More D80 woes but a few nice samples, too

[karohemd]

Stupid card reader won't work on my PC nor my laptop, either. :o(

Have transferred the photos via USB cable direct from the camera now and you know what? The CameraRAW plugin can't handle the NEF files. *headdesk*

At least I had the sense to shoot in RAW+JPEG when I tested it earlier so I have a few things to show. These photos are just resized without any processing and were taken with the Sigma 18-50mm f2.8 at automatic white balance, ISO100.

 






This is a 1:1 crop of the above








Again, a  1:1 crop from the above.


The abandoned house in Union Lane

At one point, I'm going to take the same shots with the D70 and the D80 (same lens, same settings) to compare.

Question to the photogeeks: Can you recommend a good RAW/NEF editor that runs under Windows XP? Thanks muchly.

Overall, I'm very happy. The card reader thing and the NEF files not being supported yet (I would have thought they'd be the same as in the D200) are hopefully a temporary hurdle.

And I really really like the Sigma. :o)

Comments

[fractalgeek.livejournal.com]

A good RAW convertor?

Try http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/prophoto/raw.mspx as a way of improving your default handling: Windows then just handles them like any other supported image format. "Most Canon and Nikon".

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

That will only let me view the files but I want to edit them, too (exposure, brightness/contrast, white balance, colour etc.) The possibilities after conversion are limited, sadly.

[bibliogirl.livejournal.com]

I was recommended Pixmantec's Rawshooter, but haven't used it much in anger yet. It's running happily on my desktop on W2k and I think it installed OK on my laptop running XP also.

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

Thanks, I shall try that but don't have much hope. Website says it's been bought by Adobe and integrated into Lightroom which most likely means they haven't updated since then.
I'll try the new Lightroom Beta on my laptop tomorrow.

[bibliogirl.livejournal.com]

Correct, but as of when I was told about it (~4 months ago?) there was still a downloadable version available (it's possible I may still have the install file somewhere)

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

It's still available (will install tonight) but it's unlikely they'll have included support for a brand new camera.

[bibliogirl.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, fair point.

[new-brunette.livejournal.com]

There's no update for ACR, then?

Bummer.

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

I've upgraded to CameraRAW 3.5 which was released a few weeks ago. No luck.
I'm going to install the new Adobe Lightroom Beta tomorrow and see if that works.

[davefish.livejournal.com]

Lightroom is a somewhat different beast to Photoshop. You need quite a big machine to handle it, but its workflow managment is indeed quite nice, and changing exposure, contrast, and pulling out shadow detail is slick.

Good luck, and Enjoye

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

Urk, I don't have a big machine. How big are we talking about?
Sounds good, though.
Thanks!

What did you use as RAW editor before?

[davefish.livejournal.com]

Lightroom was useable, but noticibly slow on my machine which is an Athlon 2200, with 764Mb RAM. I think that when I was using the application the memory usage just for it hovered up about 400 or 500 Mb. If you have plenty of RAM you should be okay, and if not, given that you are doing photo processing you should have more :)

I have always used Canon digital photo pro. Which is of no use to you whatsoever.

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

I have plenty of RAM (2GB) so I'll have to see. I'm also going to test Rawshooter and see how it copes.

Nikon has its own app (Capture NX) but I've not heard much good about it and it's far to expensive for what it does (ca. £120 RRP).

[fractalgeek.livejournal.com]

Worth having for the ease of management, but I see what you want now. I guess that should be a plug-in for your photo editor, but it's not an area I have dabbled in much...

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

That's why my question was to the photo geeks.

[spencerpine.livejournal.com]

Have you actually rolled an 80 yet? Because that would be cool.

Graham