How to ICC profile a camera? (no DNG)

[Electromen]

XRite ColorChecker Passport has a stand alone program.  Doesn't that fit your needs?

[Chris_Brown]

Anybody?

where should I turn to to find some help and answers?

Are you still trying to make profiles for free?

[Nino Loss]

I don´t have personal experience, but I found this site (french) from a reference in the DXO site (since DXO also can use ICC Camera profiles)
The guy there offers a 570 color patches test chart for more precise profiles and offers to create the profile (paid). Maybe the 24 color chart you´re using is not enough.

http://www.christophe-metairie-photographie.com/eng digital target.html

Thank you Francisco I'll try to find out about this guy. Who is it? How to contact him?

It might not be so important to use a bigger chart as indicated here http://www.betterlight.com/downloads/conference06_notes/myers_artRepro_color.pdf

regards
nino

[Nino Loss]

XRite ColorChecker Passport has a stand alone program.  Doesn't that fit your needs?

thank you for the suggestion, but as I wrote in my original post, DCP, for the moment, is not what I need (We'll see in the future, when a the Profile editor comes out of the Beta phase).

... and x-rite sells two professional profiling solutions, for a bit less than USD 2.000, ProfileMaker and Profiler. They are also ICC based.:

here is my OP

Till now I did not have the need for more than a visual correction of the generic Phase One profiles available in Capture One.

I need something more accurate for the next studio jobs (and at the same time get rid of the Canon 5D2's red).

The only solution I could come up with was Argyll, but I did not manage to find the time to learn all that. (I keep going back there and do not even now where to start...)

BTW I find it interesting that X-rites new i1PhotoPro package does only include the colorchecker to work with Adobe products. So what do I do when I want to use C1?

many thanks in advance

nino

EDIT: Here is a fine intro to the problem of color accuracy: http://www.betterlight.com/downloads/conference06_notes/color_Accuracy-ppt.pdf

[Nino Loss]

Are you still trying to make profiles for free?

Sorry I don't get the message, Chris. Please help me to understand you!

regards
nino

[FranciscoDisilvestro]

I'll try to find out about this guy. Who is it? How to contact him?

The only reference I have is an interview in the DXO web site. At the end there is an email address.

http://www.dxo.com/intl/photo/dxo_optics_pro/advanced_color/color_calibration_with_c_metairie

From a post in another forum (which I assume is yours) you are trying to achieve maximum color accuracy for art reproduction. This is IMHO one of the most challenging situations. Besides achieving an outstanding ICC profile, there are still issues like metameric failure and out of gamut colors. How good and uniform is your light?

I would think that Chris suggestion was that you need professional advice/consulting (not free)

[Nino Loss]

Francisco, Art reproduction is indeed a challenging situation, but I like challenges because I like to learn ;-)

For the light is use my profoto d4 and/or natural day light in the studio.

I Chris meant that I should get professional consulting/advice, than I understand. Only I am trying to get expertise myself and not only get profiles for free but also get money for the work. In general  try to be as good as possible in what I do.

The only reference I have is an interview in the DXO web site. At the end there is an email address.

http://www.dxo.com/intl/photo/dxo_optics_pro/advanced_color/color_calibration_with_c_metairie
[...]

Thank you again! I'll look it up

regards
nino

[Chris_Brown]

Sorry I don't get the message, Chris. Please help me to understand you!

I was wondering if you are spending money on ICC profile targets and software, or if you are looking for methods of making profiles that do not cost anything.

In my experience, you get what you pay for. I've profiled drum scanners, cameras, printer and monitors. To me (and my clients) it's worth it to buy a quality profiling product, or pay for a quality profiling service.

When profiling a camera, I found it imperative that the ICC profile be made using the raw capture/processing software that you'll normally use. Don't make a camera profile using Capture One, then go use Aperture or Raw Developer for all your work.

This brings me to another point. To keep costs low, I suggest you try Raw Developer as a capture & process program. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

[Nino Loss]

Chris,

I was wondering if you are spending money on ICC profile targets and software, or if you are looking for methods of making profiles that do not cost anything.

In my experience, you get what you pay for. I've profiled drum scanners, cameras, printer and monitors. To me (and my clients) it's worth it to buy a quality profiling product, or pay for a quality profiling service.

I agree with you, we try to only use quality gear. We spent a lot of money in the last years to convert to digital.
I am willing to spent what it takes, BUT I also spent sometimes money on the best there is, just to find out that for some reason it did not work as advertised, or as "pros", "advisers" and "insiders" tell you. Evidently only good was meant, and you can proof no wrong. But it happens over and over again...
In this forum, on the contrary, there are people who know what they talk about. I should ask them to do a job for me? Your are right, but I would have to fly them in over a few oceans and continents, for most of them, and I spare you all the other problems that there would be. Or I could send them my cameras. I can't afford it.
In my location, there is simply no quality service (which is obviously not true where you are). Here, even big international corporations rely on quite unqualified staff and "experts". Some clients here know that.
In conclusion, I started to learn myself quite successfully ;-).
 

When profiling a camera, I found it imperative that the ICC profile be made using the raw capture/processing software that you'll normally use. Don't make a camera profile using Capture One, then go use Aperture or Raw Developer for all your work.

This brings me to another point. To keep costs low, I suggest you try Raw Developer as a capture & process program. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

We still use C1 in my studio (We'll see in the future when/if I'll move over to the DNG profiling camp, as I get tired of being a paying P1 beta tester).

[Chris_Brown]

We still use C1 in my studio (We'll see in the future when/if I'll move over to the DNG profiling camp, as I get tired of being a paying P1 beta tester).

Since you use C1, you need to eliminate its influence on the colors and tones when making an ICC camera profile.

For example, this tidbit is from the Raw Developer site:

"Processing Disabled" Output Mode

Ability to bypass all image adjustments and all color matching operations for fast, high quality export of linear files intended for further processing with other image processing programs or RAW workflows. Also useful for creating non-color matched output for use in generating custom camera or scene profiles with ICC camera profiling software.

[Nino Loss]

Since you use C1, you need to eliminate its influence on the colors and tones when making an ICC camera profile.

But Capture One's "Color view" (former "Phase Ono - no color corrections") setting in addition to the output setting "Embed camera profile" does exactly that AFAIK. You have other info?

[Chris_Brown]

But Capture One's "Color view" (former "Phase Ono - no color corrections") setting in addition to the output setting "Embed camera profile" does exactly that AFAIK. You have other info?

Are any curves applied?

[Nino Loss]

Are any curves applied?

everything zeroed out in Capture One, but the image looks like there are still some curves applied, so I tried with and without applying additional curves in order to make the data linear. now that you ask me, I understand that this C1 behavior could be one source for the profiles getting too dark or too light, too saturated ....

[Chris_Brown]

everything zeroed out in Capture One, but the image looks like there are still some curves applied, so I tried with and without applying additional curves in order to make the data linear. now that you ask me, I understand that this C1 behavior could be one source for the profiles getting too dark or too light, too saturated

Is the "film curve" off?
No profile is being applied?
No sharpening?
No clarity?
etc.

[Nino Loss]

Is the "film curve" off?
No profile is being applied?
No sharpening?
No clarity?
etc.

yes

[Chris_Brown]

What is the gamma setting in Capture One?

[Nino Loss]

Chris,

I have set it to Linear, if that is what you meant ?!

BTW  The above mentioned "Color Editor issue", where readout values would not make sens, has been fixed. It was due to a corrupt ProPhotoRGB profile.

[Chris_Brown]

Nino,

Is this your workflow?

• Capture One is zeroed out across all input parameters
• You photograph your ICC profiling target (provided by basICColor Input)
• No ICC profile is being attached or referenced when an image is captured
• You locate the raw file and run the image through the ICC profiling software (basICColor Input)
• You create the profile
• You capture an image of a scene/product/person and apply the ICC profile in Capture One
• This captured image is too dark with over-saturated colors

Is this correct?

[Nino Loss]

yes, except that before buying the ridiculously expensive basICColor target I did a test with the cc24 (as you can see in this paper http://www.betterlight.com/downloads/conference06_notes/myers_artRepro_color.pdf the difference between cc24 and SG exists, but is not that dramatic). When I changed to Argyll, I got, with the same shot, rid of the darkness, but saturation was way down.

[Nino Loss]

Chris,
I was inquiring in LL\CaptureOne about the specific settings. I posted a screen shot with the illumiation readout http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=49793.msg410398#msg410398