Canon EOS 600D producing dark toned RAW images (.CR2)

[silbxx13]

Hi,

I am new to the photography world, using my Canon EOS 600D since the past two years. I have off late only started shooting in RAW (.CR2) format, mainly RAW+L. What I have noted is that all my CR2 files have a darkish tone added to them when compared to the same JPEG formats. All pictures are all taken in the manual mode.

Could you please help me with the below.

1. Is it a problem with the Canon EOS 600D model. Some friends of mine with Canon EOS 600D have complained of the same issue.
2. If it's not a problem with the camera series, is there any ready solution? By changing some settings or ...
3. If yes could someone please share the same with me in this forum.
4. If it can't be sorted out by simple change of settings in the camera model, can someone please provide some guided resolutions steps to be performed in adobe photoshop cameraRAW, adobe LightRoom or any other softwares.
5. I did discuss on this with a few friends of mine who have been using Canon EOS 60D and 5D series and none have faced the same issue with RAW formats. 

I have pasted some samples below. I was unable to post CR2 images in this forum, so just opened the images using picasa and taken screen shots and pasted them as simple images.

Any help will be highly appreciated and really helpful for me. Please ignore if I'm sounding very stupid, I'm new to this field.

Thanks

Biswajit

[ebiggs1 · Accepted solution]

I believe Picasa is your problem.  All RAW converters are different.  Mr Martin is correct to a point but most converters do apply the settings you made in your camera in a tag file.  That is how a RAW file can even be displayed. Otherwise you can't view a RAW file.  IMHO, Adobe is the best RAW converter.  This is an opinion shared by most professional photographers and labs.  You can certainly use DPP as your RAW converter.  After all it is Canon's own and it is free.  But I recommend you get one of programs Adobe's Photoshop Elemets or Lightroom 6, or full blown Photoshop.

Even some of the free converters are better than Picasa.  Gimpshop for instance or Darktable (Mac).

Remember it is always best to get the settings right in the camera rather than relying on post to do it.  ACR 9 will apply those settings for starters.

[TTMartin]

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@silbxx13 wrote:

Hi,

I am new to the photography world, using my Canon EOS 600D since the past two years. I have off late only started shooting in RAW (.CR2) format, mainly RAW+L. What I have noted is that all my CR2 files have a darkish tone added to them when compared to the same JPEG formats. All pictures are all taken in the manual mode.

Could you please help me with the below.

1. Is it a problem with the Canon EOS 600D model. Some friends of mine with Canon EOS 600D have complained of the same issue.
2. If it's not a problem with the camera series, is there any ready solution? By changing some settings or ...
3. If yes could someone please share the same with me in this forum.
4. If it can't be sorted out by simple change of settings in the camera model, can someone please provide some guided resolutions steps to be performed in adobe photoshop cameraRAW, adobe LightRoom or any other softwares.
5. I did discuss on this with a few friends of mine who have been using Canon EOS 60D and 5D series and none have faced the same issue with RAW formats. 

I have pasted some samples below. I was unable to post CR2 images in this forum, so just opened the images using picasa and taken screen shots and pasted them as simple images.

Any help will be highly appreciated and really helpful for me. Please ignore if I'm sounding very stupid, I'm new to this field.

Thanks

Biswajit

---

RAW files are not intended to be viewed as final output.

RAW images don't have in camera processing applied to them like JPGs do. The camera applies things like the Picture Style to JPGs, those are simply encoded as a flag in the RAW file.

RAW files are meant to have some sort of post processing, it could be as simple as loading them into Canon's Digital Photo Professional which will read the Picture Style flag and apply it, then Batch Processing them all as JPGs. To making substantial tweaks to the RAW file prior to conversion to JPG.

[TTMartin]

Digital Photo Professional Tutorial Videos (v3.8 - 3.11)

Digital Photo Professional (DPP) 4 Tutorial Videos

[ebiggs1 · Accepted solution]

I believe Picasa is your problem.  All RAW converters are different.  Mr Martin is correct to a point but most converters do apply the settings you made in your camera in a tag file.  That is how a RAW file can even be displayed. Otherwise you can't view a RAW file.  IMHO, Adobe is the best RAW converter.  This is an opinion shared by most professional photographers and labs.  You can certainly use DPP as your RAW converter.  After all it is Canon's own and it is free.  But I recommend you get one of programs Adobe's Photoshop Elemets or Lightroom 6, or full blown Photoshop.

Even some of the free converters are better than Picasa.  Gimpshop for instance or Darktable (Mac).

Remember it is always best to get the settings right in the camera rather than relying on post to do it.  ACR 9 will apply those settings for starters.

[silbxx13]

Thank you so much for this valuable feedback. This cleared my understanding, thank you again.

[Waddizzle]

Those images look as if an "Auto Lighting Optimizer" setting is being turned off and on.

[TTMartin]

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@Waddizzle wrote:

Those images look as if an "Auto Lighting Optimizer" setting is being turned off and on.

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Good call, ALO is one of the Flags, that most RAW converters don't pickup on or use.

[TTMartin · Accepted solution]

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@ebiggs1 wrote:

I believe Picasa is your problem.  All RAW converters are different.  Mr Martin is correct to a point but most converters do apply the settings you made in your camera in a tag file.  That is how a RAW file can even be displayed. Otherwise you can't view a RAW file. ...

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Most non-Canon RAW converters ignore what picture style you have set in the camera, and apply their default settings. 

Try taking several photos in row using different picture styles with RAW + JPG. Each JPG will look different, with most RAW converters they will all look the same. Or for that matter just take one using the Black and White Picture Style and load the RAW into your program, more than likely you will be viewing a color image where your JPG is Black and White.

You may be able to change this in some programs, for example Lightroom includes several different Camera Calibration Profiles. The Adobe Standard profile is the one that is applied by default. But, Camera Faithful, Camera Landscape, Camera Neutral, Camera Portrait, and Camera Standard are all available optional profiles. 

[ebiggs1]

"... most converters do apply the settings you made in your camera in a tag file."

Some RAW converters may ignor "Picture Styles' but they don't ignor the important settings.  Since I shoot 98% in RAW, I never even consider what Picture Style the camera has set.

[ebiggs1]

Getting the important setting correct is what is important.  If you miss exposure by 1 or 2 stops, it will be reflected in your RAW import.  LR also uses the "As shot" setting for WB.

I don't use Picasa because no one in my profession does.  They all use Adobe products.  I do have one friend that uses DPP but he is the only one.  He likes it but when it comes time to turn in work, he switches to PS.