RAW Capture

I tended to capture my shots in jpeg. This was true especially on my Fuji X series camera. The jpg coming out from the camera were often spot on and tweaking the RAW files were just time consuming to be quite honest.

On the other hand, my Leica M and Q could only produce reliable photos when the scene were captures in RAW. Their jpg were either too soft, or too harsh. They could not be relied upon. Their RAW conversions however - I used the native Aperture software - were amazing. They were consistently sharper and render nicer tones.

The Sony however, were a bit of a hit and miss.

RAWJpeg - in this pair, the jpeg had a significantly cooler tone to the jpeg. Contrast also a bit higher.RAWJpeg. The difference in dynamic range is pretty obvious resulting in higher contrast in the jpeg. The tone is also slightly warmer.RAWJpeg. Sorry about the crop but I prefer the jpeg on this one. The shadow appeared to be more defined but I think this is from the post-processing.In the last few weeks, I had been trying out snaps exclusively using RAW. The Sony files coming out from the Alpha 7R mark II were a pain since the captures were 42 MP, producing RAW files of 53MB each! It could slow down my post-production. The Fuji - 24 MP - were bearable. The question was, was the extra effort worth it?

I must say that there were subtle differences between the RAW and the captured jpg. The tones were more consistent and the colour tended to be richer. I wasn't sure about the sharpness though. The jpg at 42 MP were certainly sharp enough ....

RAWJpeg. I prefer the more life-like tone of the RAW on this one.RAWJpeg. I prefer the jpeg on this one. It seems that jpeg from the Fuji is more pleasing compared to the Sony.From now on, I plan to stick to RAW. This would be especially the case as I plan to move to medium format at some stage. Better get into the habit ....

No Lightroom Gel

With almost everything in life, I believe at love at first sight. No, I wasn't talking about Anita here although truth be told it was like that. I was talking about my photography here.

I always had to try and use a camera before I buy it. And the same goes with my photography work post capture. I had been using Lightroom since version 1 but was never completely happy with it.

When Apple Aperture came into the picture, I gave that a go but in found the first iteration of that software very sluggish and almost unusable. I persevered Lightroom. Grudgingly.

Then came the later versions of Aperture and I never looked back. I loved the white balance control and the skin tones I was getting from it. I couldn't even replicate it consistently in Photoshop. And it was blazingly fast.

Imagine my disappointment when Apple decided to discontinue the development of Aperture and concentrate on a more consumer orientated product instead - Apple Photo. It hasn't have half the control of the old Aperture.

So, I had a choice to make. Shall I relearn and tolerate Lightroom. Or shall I cross my fingers and toes, stick to Aperture and pray that whatever support left that Apple put in on maintaining Aperture would carry me through. Or better still, Apple might change their minds and reinvest in what was otherwise a superb software.

In the meantime, I have decided to stick to Aperture. I had tried my level best in the last couple of weeks to tweak my workflow, but it looked that there was too much hassle for the change. Hopefully I would be able to get a third party RAW converted to my future cameras while I learn to use Lightroom. But that's not going to be any time soon.

Almost Done

It took me a while to go through all the snaps from the recent trip to Fraser's Hill. I managed to go through the first three days. Now, just the final day remaining and then the tagging plus uploading to my server would come next.

Maybe it would only be ready for upload to Flickr next week, if I have the time.

I must say that the combination of the Alpha 7R mark II and the Leica primes definitely shone. If only the combo did auto focus! When it came to contrast, sharpness and colour rendition it was almost flawless. They were about the only set of lens which could really extract the 42 MP goodness from the sensor.

Alright. Best be back to the editing. I might as well get them all sorted out by the New Year day off.

Doing the Post

After the walk yesterday, we all spent the night at the apartment. Partly for the boys to play with their PS4 and Anita to do some cleaning. But for me, it was all about the post-production work and posting of the photos I took during the Scott Kelby Photowalk - #WWPW2014# - yesterday. All together, between the GR and X-T1, I got almost 400 snaps, but it boiled down to around 255 post-sorting out and editing.

They were all grouped into five segments, and were already up on Flickr, Facebook and SmugMug for my record. I would be blogging about it after I get some breather.

Exiting ApertureUploading onto SmugMugThe boys were up past midnight playing their console, while I woke up early - always a morning person - to finish things out, do the uploading and then off for my morning ward rounds.

Next would be lunch before returning to Gombak. I might pop out to Low Yat in the afternoon since I need to get a new Bluetooth handsfree unit for my phone. The last one gave up on me last year and never got around to be replaced.

More blogging later then ....

588 Snaps

588 photographs was the total that made my final edit from my Lugano trip. Most taken on my HTC One since my X100 ran out of juice in the middle of one of my walks.

I was just done with geotagging and keyword insertion. Next would be some editing as well as exporting onto their relevant albums.

This should be fun .....