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I use the Photos library view, and you can simply drag the divider line to change the sidebar width. I would expect it’s the same with the Files view.
Andy
To be honest, I also have a particular workflow too.
Likewise, I do also find the Vibrancy level with Auto Enhance a bit too much. The effect is OK, but just more than I prefer for my personal taste in what I’m looking for in my adjustments.
To be fair, I haven’t found a single app where its Auto Enhance feature does give a perfect final image. As Nik has mentioned in past tutorials, it can be handy as a starting point though.
Personally I prefer a more ‘natural’ finish to my initial adjustments, so nearly always want to turn down some of the adjustments.
I’m always experimenting with different adjustment techniques, but currently it comprises of the following.
Apply any cropping, straightening, or lens adjustments.
I may add a preset (such as a Provia LUT for my Fuji images).
Then hit the Auto Enhance button (WB off, Levels on).
My next step is to set Luminance mode for Levels, and reset Vibrancy to 0, and adjust Saturation instead. I feel this gives that more natural look I’m after.I just find that the Luminance mode, along with Saturation, works better when you have a lot of solid colour in an image – such as areas of green, with grass or trees etc. it’s especially better for solid reds.
Then it’s whatever other adjustments might be needed.
Of course it’s each to their own, and it’s not really practical to make the Auto Enhance work perfectly for everyone. There’s also the danger of overwhelming the user with too many options, and you might as well not bother using Auto Enhance at all.
However, the idea of having an Auto button on certain adjustment panels is appealing. That could be more useful, especially with the exposure based settings. Some of them do already have one of course (Levels and WB for example).
Although it shouldn’t matter what order adjustments are made in a modern Raw workflow, the practicality of it means that it does actually matter. Many adjustments are still dependent on other adjustments that are made.
Cheers
Andy
Ah, Ok, I can see that now, having just had a look. Yes you have to click the button twice to get to Luminance mode.
That’s probably what made me move to trying the curves tool instead, as it was giving better results (for my own preference that is).
Thanks,
Andy
OK, thanks Nik.
To be honest, I would have expected auto curves/levels to behave the same however it was applied. For comparison, the Auto button (on the curves tool) in Apple Photos does provide a multipoint curve adjustment.
Thanks,
AndyThank you John, understood. I don’t have any of those, so that explains it. I didn’t realise that this was one of the file dependent features.
Tone Map?
Have I missed something there, I don’t see that anywhere in the panels at all!
Cheers
Andy
I don’t know if this helps at all, as I only have a few Fuji RAF files in my collection from a few years ago. However, it may point to something.
The cameras I owned were the old EXR sensor models, and from those I understand that Fuji likes to use wacky designs of sensor. I know these have been a continuous cause of headaches for me finding software that can deal with them. The only ones that ever did were the Fuji proprietary software, and Lightroom.
As I understood, they used a strange diagonal hexagonal (it might have been octagonal, I can’t quite remember now) array. It was also possible to take shots that split the sensor arrays into two separate images, that were later ‘stacked’ to create an enhanced image. There were a couple of options, the most common was for low light, where it stacked a pair of under/over exposed images (the data was hidden inside the RAF file), and merged them (either in the camera, or using the Fuji software) to reduce noise. Or you could just shoot with the whole array for full resolution.
I did find out that some softwares could open and edit the RAF files, but only partially. They would only work with one of the hidden versions, which was usually the underexposed version. Converting to DNG enabled more software to be able to open them such as Photos, but the editing was starting from the underexposed version, and often ended up being grainy, and difficult to get the best out of, and are half resolution (the Fuji software maintained full resolution).
I’m currently actually working on these in Nitro myself, and still see this issue. Although on the ones I’ve started on Nitro has occasionally opened the over exposed version instead. However, when returning to those later, it re-rendered them using the underexposed version, so I had to re-adjust them. That seems to have stuck now.
I believe Fuji abandoned the EXR technology some time ago, but I didn’t know if they’d produced something similar instead.
Anyway, I don’t know if that may explain what’s happening here or not, worth a try :-).
(PS. I never bothered you with this in support, as I realise these are pretty tricky to handle, and not worth the effort for a handful of less popular, and unsupported, cameras in Apple Raw).
Thanks Nik, looks interesting.
Could I perhaps put in a request for improvements to the crop tool, and the noise reduction features be near the top of that list?
I know you’re aware of the cropping issues, but it can be fiddly getting a decent crop applied. I think NR is also something that is missing compared to competitors perhaps (other than the basic Raw NR it already has).
Cheers.
Andy
This has certainly been a big point of discussion, and one I find interesting to see pop up here.
.
Do you:1. keep the selection fixed, and move the filmstrip along
or
2. do you fix the filmstrip, and move the selection along
It can depend on using N-Up modes too. It’s appears to be not easy to please everyone here, especially when N-Up selections are involved.
Personally, I’m with you, certainly for single image viewing/editing, I feel its better to fix the selection in the centre, then move along only when you get to the end (or beginning) of the row. This is so you can see the images preceding, or following, the current selected one. For me, this doesn’t matter how you navigate, whether it’s swipe, click, or arrow key.
For N-Up, Nitro fixes the filmstrip so the thumbnails are static (unless you manually move it along) as you select multiple images (that can be irritating if it moved along as you selected each image).
It’s actually not as straight forward a choice as it seems, with personal preferences, and workflow practices to consider.
Cheers,
Andy
Just a thought, as a simple UI option, how about just using a triple click to cycle between none/thirds/golden. Of course I’d understand this wouldn’t work so well for any more, but should be fine for just those perhaps.
Cheers
Hi Nik,
Could be handy to include the ‘Golden’ ratio grid too. I sometimes prefer that for some images.
I probably wouldn’t bother with others though – such as the Golden ‘spiral’.
Cheers
Andy.
Yes, it’s a strange one with Photos and Keywords isn’t it.
Even Photos itself cannot access its own keywords on iOS or iPadOS, they don’t even show on in Photos at all on my iPad.
Clearly an Apple limitation.
There are other apps that have managed to access them, as they do actually sync across iCloud, but it seems to be a bit of a hack, so I wouldn’t trust it too far.
I’ve been using the On1 LUTs here, they have a load of free LUTs that are quite handy for a bit of creativity. There’s a nice set of B&W ones in their set, which I’ve used to create some of my own presets in RP for my favourite ones.
Just do a search for On1 free LUTs.
Cheers
Andy.
Thanks Nik, that will explain that then.
I’ve just tried a batch of photos again, and for sure the psychedelic preview seems to be fixed, but also I didn’t get a crash either. Although I have now just updated to 16.5.
if it starts again, I’ll run the diagnostic log saving and send it to you.
Cheers.
Andy
