[Digikam-users] Re: Processing RAW images to get to the look of the jpg preview

[Remco Viëtor]

on Sunday 19 June 2011, Sven Burmeister wrote: 
> Hey everybody!
> 
> I have a Panasonic LX3 and shoot RAW pictures. Compared to the jpg preview 
the 
> RAWs are always darker, no matter whether I pick 8 or 16bit for demosaicing.
> 
> I do see that "dark" has the advantage of showing more details (e.g. on the 
> pink flower bits), especially in bright areas but I would like to be able to 
> get to almost the same picture from the RAW as the jpg preview shows.
> 
> So I'd like to know what others do for processing their RAW pictures and 
> whether the darker is better or inevitable in your opinion or whether I'm 
> doing something wrong.

Usually I need to adjust levels and saturation, sharpen, and use an S-shaped 
curve adjust. Also, gamma has to be adjusted to 2.2 (esp. when using blend or 
unclip, not sure about 'solid white'). Those steps are all applied 'in-camera' 
when you shoot in jpeg, and for the jpeg preview embedded in the RAW.

The gamma and saturation can be adjusted in the RAW developer, the others I 
prefer doing afterwards. 

Note that you should use the white balance from the camera to get the same 
result as the embedded preview (in first approximation), as that is the one 
used to generate the preview you try to imitate.

I usually don't aim to imitate the camera JPEG (for that I'd better shoot 
RAW+JPEG or just JPEG ;) ).

As to the 'why' of the darker RAW images, have a look at the Dcraw website 
http://www.cybercom.net/~dcoffin/dcraw/

regards, 

Remco