Capture is solely aimed and optimized for working with Nikon NEF files from all Nikon dSLR's and I believe also some non-dSLRs. It cannot open Canon files, sorry.
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12/18/2005 01:29:31 PM · #4 |
Basic comparison between CS2 raw conversion and RS premium 2006 raw conversion...
all settings in each program at zero with sharpen turned off in RS. Sharpen setting in CS2 at default (probably has some percentage of sharpen)
CS2 conversion
RS premium 2006
I like both programs - RS premium has touchy but more versatile creative adjustments, to be accurate one may often have to be a bit more cautious with it.
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12/19/2005 01:17:50 PM · #5 |
Out of those two I strongly prefer CS2 for its warmer color and better default contrast.
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12/19/2005 02:42:56 PM · #6 |
Contradicting what Azrifel says I find the RS (I use the premium edition) more intuitive than Nikon Capture. RSPremium isvery eficient and as saved me lots of time. At the present I only use photoshop to do sopt editing or more complex editing of the files. All of my wedding photos that I sell are more than 95 percent done only through RSP. The fast proofs and the crop tools are a must.
The first jobs (weddings) that I did I shoot jpeg. I then had to open the ones that I sold individually in Photoshop to crop it to the printing proportion (1:1.33 instead of the 1:1.5 of the uncropped fles), correct exposure and saturation and so on. Then save it as another jpeg. Know I do all this in RSP.
I really think if you want to compare NK you have to compare it to RSP. It's a more fair comparison. But let me put some light in to the power of RSP. Or not.
Here's a photo of a litle girl with her grandfader. This was done with the 10-70mm kit lens at f5 1/100 sec. with heavy backlight and fill in flash (SB800). The correction consisted in +0.5 EV compensation and a bit of curves (all in RSP)
This is a 100% crop of the jpeg:
I got an order of a huge print on this particulary photo, a 50x60cm (about 20x24 inc.), so I used the upsampling in RSP to 200% and exported it as a tiff with the upsampling. Here's a 100% crop of it.
I was shocked with the qualaty of the print! This was not a top qualaty photo and the print is amazing. Sinse I tryed raw I never went back, and when I was converted to raw I was using RSE. Know with RSP it's a joy. It turned a 4.8 MP image (a crop of the original 6 MP) in to a 19 MP one and it does a pretty good job in my opinion. The resultant tiff is 4010x4818 pixels.
I'm more than convinced.
Message edited by author 2005-12-19 14:44:14.
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12/19/2005 02:43:02 PM · #7 |
| Sander - thanks for the eval. I use RSE only because it runs so much faster on my system and seems a bit more intuitive for me. I do have Nikon Capture and will now use it more on my more critical work to see how much difference I get. |
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02/16/2006 01:42:19 PM · #8 |
Thank you, very informative.
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