Software for RAW conversion

Just curious what software everyone uses.

I use DPP that came with camera. For free, I don't think you can beat it. But I am seriously considering buying Adobe Photoshop Lightroom.

I also like DPP and much prefer it to CS2. All I really need to do with my photos is fix WB and exposure and maybe crop and straighten. DPP is great for all that, apart from the straightening bit so I'll just need to work on getting my shots straight in the first place.

Bridge and ACR are OK to use but Photoshop is unwieldy for my needs. I just find DPP the quickest solution to achieving the results I want. I am also considering Lightroom but haven't really played around with the beta enough yet.

After "playing" with the beta for Lightroom I prefer DPP using Photoshop for other things.


Jack

tdodd wrote in post #2724649
I also like DPP and much prefer it to CS2. All I really need to do with my photos is fix WB and exposure and maybe crop and straighten. DPP is great for all that, apart from the straightening bit so I'll just need to work on getting my shots straight in the first place.

Bridge and ACR are OK to use but Photoshop is unwieldy for my needs. I just find DPP the quickest solution to achieving the results I want. I am also considering Lightroom but haven't really played around with the beta enough yet.

Agree, DPP is almost all thats needed for most shots, but the straightening and poor highlight recovery are really holding it back. I'm kind of hoping DPP comes out with a new version before I have to make my final decision on Lightroom.

Golly gee, another RAW thread...

I use C1 Pro and it is, imo, one of the best to date. In reality if you choose any of the popular conversion programs and learn it, learn it well, you should do fine. The choice of this is really a personal one. Most of them can get you to a point of good conversion but are you comfortable with the UI, the time it takes you, etc. If you want to use the Canon picture styles you are pretty much stuck to DPP but Lightroom does have some presets that are very similar in nature.

The next version of C1 LE is due out in the spring with C1 Pro (personally I think they have this backwards) being due out in the fall of 2007. I will use Lightroom as I get a copy due to being a purchaser of RSP. I do anxiously await the next release from Phase one which is touted to being pretty darned good and some 300% faster than it is now. Right now it is not bad in the speed area if you have a decent PC.

Further to my post #3 above I've now spent ~5 hours fiddling with 118 troublesome wedding photos using Lightroom, most of which needed WB correction, many of which needed exposure/highlight/sha​dow correction and some of which needed crop/straighten. From a standing start I had to fiddle and experiment at first and there was a lot of CTRL-Z going on but in the end I completed all 118 photos and output them to jpeg.

I really liked the info on blown highlights and crushed blacks and the easy highlight and shadow recovery tools. It was also great to have integrated cropping and straightening and to be able to see the resultant effect in the edit window, unlike DPP.

I ran myself a slideshow of the DPP output with the Lightroom output to compare the result s from each and I'd say that in 8 out of 10 cases I preferred the results from Lightroom, in 1 out of 10 cases the results were comparable and in 1 out of 10 DPP had the edge. Given my limited experience of Lightroom so far I'd say this is a great endorsement of the product and I can't see any reason not to make the switch.

I was mostly using DPP but have recently been using UFRAW (dcRAW based GUI). I like the results that I can get by setting my own base curve on a per picture basis adjusting WB as needed.

e-k

Wow! I thought I was the odd man out for using UFRaw. Despite the drawbacks of its amateurish interface, it allows a lot of precise control and highlight retention.

Tried a lot of them (RSE, Bibble, ACR), but I just settled on using Canon DPP, which is my favorite. After having tried LR Beta, I've decided that I will be using the full version of the software to manage my workflow. I will eventually ween myself completely free of DPP unless Canon seriously overhauls the program and gives it as many feature rich options and a sleek UI that competes with LR, but I doubt they will. If I'm going to perform a simple RAW conversion for a few family and friends photos, I'll still be using DPP. For work involving a heavy workload, batch processing, cataloging and tagging images, I'll be using LR.

I've been using Adobe Camera RAW. I have CS2 and PSE4, usually I use PSE4 but recently noticed there are more options with ACR using CS2.

Does anyone use ACR with PSE5?

Eagle wrote in post #2729389
I've been using Adobe Camera RAW. I have CS2 and PSE4, usually I use PSE4 but recently noticed there are more options with ACR using CS2.

Does anyone use ACR with PSE5?

ACR with Elements is a joke. Only included by Adobe, I think, so they can market that it does RAW conversions... Well, I guess its good for Nikon folks who have to pay EXTRA for a RAW converter.

Elements ACR is on par with Canon's Zoombrowser (actually, I think that's being a little kind to ACR )

Since I only have Elements, I avoid ACR altogether and use DPP.

Another DPP user here. Could use some improvements, but fine for now.