? for Nikon users re RAW conversion, skin tones

VayCayMom · October 13, 2010

I have been experimenting with the different camera calibrations in Lightroom3, looking to see the difference in the final product.I have been using whatever appears to be the brightest. But I also notice that what I see in the basic preview is not what I end up with when it reaches my CS5.

Skintones are the most important object to me. And does anyone use Nikon Capture, what settings do you find provide the best skin tones?

Thanks in advance for your feedback.

Matthew Saville · October 13, 2010

CAN OF WORMS!

Wow, this is a huge debate that could go on forever.

But let's put the facts and the varaibles out on the table...

* You're using Nikon and Lightroom 3

* You're shooting portraits, and skin tones are therefore important to you. (What race? What lighting?)

* You're not happy with the Lightroom profiles, at least some of the time, and are wondering A) what other people use in Lightroom, and

if there are better alternatives.

...To answer, I have to say that I do often love the skin tones I get SOOC and I'll use Nikon View NX to output JPG files straight from my RAW files. I gotta say, Nikon's in-camera processing is very powerful, and people don't give it enough credit in comparison with Canon's skin tones.

However when I'm not perfectly happy with the exposure or tonality in an image, I do use LR3 and I'm not THAT unhappy with the skin tones, now after having a few years experience with the ACR converter.

I used to not like Adobe's home-grown profiles, and preferred their approximations of Nikon's D2XMODE profiles. However with LR3 and the latest ACR converter, (I also use Bridge) ...I must say that Adobe's Standard conversion is pretty darn good.

A couple things I can suggest:

In-camera, use D2XMODE1 for skin tones and pay VERY careful attention to your white balance and colors in general. Especially in easy light, it's entirely possible for Nikon's in-camera colors to, well, rock.

In Lightroom, make sure you're not over-processing the images. Certain processing parameters can really begin to mess things up, such as highlight recovery. Zoom to 100% and mess with highlight recovery and see how it doesn't just bring down the highlights, but it also changes the hues a little bit. Fiddle with other parameters too, and see how they affect skin tones.

I prefer the Adobe Standard and D2XMODE 1 profiles, depending on the race of the subject and the light that is hitting them.

I try and NEVER touch saturation or vibrance.

For practice, I'd recommend going out and shooting some portraits in various lighting, bracketing your white balance in Kelvin. Fiddle with both the main parameter, but also the up-down direction. (Green & Magenta)

Review these images in View NX, and also in Lightroom, and just see how you like the skin tones...

Good luck!
=Matt=

VayCayMom · October 13, 2010

Thanks Matt, this is exactly the type of answer I was hoping for. Sometimes my skintones are a big problem, well maybe there are other problems too but I don't care about them! I did use View for a while to cull my images because it seemed faster. You have given me a lot to work with. thanks again!

Qarik · October 13, 2010

VayCayMom wrote: »

I have been experimenting with the different camera calibrations in Lightroom3, looking to see the difference in the final product.I have been using whatever appears to be the brightest. But I also notice that what I see in the basic preview is not what I end up with when it reaches my CS5.

Skintones are the most important object to me. And does anyone use Nikon Capture, what settings do you find provide the best skin tones?

Thanks in advance for your feedback.

what do you mean the "basic preview"? And why are you going to CS5?

What is your start to finish workflow now?

ImissFilm · October 14, 2010

VayCayMom wrote: »

Thanks Matt, this is exactly the type of answer I was hoping for. Sometimes my skintones are a big problem, well maybe there are other problems too but I don't care about them! I did use View for a while to cull my images because it seemed faster. You have given me a lot to work with. thanks again!

For me to get the best results for my nikon raw images with the minimal fuss is Nikon's Capture NX2. This software will get you some great results for the natural skin tones that you are looking for without worrying about lightoom settings to match the nef files

You can do a lot of post processing with it and since it is Nikon's software they have the ability to read Nikon's proprietary NEF coding. No other software except Nikon's can do that. With this software you have almost all of the in camera controls to turn on and off as well.

Now the bad.... the software is not the most intuitive. If you are batch processing a bunch of photo's it takes a long time. Its noise reduction is no where close to LR3. The software takes a lot of getting used to. It is not for everyone. But if you are shooting Nikon NEF it is worth giving it a free trial from the nik website.

I use lightroom 3 as well. I love lightroom 3 because of its ease of use for certain things that I want or need to do. They both have a place in my workflow for NEF files....

Matthew Saville · October 15, 2010

ImissFilm wrote: »

For me to get the best results for my nikon raw images with the minimal fuss is Nikon's Capture NX2. This software will get you some great results for the natural skin tones that you are looking for without worrying about lightoom settings to match the nef files

You can do a lot of post processing with it and since it is Nikon's software they have the ability to read Nikon's proprietary NEF coding. No other software except Nikon's can do that. With this software you have almost all of the in camera controls to turn on and off as well.

Now the bad.... the software is not the most intuitive. If you are batch processing a bunch of photo's it takes a long time. Its noise reduction is no where close to LR3. The software takes a lot of getting used to. It is not for everyone. But if you are shooting Nikon NEF it is worth giving it a free trial from the nik website.

I use lightroom 3 as well. I love lightroom 3 because of its ease of use for certain things that I want or need to do. They both have a place in my workflow for NEF files....

Very well-put. Nikon's Capture NX is great for low-volume processing, and also lower ISO's. Unfortunately if you find yourself shooting very often at higher ISO's, I think it's better to process in ACR or something.

Which is why personally, my compromise is to cull images in View NX, and I can output them with minimal bumps in the contrast / color if necessary, but if they need real serious work I just go to Bridge or Lightroom, instead of Capture NX...

=Matt=

VayCayMom · October 15, 2010

Thanks everyone for your input. I have all of the software we are talking about and I have been experimenting with some old files. Some of my confusion also was due to computer issues, not enough speed, and freezing, and sticky cursor. After running just a few images through Capture NX2, I see it's value but I miss alot of Lightroom3 bells and whistles. I recall that the reason I added NX2 to my arsenal was due to advice from this forum when I had some major issues with skin tone from an event, and it did do the trick when I couldn't get what I wanted from Adobe.

Thanks again!

Matthew Saville · October 16, 2010

VayCayMom wrote: »

Thanks everyone for your input. I have all of the software we are talking about and I have been experimenting with some old files. Some of my confusion also was due to computer issues, not enough speed, and freezing, and sticky cursor. After running just a few images through Capture NX2, I see it's value but I miss alot of Lightroom3 bells and whistles. I recall that the reason I added NX2 to my arsenal was due to advice from this forum when I had some major issues with skin tone from an event, and it did do the trick when I couldn't get what I wanted from Adobe.

Thanks again!

Which is again why I suggest working very hard to get your images to look awesome on the back of the camera, and then just use View NX instead of Capture NX. It loads fast, works great for culling, and lets you output JPG's if you decide you like the in-camera results. And again, LR3 and BR CS5 are not that bad if you spend some time to get used to the nuances of processing.

It can also help if you study your images in View NX, while also processing them in LR3, you can often get the LR images very close, or even better, and soon it becomes second-nature...

=Matt=

VayCayMom · October 16, 2010

Matthew Saville wrote: »

Which is again why I suggest working very hard to get your images to look awesome on the back of the camera, and then just use View NX instead of Capture NX. It loads fast, works great for culling, and lets you output JPG's if you decide you like the in-camera results. And again, LR3 and BR CS5 are not that bad if you spend some time to get used to the nuances of processing.

It can also help if you study your images in View NX, while also processing them in LR3, you can often get the LR images very close, or even better, and soon it becomes second-nature...

=Matt=

Believe me that is my goal!! it makes things much easier and cuts the work time by 70%!! Every once in a while I might hit that goal for 5 out of 50 images, and wow, I get it. But I am not there yet. I want to be a better photographer not a great fixer!! I am realizing that I need to do a lot better with exposure, a whole lot better.
Thanks for your encouragement and solid advice, and for taking the time to do this.!

ImissFilm · November 5, 2010

Matthew Saville wrote: »

Which is again why I suggest working very hard to get your images to look awesome on the back of the camera, and then just use View NX instead of Capture NX. It loads fast, works great for culling, and lets you output JPG's if you decide you like the in-camera results. And again, LR3 and BR CS5 are not that bad if you spend some time to get used to the nuances of processing.

It can also help if you study your images in View NX, while also processing them in LR3, you can often get the LR images very close, or even better, and soon it becomes second-nature...

=Matt=

Hey Matthew,

Do you know if View NX creates Jpegs from the embedded jpeg preview in NEF files? Also, do you know any where I can find LR3 presets to match NEF profiles. Yes, the laborious study of side by side images would eventually get me there. However, I am like our thread starter.... I want to be out and about as much as I can with the camera and spending less time behind the computer.

Matthew Saville · November 7, 2010

ImissFilm wrote: »

Hey Matthew,

Do you know if View NX creates Jpegs from the embedded jpeg preview in NEF files? Also, do you know any where I can find LR3 presets to match NEF profiles. Yes, the laborious study of side by side images would eventually get me there. However, I am like our thread starter.... I want to be out and about as much as I can with the camera and spending less time behind the computer.

No I'm not sure exactly how View NX creates JPG images, but I will say that it takes quite a long time to output the file so I'm assuming they're not just stripping a low-quality JPG preview. The images look EXACTLY like the high-quality JPG files that the camera would normally create.

Like I said, it's good enough for proofing. If I need to do something big, I'll process the RAW file.

I'm not sure where to find more LR / BR presets; all the presets I've used have come with the programs... I like D2X MODE 1, or 3... I have a couple friends who have shared other profiles with me, but I'd have to do a lot of digging to find' em...

=Matt=

imagesbyeduardo · February 14, 2012

Some Nikon skin tone stuff
Here are a couple of experiments that may be of interest to this discussion:

http://imagesbyeduardo.com/main/2012/01/11/adventures-in-skin-tones-management/

http://imagesbyeduardo.com/main/2012/02/13/fine-tuning-skin-tones/

Ed911 · February 18, 2012

imagesbyeduardo wrote: »

Here are a couple of experiments that may be of interest to this discussion:

http://imagesbyeduardo.com/main/2012/01/11/adventures-in-skin-tones-management/

http://imagesbyeduardo.com/main/2012/02/13/fine-tuning-skin-tones/

Your links aren't loading. All I get is a blank page. I clicked on Matt's link above your post and it works fine.

Just thought I'd let you know.

? for Nikon users re RAW conversion, skin tones

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