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Correct color representation is next to sharpeness and correct light of course the most essential element of photography. Modern digital camera's generally have good color rendering. There seems to be one noticable exception, some blue, purple, violet hues seem to create a specific problem for digital camera's.
This Early Purple-Orchis (Orchis mascula) was shot with a Canon 1D, Canon 180 mm macro lens and flash. The picture was taken in highest resolution jpeg. When reviewing on the lcd screen of the camera, I noticed a color shift and decided to also make some pictures using RAW, ie without in-camera compression.
Picture of the same early purple orchis as above, same flower, same camera set-up, only difference, captured in RAW rather than jpeg. When converting the RAW image into jpeg using the Adobe camera raw plug-in for Photoshop, the image "miraculously" revealed its true colors.
A search on internet didn't immediately give a clear answer. Some possible directions to look for a solution are listed below...
A search on internet didn't immediately give a clear answer. Some possible directions to look for a solution are listed below...
There is a difference in sensitivity to colors between the human eye and the imaging chip in digital camera's. Whereby the eye has a broader spectrum than the chip, especially in the range of the purple to violets. Tribecalabs (from where the schema on the left comes) developed a software package to enhance the purple tones. See more on http://www.tribecalabs.com
Although I believe this to be true, how come the pictures above are so different? The color is clearly there, seems like the jpeg messed it up...
This anyhow is a topic that spurs quite a bit of discussion, e.g. at the forum of Luminous Lanscape http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=10538
Although I believe this to be true, how come the pictures above are so different? The color is clearly there, seems like the jpeg messed it up...
This anyhow is a topic that spurs quite a bit of discussion, e.g. at the forum of Luminous Lanscape http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=10538
I tried to find references on color errors when using jpeg algorithms, but I don't seem to find a clear answer. A quite frustrating observation is that this happens with the more expensive digital SLRs (seen this with Canon D30 / 20D and 1D) but not with the cheaper point and shoot camera's...anyone with a good idea as to why this happens...most welcome.
Some comments on the Naturescapes.net site pointed to the importance of having the white balance the same. The example on the left is from one and the same shot (RAW + small jpeg). The jpeg (left) again deviates from the converted RAW (right). During the conversion, I kept the in-camera default settings...
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