DPP

[DC65]

I have a T4i and I have been looking at photo editing software. I'm interested in the DPP software, mainely because it's free.

The latest version 4, from what I can see only works with full frame cameras. I'm not quite sure if version 3.13.0 is still available.

I'm new to photogrophy and there is a lot I don't understand but I'm sticking with it.

Can anyone tell me if I should be persuing DPP or start saving up for Lightroom and a new computer?

Thank you.

[wq9nsc]

That is very odd that you notice a significant drop in sharpness when converting to JPG.  A JPG conversion with quality set to 10 should look very nice and very close in quality (including sharpness) to the displayed RAW image in DPP.  For printing, I export TIF files which are 10 to 15 times the size of a high quality JPG file but on the monitor a high quality JPG and TIF file look extremely close and as good as the displayed processed RAW file in DPP.

Are you viewing the converted JPG files in DPP or the computer's native JPG viewer?  Is it possible that the JPG viewer you are using is doing its own compression/quality loss?

Rodger

[BurnUnit]

At this point I'd try a little experiment. Set up your camera on a tripod outdoors under good sunlight conditions. Shoot a static scene with enough detail and contrast to judge for clarity and sharpness at the highest JPEG resolution and quality level. Then shoot the exact same scene as a RAW file using the same exposure settings. Keep the shutter speed up and stop the aperture down a bit to get things focused as sharply as possible.

Open both files in DPP4 and compare them with no editing applied.Then convert and save a copy of the RAW file as both a JPEG and a TIFF file and compare them again to the image shot as a JPEG. Then do a little bit of a crop & rotate adjustment to the RAW file and convert and save it as another JPEG file and compare it to the other images. If you're seeing much of a change of quality in any of these images post a few samples here so we can see what's going on.

[RobertTheFat]

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@imitchell119 wrote:

Exported JPGs are soft (even though high quality is specified) and look like the "soft tabs" in DPP.

I don't think computer power affects anything but how long the image processing takes.  Unless the software can detect poor graphics capability and then actually change the image processing algorithm(s) it uses - but one would think that it would give me a choice.

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To me your symptoms suggest that DPP may be running out of memory and therefore unable to do the more detailed computations. If you're on a windows machine, you might try devoting more disk space to paged memory. That could slow things down a little (or a lot), but it might conceivably solve the immediate problem.

[Waddizzle]

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@imitchell119 wrote:

Hi,

I am noticing that I have higher quality images displayed in the "Crop and Rotate Images" but when I click on another tab (such as "Adjust Image Detail") the images looses a some sharpness, contrast, saturation.  This is true of the other tabs as well.

Only the "Crop and Rotate Images" tab has the noticeably higher quality.

Any thoughts on how to fix this (or what is causing this)?

DPP 4.9.20.0

Canon 40D RAW images

Thanks!

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Any image can look “soft” when zoomed in far enough.  

The 40D RAW files are only 10MB, or so.  DPP should be to handle those files with ease.  It would make sense that “Crop and Rotate” would display a high resolution image, so that you can make precise adjustments.

Significant amounts of adjustments can soften images, too.  Noise reduction and Sharpness can both remove details.

[BurnUnit]

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@Waddizzle wrote:

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Any image can look “soft” when zoomed in far enough.  

The 40D RAW files are only 10MB, or so.  DPP should be to handle those files with ease.  It would make sense that “Crop and Rotate” would display a high resolution image, so that you can make precise adjustments.

Significant amounts of adjustments can soften images, too.  Noise reduction and Sharpness can both remove details.

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Thanks for adding that. It's too easy to take just a narrow view when trying to sort out a problem like this, especially when trying to diagnose things so remotely. All comparisons should be made with the images viewed at 100% magnification to be valid.

[imitchell119]

I guess I would agree but the crop/rotate is showing the fine detail after adjustments.

I'll follow the procedures from BurnUnit as well as get my hands on a more powerful computer (but I don't think compute power would degrade anything but the speed of processing)

[BurnUnit]

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@imitchell119 wrote:
I guess I would agree but the crop/rotate is showing the fine detail after adjustments.

I'll follow the procedures from BurnUnit as well as get my hands on a more powerful computer (but I don't think compute power would degrade anything but the speed of processing)

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I think you're 100% correct in making this assumption. But it would be interesting to know if you do see any difference in the final output between your current computer and one with a bit more "oooomph". I would expect only the processing speed to improve.

[Waddizzle]

Making several DIFFERENT, heavy adjustments can make images look soft, is what I meant. Sorry.

[imitchell119]

No need for apologies Waddizzle - all thoughts/input are greatly appreciated!!!

I'm happy folks are talking me through this

[wq9nsc]

The computer resources available shouldn't create any difference in the ultimate quality of the output file, the only difference will be the time required to create it. From a process viewpoint it is easier to work with a faster computer because you spend less time waiting for the computer to do its processing after you make an image adjustment.  I first started using DPP with a Canon 1D Mark II back in 2005 with a pretty slow Dell desktop and with that setup I found plenty of other things to do while the computer was crunching through a RAW image 🙂

It is also a great point that cropping with the associated "zooming" will result in a softer looking image as the sensor to screen pixel assignment hits a 1 to 1 ratio or beyond and this happens long before this point when higher ISO (or poor exposure) results in softening via noise.  Under the right conditions, pretty severe crops can be used that will still provide a reasonably sharp photo at normal viewing or print sizes but trying to "blow them up" beyond that point results in softness.

As an example, the first crop below uses about 25% of the sensor area of my 1DX M2 and the second crop is 4% of the available sensor area so trying to do a large magnification or print of the tiny crop would result in a very soft photo and neither crop would be desirable for portrait work.

Rodger