Re: Profiling Digital Cameras
Re: Profiling Digital Cameras
- Subject: Re: Profiling Digital Cameras
- From: Paul Guba <email@hidden>
- Date: Sat, 09 Mar 2002 09:37:55 -0500
Making a good profile for a digital camera is not a very
complicated thing. It is the expectations that many have for this
profile that make it seem complex. You must remember that digital
photography is fundamentally the same as film up until the light hits
the sensor. With that in mind you must realize that you must control
all the variables associated with creating a photographic image. Any of
which can change the apparent color of the image. Your options are to
profile every scene you photograph, or to create a general profile that
can become a starting point in your work flow. I prefer the second
method for several reasons. First I believe you profile the cameras
sensor not a photographic scene. The sensor is relatively stable, a
scene is not. The very nature of shooting a target makes it impractical
to shoot a target for every scene. The target must be flatly lighted
and ideally perfectly squared to the camera. I could not imagine
shooting a catalog and having profiles for every setup. It seems a
recipe ripe with error, if not in shooting the target than in applying a
profile. I have found the best thing is to light the target with the
lights you will most likely use on a daily basis. This gives you a good
starting point hopefully capturing colors to the fullest extent of the
sensor.
There will always be situations when some colors do not photograph
as they appear. This is the nature of photography. This could be
because of metermerism or UV florescence but not necesarily a problem
with a camera profile. A clothing red may look similar to a target red
but they are not the same. There different so you should not expect
them to react similarly. This has been the story with photography for
as long as I have done it.
I have recently profiled several LightPhase cameras. I did have
some problems but latter found it to be operator error and not a
profiling issue. I also found the out of box profiles to be quite good
with this camera system. The customs profiles were better but I think
you could get very good results with the ones provided by them.
If you expect a camera profile to be some magic bullet that shoots
around corners and solves all your problems then you will be sorely
disappointed. It can however improve your work flow by providing a
standard starting point. From there you are free to use your brain and
improve upon your image as to how you see fit. Just as in making a scan
or a print. The profile is where I start, not where I end.
Paul Guba
email@hidden
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