Nikon Capture NX2 vs Adobe Photoshop CS4

Hey Folks,

If anyone's interested, I just posted a short piece about NX2 and CS4 (well, ACR, I spose) for Raw conversions from my new D300s.

Here.

The short of it is that NX2 looks WAY better, and is WAY slower.

Cheers

Carl

PS - fixed the typo in the url noted below.

I'm getting an Error 404 on your link

Here is the right link. http://skolaiimages.com/journal/2009/10/21/nikon-capture-nx2-and-adobe-cs4/#more-1119
Your conclusion are not quite accurate. You can make your files sing using CS4, it just takes knowing your way around the program. NX2 essentially uses your jpeg settings, so while you get "better looking" files straight out of camera you are not using your raw imager's full capabilities (ok, I am generalising here). While I do agree that NX2 will generally take less work to give you a final product, it has too many problems to justify the price tag.

Hey Luke

Here is the correct link .. For some reason the post added a 'vv' to the end of the url and now I can't edit it. I apologize for that (Jim - it'd be nice if some editing were allowed of original posts - even if just for 24 hours or something - PS - oh, now I see how to do that, via the forum homepage. Cool).

Hey Younes - I appreciate your comments ... and trust me, I spent plenty of time with ACR adjusting files .. but I'd rather not have to .. if NX2 can render the files correctly in the first place.

I understand both RAW converters are powerful programs, capable to making enormous adjustments to a raw file (far more than I know about, for sure) ... but if the white balance is off, the exposure is off, and even sharpness is different b/n the 2, I'd say there's an issue. The 2 examples posted are simply unadjusted RAW files. To bring an image into CS4, from either NX2 or ACR, I'd like for the image to not have a nasty magenta cast. :)

If there's something I can adjust in the ACR defaults, etc that render the image correctly, I'd be up for trying it.

Cheers

Carl

Interesting, Carl, and quite helpful.

First, see this thread here at NPN. It's for the D300, not the D300s, but it may help a lot.

I too have been amazed comparing the results I got with NEFs from my D300 in Lightroom and in ViewNX. I did not install the trial CaptureNX because I had read about it crashing a lot (which problem may have been fixed, but I try not to cause my [Windows] computer more problems than I can deal with). ViewNX, if it were not so slow, would be absolutely wonderful: the "as shot" settings really are, and, while they should be, it is still a little bit surprising. There is even less noise, using the no-noise-removal in View and the default noise removal in Lightroom.

Anyway, I just want to say that I've had an experience similar to yours. And yours has consoled me about the slowness of View and saved me from trying Nikon's even slower, pay-for-it software.

hey Rosemarie

Thanks for your post .. those settings are helpful, for sure .. none of them get it like NX2 does, but maybe that's because Matt's profiles are for the D300 not the D300s .. I'm not sure how different the RAW files are between those 2 cameras at all, so that could be the difference I'm seeing.

ACR is definitely a capable program and with enough tweaking, most files could probably resolve as they do in another program.

I haven't had any issues with NX2 crashing, once it got running. I remember that seeming to happen quite a bit with Capture 4 though .. I stopped using it for pretty much exactly the reason you didn't install NX.

Thanks again for the link.

Cheers

Carl

For the reasons stated above, I think both raw converters are pretty clunky. ACR is like my first car - no power steering, no power brakes, stick shift. NX2 is slicker, but imprecise when doing critical adjustments (sorry I am a mask and layer kinda guy). I have found that Phase One Capture One is the converter that gives me the best combination of features - it has the best batch mode operation, good quality output, and very very fast, since it works on tiny screen previews non-destructively rather than the raw file. It is not unusual for me to come back from an event with 1000 images, and within a couple of hours I will have tiff files for additional editing in PS, small jpgs for posting, and large jpgs for sending to a printer. And it supports custom curves for many cameras.

I have two programs, Phase One Capture One and NX2.

I don't shoot large volumes so I haven't used my P1C1 program much.

When I started with NX2 I only had 1/2 gig RAM and it took forever. I have since upgraded to 6 gig RAM with a new computer and it seems reasonably fast.

I've never used PS so I can't compare. There are still a lot of features I don't know about in NX2. The instruction book is hard to me to follow.

I really don't like all the buttons I have to push to get a product but maybe its that way on all programs. But, being designed for by Nikon I would think NX2 could render a better photo since the alogrithms are in their cameras. Do they share those with PS??

Thanks for the work, Carl. Thought you'd have gone for a D700???

http://www.dxomark.com/index.php/eng/Image-Quality-Database/Nikon

Synopsis:

Low light performance rating----higher being better
D90 = 977
D300 = 679
D700 = 2527

But it all depends on your glass, DX or FX.

Photography being a hobby I spend more on camera technology than I do for my job's equipment. The latter makes money. Hobbiest are crazy, anyway.

I did not make it to AK this year. Too much smoke and dry rivers.
the fisch

I wouldn't be too hard to create a pre-set in Adobe to get what NX2 is showing you; as Younes stated, NX2 is just applying its own set of values so you don't have too. Different strokes for different folks - I personally like tweaking an image to get what I want.