Scouser Loc: British Columbia

Colour replication in photography is not something I get too excited about. However, many years ago I worked for a can-making company and one of the many customers we printed cans for was Coca-Cola. The customer's rep came to our plant to help us achieve the precise colour match for 'Coca-Cola Red'. His documents listed 76 different shades of red!
One of my tasks was to produce colour swatches for the printing machine operators to work to, using a regular Olympus film camera and lens. This was in the pre-digital era, but 76 different reds? On film processed at a local pharmacy? Not!
This is probably one of the reasons I don't get too excited about colour replication nowadays.

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Raw isn't just a file format, it's a way of life. RAW is a way of living free of the dictates of camera engineers and product designers, using your mind to see the world in color channels that exceed those of the human eye.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

True colors? Original colors? That's such nonsense. I assume what you mean is Nikon's colors. There's nothing "truer" about Nikon's colors than anybody else's colors. When raw data is processed to create an RGB image an input profile is used that determines color and tone response. Nikon's engineers have created those input profiles for their cameras and for NX-Studio. Nikon's engineers do not have special access to "true colors" that the rest of us don't.

Camera input profiles and all the various processing software app's input profiles share a common problem. They are all generic. When an input profile is created it's created using a generic light source. In other words a light source that doesn't exactly match the light source in each of our photos. The result is color inaccuracy and there's no real way to avoid it. All the different engineers be it Nikon, Canon, Adobe etc. work to produce a pleasing generic response or if you prefer a deliberately skewed result like the Fuji camera's various film sims.

When we process raw files we can choose what we want to do. If what you really want is accurate color then you can't use any generic input profile -- they're all inaccurate and that includes all Nikon's. Yes they're different and you can like one over another but none of them are more "true."

So it's fine to prefer one generic result over another and/or to adjust the result yourself. The problem with NX-Studio is that it's crude software by comparison and doesn't provide the user with options. Using NX-Studio all you can do is select from the supplied list of Nikon's generics. You can't import or create a custom profile that would be more accurate. For example:

The NEF raw file below is processed using three different input profiles -- there are differences. The middle one is considerably more accurate to the actual colors of the subject than the other two. For the middle image I created a custom input profile for the light source where the photo was taken (overhead daylight LEDs). The other two profiles are generic. In the PL-7 generic the reds are too orange. In the NX-Studio generic the blues are too red. Look at the color checker green patch in the NX-Studio's rendering -- that's way off. In fact the poorer job accurately reproducing the color check is the NX-Studio result. The custom input profile used in the middle image most accurately reproduces the color checker.

(Download)

CaltechNerd Loc: Whittier, CA, USA

Absolutely true. By the time you go through all those layers, including the viewer's eye and you left out the color of the surrounding space which influences how you see the picture's color, "perfect" color reproduction is meaningless.

stan0301 Loc: Colorado

In as much as cameras and human eyes don't see things the same way - I don't quite see why you worry about presenting an image "just as your camera saw it"

lesdmd Loc: Middleton Wi via N.Y.C. & Cleveland

Shouldn’t the default be just as your “eye saw it” ?
Either you want to re-create reality as you perceive it or create some sort of a fantasy. But why would you allow the camera to make the decision for you?

camerapapi Loc: Miami, Fl.

Paul, you do not have to believe me, just call my lab technician that he is wrong, a man that has been printing images for as long as you have lived. Talk to Nikon or perhaps to Canon and ask them if the colors of the original RAW data is best reproduced with Lightroom and just listen to what they have to say. It is not me, just discuss color reproduction with those companies.

If you are happy with the colors you get now with whatever editor you are using that is fine with me. If you alter the colors to simulate what you like it is also fine with me. They are your images, not mine.
I will continue to use proprietary software because those are the colors reproduced the way I like them....and yes, my monitor is calibrated every two weeks.

I again rest my case.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Duuuh... That's funny.
Talk to Apple and ask them if an Android OS phone is the best for.....
Talk to Nike and ask them which sports shoes are the best for......
Talk to UPS and ask them what's the best way to ship.....
Talk to Dawn and ask them what's the best way to clean.....

Of course Nikon will tell you the color their software produces is best. The point is there's nothing about the color Nikon's camera profiles create that's different in some unique way that makes them "the best" or "true" as opposed to other alternatives. They're just different.

All you're saying is that NX-Studio is the only way to process NEF files and get Nikon's own camera input profiles. That's correct. And you're right there's a difference. They're all different one from another. You're wrong if you suggest it's a quality difference. It's fine for you to prefer the results produced by Nikon's input profiles. It's just as fine for someone else to prefer an alternative.

BUT when the job changes from colors you like to colors that accurately reproduce the subject then Nikon's generic input profiles are no better than any other generic input profiles and they fail just as badly (see above: https://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-799859-2.html#14458469). Cross the line from enthusiast photography to commercial photography. A gallery wants reproduction photos of a dozen color paintings and the artist is very fussy about color. Try that using a Nikon and NX-Studio to process the raw files and you're not getting paid. To do that job properly you will control the light source and you will create a custom input profile for that light source and you will use software to process the raw files that can apply that input profile -- that is a quality difference.

Raw processing software that can apply a custom input profile:
Adobe
Capture 1
DXO PL-7

Wyantry Loc: SW Colorado

Well, it might be that engineers and color scientists are more knowledgeable about light, colors, frequencies, wave interactions and other technical aspects. These in order to develop better sensors, lenses and file manipulation softwares.

Photographers are not really tasked with recreating reality — which is why each and any photographer editing or manipulating RAW files to create an image has a personal preference of how the completed image should appear.

Photographers/editors CREATE their personal perception of reality.

Scientists and Engineers attempt to DUPLICATE reality based upon known principles of light and physics.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

What case?

In case you are not aware, EVERY manufacturer uses a different logarithm to create their proprietary raw file. This results in a bias when it comes to color from the get go, so...

Original colors? You are dreaming. How can you use the 'original colors' when they do not exist in the first place. Ask that question to your 'authoritative' source.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

Attempt is the keyword. They all fail.

camerapapi Loc: Miami, Fl.

I am afraid some of you got me wrong but I expected that. I have never said that colors reproduced by NX Studio are better than other colors but instead what I said was that if you want the TRUE colors of your files proprietary software is the way to go. If you like the colors ON-1 or Lightroom or Photoshop produce it is perfectly fine with me, it is your decision.

If you ask Nikon or Canon or Olympus, I know nothing about Sony or Fuji, which software to use to reproduce the ACCURATE colors from the files of their cameras they will tell you to use proprietary software. I asked ON-1 if the colors I get from NX or Olympus software were identical to those that output ON-1 and the answer was NO. If you like the colors using ON-1 by all means, keep on using it. If you do not like the OM Workspace colors for Olympus files then use something else. It is all your choice. I am not wrong, the camera companies are the ones that tell me that using their proprietary software I will get the BEST colors their files are capable of. My own lab technician swears by proprietary software so I assume he is also wrong.

Gentlemen, we are all different so use what you feel works best for you but remember that each camera company designed a software to extract the best of the files produced by their cameras. My choice is to use what the company designed for their cameras.

Once again I rest my case.

tcthome Loc: NJ

Jeez! Now if everyone on UHH would just use the same monitor, Xrite i1 Display pro to calibrate their monitor, Color Checker Passport, we would all be seeing the same colors! MAYBE! No smiles option for this reply or would add 3. Happy shooting.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

There's a problem with your language and choice of words. You start this post saying: "I have never said that colors reproduced by NX Studio are better than other colors..." But you then continue in that and the following paragraph to use the words (in all caps) TRUE colors, ACCURATE colors and BEST colors.
Let's clarify:
When you say NX-Studio renders TRUE colors what you really mean is NIKON colors correct?
When you say NX-Studio renders ACCURATE colors what you really mean is NIKON colors correct?
When you say NX-Studio renders BEST colors what you really mean is NIKON colors correct?
(Specifically Nikon's generic camera input profiles).

So what you need to do is stop saying TRUE, ACCURATE and BEST when you mean NIKON.

If someone using a Nikon camera and processing NEF files chooses to use software other than NX-Studio the color rendering they will get will not be NIKON color. Do you understand in that case that the option does exist to get colors that are truer to the subject photographed -- a more accurate match to the subject photographed than Nikon's generic colors?

chrisg-optical Loc: New York, NY

I haven't noticed that effect ever myself, but I don't doubt it exists for many due to differences in rod/cone wavelength responses, iris color, angles, etc.

I have noticed that depending on what other color it is adjacent to, and the thickness or coverage of the color on the screen, it can affect perceived colors, even though the RGB value is exactly the same on the same monitor.

Some colors are tricky too. Years ago I designed a website for someone, and he was fussy about a particular shade of orange as the theme color. He complained that the orange looked different in the certain parts like fonts and thinner sections/lines. When I showed him the RGB values were exactly the same, he was amazed.