Color Issues - Help Needed

printergirl

I am demoing two different products to help with color correction and workflow. I am getting such varying results from each, on the exact same picture, I would like some input and thoughts on what appears to be working or not working. I will post each set of pics (two quick snapshots I did to play with) and please, any help or thoughts would be appreciated on which you think is producing better color.

TREE PICS

Version #1



Version #2



CAT PICS

Version #1



Version #2



Thanks

printergirl

Sorry to bump. I was really hoping to get some opinions on this. I only have 30 days to try both programs and then I need to make a decision.

Sam

What two programs are you demoing? What programs do have now? Are you working with a calibrated monitor?

I guess I don't understand exactly what your trying to accomplish. I use CS4, shoot RAW, and adjust white balance color to taste. Sometimes auto color works sometimes not, but I don't rely on an automatic fix.

Sam

printergirl

I am demoing both Aperture and Lightroom. Calibrated monitor, but should probably do it again soon. I need something that can help me with my speeding up my workflow in processing. At this point I am leaning towards Aperture, just because I like the interface better. None of the pics were done with an autofix, but with me tweaking them. I guess I'm really not seeing much of a difference in the tree pics, but on the cat ones, I have two very different looks.

I'm sure I could play with it in both and make them look closer to each other, but my goal is to be able to process pics faster for shoots that involved a lot of pictures (not portraits though, which I prefer to take more time with), therefore I timed myself on each and put the same amount of time into PP on all photos.

I guess all I am really looking for is opinions on which cat pic looks better (or what needs to be done to each) to improve the shot. Does version #1 of the cat pic look too soft? Should I punch up the colors? I think I did that too much in version #2.

pathfinder

Are you shooting jpgs or RAW files?

Are you shooting your jpgs in sRGB or aRGB?

If you are shooting in RAW, what camera profiles are you using? Lightroom offers a number of different profiles, and that will affect how the images look. I am not aware if you can choose or edit your camera profiles in Aperture.

Whether the images look better in one program or the other will depend entirely on how they are edited, and not which program is "better".

I vastly prefer Lightroom over Aperture, even though I started with Aperture when it first came out. That said, there are lots of successful shooters who use and love Aperture. You just have to decide which works better for you and gives you the image quality and appearance that you want.

If you think you will want to use Photoshop as well at some time, that might be a vote for Lightroom, as LR and PS work very well together. I use them both everyday, and the transfer of a file from one to the other is seamless.

Your images seem to vary in contrast. That can be altered with either program, Aperture or Lightroom.

I prefer the higher contrast images for these two images, but might not for all images. Depends on the subject and the lighting.

printergirl

Shooting RAW.

It appears I have a lot to learn about each before making a decision about either.

Thanks!

RicherSea

I personally use Lightroom and it does integrate very well with photoshop. I would choose the one that fits your workflow and image management system better, rather than the one that you feel might have better image editing qualities, since you can always resort to full PS if either fall short on the occasional image.

printergirl

Wow. Just recalibrated my monitor again. It was off a bit. What a difference that made. Now I see what some see on their monitors, is NOT necessarily what others see. I am just using the in-computer calibration settings (not using Spyder or anything) on my iMac.