camera raw before photomatix ?? Help

handsomejackuk · Mar 30, 2013

I have a few issues regarding using camera raw to before photomatix.. now one of the reasons i use camera raw before photomatix is to fix lens vignetting probs. now if i take 3 raw exposures and i usually view them in jpeg ( save on camera as jps and raw) first to confirm they look ok.. i then open each seperate raw file in camera raw apply lens correction as per my camera .lcp.. what more should i do to the files before importing in to photomatix ? i save them as tif to preserve the quality, and sometimes alter exposure clarity etc. now should i be making adjustment to sharpening and exposure etc all in camera raw before opening in to photo matix, as this seem to give me a bad batch of bracketted files... i seem to get better results by just opening the 3 raw exposures in photomatix first and not.. opening them in camera raw problem is i have bad vignetting and the lens corrections not applied, also bad Chromatic aberrations...

any thoughts on this and what do others do ?

hirejn · Mar 30, 2013

When you take a RAW file into a processing program like Photoshop or Photomatix or any plugins, any saved results become TIFFs. That means they no longer have the RAW adjustments available. You can still use the tools in Lightroom, for example, but it's similar to editing a JPEG. You don't have the latitude of RAW. The original RAW is still a separate file. My approach is to go as far as I can in RAW before opening it in PS or a plugin. Lens corrections shouldn't degrade the image. When to apply sharpening and noise reduction is somewhat subjective. It's usually the last step before outputting a file, but I usually do it in RAW.

handsomejackuk · Mar 31, 2013

hirejn said:
When you take a RAW file into a processing program like Photoshop or Photomatix or any plugins, any saved results become TIFFs. That means they no longer have the RAW adjustments available. You can still use the tools in Lightroom, for example, but it's similar to editing a JPEG. You don't have the latitude of RAW. The original RAW is still a separate file. My approach is to go as far as I can in RAW before opening it in PS or a plugin. Lens corrections shouldn't degrade the image. When to apply sharpening and noise reduction is somewhat subjective. It's usually the last step before outputting a file, but I usually do it in RAW.

I get the Raw thing...and the non destructive lens corrections as it save the info in a XMP file i think... I just dont know what to do with the 3 brackets in camera raw... how much processing do i need to do ? if i get 0ev +1 -1 will they stay the same ? do i need to remove noise sharpen clarity adjust etc. or just do the lens corrections, with CA applied then save as tiff and then open i photomatix or is subjective. and different for every image... What i have been doing is open the three brackets, and creat a normal, dark, and a bright image..then use them....