Capture One opinion ?

[D Thompson]

I just attended a seminar by Ed Pierce and he uses Capture One to convert RAW images. I have the Canon 20D and use the DPP v1.6 when I shoot RAW. While I don't think I want to invest $450 for the full version of C1, I have noticed there is a LE version. I'll have to dl the trial from work or somewhere, since home is dialup :( . I know a couple of you were going to try it out on another thread, but never posted how you liked it and if the LE version is good. I did see the one shot that I think Bluedog posted using C1 LE and it looked good. Any opinions of C1 LE??

Thanks,
Dennis

[TheObiJuan]

Hope this helps.
;)

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/software/c1-le.shtml

[Bluedog]

I did see the one shot that I think Bluedog posted using C1 LE and it looked good. Any opinions of C1 LE??

Thanks,
Dennis

Thanks for the compliments ... ;) ... I'd give RAW Shooters Essentials a try before spending any money, if you haven't already. Its FREE and works quite well I think. The Canon DPP works fairly good just limited to what your able to actually correct.

[GlennD]

I've been shooting RAW for about 5 years and have tested just about every RAW converter available and I have my own personal opinions on them.

First of all, the human eye is very sensitive to facial expressions, including skin tones. For that reason, skin tones are my primary concern and DPP gives me the best skin tones of any converters I've tried.

I also want a converter to convert the RAW image with correct WB into a TIFF file so I can do any other adjustments in Photoshop. Cropping, noise reduction and sharpening are not necessary in a RAW converter for my workflow.

Maximum Dynamic Range is always wanted and there is a big difference in RAW processors in the area. ACR gives the best control of highlights and shadows and if I have a problem image ACR will sometimes do a better job.

I stopped using CP1 because DPP gives me better overall results and gave up on RSE because of very poor skin tones although it has good resolution once you control the artifacts.

I suggest you try them all for your self and compare. The Faststone viewer, although it does not allow use of ICC profiles, has a wonderful comparison feature that allows zooming and moving four different images in sync so it's easy to compare results.

Most of this is personal opinion and some might disagree but that's where you have to decide for yourself.

Glenn