Test with Aperture compared with LR2 and Capture NX2

Question

Level 1

10 points

Test with Aperture compared with LR2 and Capture NX2

I've compared LR2's Nikon Beta profiles with Capture NX2, Jpegs out of my D3 and my custom Aperture Neutral settings. Here are the results.

http://home.cogeco.ca/~vistekrebel/

APNeutral.jpg - a version with my custom neutral presets
Capture.jpg- Nikon's version
_DSC3908.jpg -D3 camera processed jpg
_DSC3908.NEF - the D3 RAW file
LRneutral.jpg - LR2.1 using beta profile Camera neutral

I did not adjust exposure or white balance. Noise reduction was left at defaults or no applied depending on the software. Sharpening was applied to try to match Capture NX2 as closely as possible. Camera was set to centerweighted metering at 200 ISO. The Gretag McBeth colorchecker is the target.

I'd like to hear your comments on the results. I feel Aperture did a better job than LR2.1 and has some nicer qualities than Capture.

AK

MacBook Pro 17" HD 2.4Ghz, Mac OS X (10.5.5)

Posted on Oct 21, 2008 1:32 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Oct 21, 2008 2:19 PM in response to Vistekrebel

Hi,
I did similar with ViewNX instead of Capture NX2 (because I don't have it), and my conclusions were similar to yours. I thought ViewNX may have had the better ultimate level of detail, but it was very hard to pick.

Regards,
Calx

Reply

Answer 2

Oct 21, 2008 4:31 PM in response to Vistekrebel

Hi,

Out of interest, can you provide details of the neutral presets you've made?

Thanks

Reply

Answer 3

rwboyer

Level 4

3,176 points

Oct 21, 2008 6:31 PM in response to SiBeesley

Just a note - If you have not tried the DNG presets with LR2 you may want to check them out along with ACR 4.5 update for LR2.

With the profiles and DNG update NEF's in LR2 are really hard to tell the difference from NX2

Here is a quick test I ran when they became available.

http://photo.rwboyer.com/2008/08/adobe-lightroom2-and-dng-camera-profiles/

RB

Reply

Answer 4

Vistekrebel Author

Level 1

10 points

Oct 21, 2008 6:40 PM in response to rwboyer

Actually that is with the Lightroom 2 DNG presets from Adobe labs (in this example I used the neutral preset). I've been playing with them for a while. Check out the most saturated red square at 200% on all of the jpegs.

Reply

Answer 5

Vistekrebel Author

Level 1

10 points

Oct 21, 2008 6:47 PM in response to SiBeesley

I used a jpeg out of the camera as a reference and tweaked the settings to get as close a match visually as I could. Things may be a bit off by the numbers but visually quite similar. Here are screen shots of the adjustments I made for my neutral preset. Still a work in progress.

http://home.cogeco.ca/~vistekrebel/Picture%201.jpg

http://home.cogeco.ca/~vistekrebel/Picture%202.jpg

http://home.cogeco.ca/~vistekrebel/Picture%203.jpg

Reply