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Impact of clarity and sharpening on exposure warnings

Tom de Meadows
This is not an issue insomuch as it is an attempt to gain more knowledge about how C1 processes RAW files.

I have noticed that clarity and sharpening values can have a significant impact on exposure warnings, it actually seems to somehow amplify them. In other words, I can have a raw image with no or very minimal exposure warnings; after some processing the very same image can end up with significant exposure warnings depending on the values dialled for clarity and sharpening; for example (numbers picked randomly), if I dial clarity 30 & structure 30 and sharpening 300 with a radius of 1 or 2 a photo with no exposure warnings can end up with significant exposure warnings.

I do know about fine tuning the settings at 100% and don't have problem with this but would like to understand more about why this happening.

Again this is not an issue but an attempt to gather more information about how C1 works.
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Comments

7 comments

Date Votes
  • Tom de Meadows
    There must be somebody that comment on the original post. I know it is slightly exoteric but I am sure somebody in the forum can give a sensible answer.
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  • john steele
    Good question! I could handle a deeper understanding of these adjustments.
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  • Tom de Meadows
    [quote="sinar" wrote:
    Good question! I could handle a deeper understanding of these adjustments.
    Well, obviously nobody seems interested or capable or providing a deeper understanding.
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  • Gillian Carroll
    Interested yes, but I don't know the answer! Hopefully some knowledgeable others will enlighten us 😊
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  • Ian Wilson
    Moderator
    Top Commenter
    Well I don't really know about it in depth, so I held off from answering at first.

    I agree that I can see significant exposure warnings appear where there were none before. I tried this on an image where I had adjusted the levels to the ends of the histogram, but not encroaching on it, but had made no clarity adjustment. Then dragging the clarity slider up, exposure warnings do appear.

    But thinking about it, you would expect that wouldn't you? Clarity increases contrast locally, so bright bits will get brighter and dark bits will get darker. (In fact, as you drag the clarity up, you can see bright bits getting brighter and dark bits getting darker, but in a different way form using the contrast slider.) So if you have adjusted levels just to the point that no exposure warnings appear, they then would because the bits just at the right hand end would be getting brighter.

    Structure does a similar thing on a much finer scale, I think. On the same image instead of increasing clarity, I increased structure to 100%. At first I thought that there was no effect on exposure warnings, but when I zoomed in to 100% zoom level, I could see fine speckles of red over-exposure warning, too small really to notice when zoomed out. Again, if it increases local contrast on a very small scale, you would expect that, I think.

    So I suppose the answer is to suggest that it is better to set clarity and structure before setting levels, or to be prepared to adjust the levels setting slightly after setting clarity and structure.

    Of course it depends on the image, but I wouldn't routinely increase clarity to as much as 30. Clarity in the latest versions of C1 works a bit differently from how it used to in older versions. But when I was first learning to use C1, I used to reckon that I could increase clarity gradually and there would suddenly come a point where it made a noticeable difference, and then it was time to stop, because to go further would be to do too much. (It can end up looking a bit artificial.)

    Just a few thoughts...

    Ian
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  • Gillian Carroll
    Thanks Ian 😊
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  • Tom de Meadows
    Ian,

    It is a very good point about clarity and structure increasing local contrast, very possibly micro-contrast in the case of structure. 30/30 is a clarity/structure setting I use very often and, as you mention in your reply, one of the effects is to create a web of exposure warnings, both blown highlights and burnt shadows, only fully visible at 100% zoom or, even 200% zoom - please read this in the context of the last sentence of the post.

    My experience is that exposure warnings appear in the following scenarios:

    1) just dialling a high clarity & structure adjustment without doing much more than lighlty increasing exposure
    2) in combination with levels as you correctly point out
    3) in combination with sharpening settings, with a clarity & structure adjustment of 25/25, I very often find that I have to use a sharpening value of 250 or less with a radius of less than 1
    4) in combination with Colour Balance adjustments

    Understanding how the many different adjustments supported by C1 is the main purpose of the thread

    In my mind all of this poses several workflow questions as I rarely examine every corner of my photographs at 100% zoom, I am selective on my usage of 100% zoom, otherwise I could spend a full day on a single image and would a much more powerful computer.
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