View Single Post
Posts: 515 | Thanked: 259 times | Joined on Jan 2010
#1
Hi,
I love that FCamera can give me access to RAW, but to be honest when compared to the output the default camera is still better. Please allow me to clarify, the FCamera DNGs have better resolution, but the default N900 camera gives better color output, more even and realistic.

Here's the deal. Yesterday I profiled my N900 using my Colorchecker passport and I loaded the N900 color profile into Lightroom and no matter what, I am unable to get the same even color across the frame color just seems to be off.

a) Vignette - FCamera images are darker around the edges but this can be resolved in LR
b) Blue / Green noise in shadows - I know part of the shadow issue has to do with color balance in the shadows, but not all dark areas should look green/blu-ish. Some shadows have uneven tones. I've tried split toning, adjusting shadow color in the camera calibration, white balance and I am not able to get even color. What is interesting is that the vignetting isn't just dark but also creates the same unnatural color variation in the vignette so even though I can compensate for the vignette I am unable to get even color throughout the image.
c) Exposure - FCamera slightly underexposes. IT's great because there is less likelihood of channels clipping but it if I wanted to expose just a bit bright, it is impossible to do unless I go to Manual and when outdoors in daylight, it is impossible for me to tell from the LCD if I have proper exposure. If there was a way to set +1/3 or +1 ev, that'd be great. As is, guessing when you're outdoors is not the best way to go.

So I guess here's my question. Is it possible for FCamera to output the image AFTER Nokia has processed the image (dark frame subtraction, color adjustment, tone curve) but before it gets written to JPEG? If you can do that that would make a huge difference to image quality

For those that say then that's not real RAW, I beg to differ, all DSLR's today do some of these same adjustments before writing to RAW.

Last edited by geohsia; 2010-10-02 at 18:56.