Canon DPP Clarity setting greyed out.

[Miqs]

I have a Canon EOS 90D and using Canon Digital Photo Professional for edits to my raw images. I notice there is a clarity slider in this app but for me it is greyed out. I have read that it depends on the image quality setting on my 90d but don’t know what setting I should use to enable the clarity slider to work. Can anyone help? Thanks.

[wq9nsc]

The clarity slider is based upon the camera and its sensor and only works with certain cameras.  It is functional with my 1DX III camera bodies but not with my earlier 1DX II bodies.  File setup is the same for both generations of camera bodies, I always have the cameras set to save the image in RAW format.

And on edit, the current version of DPP was released back in April and along with its typical memory leak it has a cute glitch in that unlike all previous versions, instead of telling you it is up to date when you check for updates it is more than happy to update itself over and over with the same version.  Not a big deal but attention to detail is a good thing and hopefully that gets addressed in the next update; I am not holding my breath on the memory leak issue because that has been a problem for many years at least in the Windows version and I think it has now transitioned from being a glitch to being tradition 😂

Rodger

[p4pictures]

If your camera does not have the Clarity setting then the slider is greyed out in DPP for those images.

I did just look at the EOS 90D manual and could not find the Clarity setting there, so that is why it is greyed out for you. I think the clarity slider was introduced to cameras launched in 2020 or after, so that includes the EOS-1D X Mark III, EOS R5 and EOS R6, but not the older EOS R and EOS RP. 

[Miqs]

Brian thank you. I guess I haven't the clarity option. It's a shame as I previously used Adobe LR and PS which gave the clarity option but not DPP. However can you give me any direction on the image settings on the camera. I always shoot raw images with setting below and seems ok but don't really know what the others mean. Any help will be much appreciated. See below. Thanks.

[p4pictures]

Your camera can save RAW files in two formats, the standard RAW and a more compressed version called CRAW. CRAW images are compressed more, and can exhibit some artefacts in areas of smooth tone - skies - as well as have reduced detail compared to "full" RAW images. However for most cases it is not at all obvious. Lightroom / Photoshop / DPP all process the CRAW images in the same way as RAW images. 

The other settings on your camera - the second row - is for JPGs. If you don't want to create in-camera JPG then the setting you have will do that. Some photographers like to have a RAW and JPG, some like a RAW only, some like a JPG only - ultimately this is down to preference and potentially client needs.

The settings that you make on your camera are saved in the RAW image metadata, and this is what DPP will use to initially display the image. For example if you set the camera picture style to Monochrome, you will see black and white images on the LCD, and DPP will display the RAW as a black and white image, but you can change the Picture Style in DPP to show the image in colour. 

There is only one setting which affects the RAW data saved that cannot be undone, and that is the Highlight Tone Priority, normally the setting is disabled, but if you set Enable (D+) or Enhanced (D+2) then you might find that RAW images have more noise in the shadow areas and smoother gradation in the whites. Also the camera ISO low limit will be ISO 200.

[Miqs]

Thanks Brian. Very helpful.

[stevet1]

Miqs,

I personally shoot in CRAW. Where a full RAW might run 20-40mb, a CRAW photo will run 14-16mb.

It saves on storage, and I haven't noticed any real degradation in image quality.

Steve Thomas