Re: Digital Camera Profiling...Why can't we all just get along?
Re: Digital Camera Profiling...Why can't we all just get along?
- Subject: Re: Digital Camera Profiling...Why can't we all just get along?
- From: Andrew Rodney <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 18 Apr 2003 07:26:13 -0600
on 4/18/03 6:02 AM, Jack Bingham wrote:
>
Well here is the thing. I am constantly amused/amazed/irratated to hear that
>
what I do successfully every day doesn't work.
Please find the post where someone said using camera profiles doesn't work!
I've also built camera profiles with great success and with the same
software and targets had just awful results. The mileage varies a lot. And I
suspect I've been trying all kinds of solutions since profile creation could
be made for digital cameras dating back to ICC Dcam and perhaps before (I
can't really recall the first package I tried but it's got to go back a good
5-6+ years).
The problem is that *some* people are making bogus or at least highly over
optimistic clams for camera profiling as the right answer for all (certainly
most) cameras, situations and photographers. This is dangerous considering
the history of color management (even dating back before ICC Color
Management). Out "industry" has a history of a lot of promises that didn't
pan out. Usually these claims were made by people who had a product to sell
and this isn't the forum for those kinds of claims. A lot of people who have
been in this business for many years have seen this as a problem that
ultimately negatively affects the CMS industry.
Camera profiling like any kind of ICC color management is far from perfect.
In fact, of all the profiling areas we have to deal with, camera profiling
is IMHO the area that has the most holes.
But ICC Color Management is still a much better set of tools and solutions
than not. However, if you take the same display and Spectrophotometer or
Colorimeter and try 6 different software packages, how come you get
basically 6 different profiles and behaviors? IF you use the same printer
and Spectrophotometer but 6 different profile packages, how come you don't
end up with 6 identical prints? If this all works as it's supposed to, why
do most color geeks recommend calibrating to a D65 white point for a display
when we know we're looking at prints under a D50 light box and so forth?
This stuff works pretty darn well but there are plenty of holes and it's
important that those of us that DON'T sell products (but do get paid to
sometimes train, speak, consult and build profiles) present the "facts" as
we seem them in a rational light.
I don't want to sound negative about any aspect of ICC Color Management. But
I'm also not going to fly the profile flagpole. It's just too dangerous to
the people reading these posts expecting rational answers like "can I or
should I build a camera profile" or "What can go wrong?"
Camera profiles can work wonderfully or produce pure junk (and often many
shades in between). This is an area that is still in flux. Camera Raw is a
solution for some that may not be perfect but is an interesting development.
I find the comments about ACR being a really good product if you could use
custom profiles amusing. It's like suggesting that Ferrari should put
trailer hitches on their sports cars because some people might have a
trailer to haul. And those that suggest that professional photographers
can't possibly use ACR simply haven't a clue about professional
photographers. Some of the best, highest paid photographers who produce some
pretty high quality work ARE using ACR.
We can all get along if we lower the BS factor a few notches.
Andrew Rodney
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