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DNG Catastrophe

Spicyjello
Hello,

Well when I was a young lad and didn't know better I converted my images to DNG. Then I grew up and discovered Capture One and now over half my library will not import! Why you ask? Linear DNG is why. Capture One will not support a particular type of DNG conversion. I have no idea how I converted to linear but there is an option in Adobe DNG converter.

2 Points...... if you convert to DNG and want to use C1. DON'T USE LINEAR

2nd......anyone have any clue how to "fix" the DNG's to repair the errors of my youth? I have tried reconverting several different ways with no luck.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. This issue is keeping me from fully adopting C1.

Thanks and beware the "linear DNG"

Troy
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Comments

8 comments

Date Votes
  • Eric Nepean
    Convert linear DNG to TIFF?
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  • Spicyjello
    I suppose I could but I would be losing its RAWness. Might not have any other choice at this point.

    Thanks for the advice!

    Troy
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  • OddS.
    [quote="Jonzinator" wrote:
    ...I would be losing its RAWness.


    Some computer operations can not be reversed/undone. Linearization consumed the raw sensor data. What is the remaining RAWness that you are afraid to loose by converting linear DNG to TIFF?
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  • Spicyjello
    Since I don't have an in-depth understanding of how the DNG conversion process works and how a TII might differ. I just want to make sure that I don't lose any adjustment latitude by converting to a TIFF.

    Troy



    [quote="OddS" wrote:
    [quote="Jonzinator" wrote:
    ...I would be losing its RAWness.


    Some computer operations can not be reversed/undone. Linearization consumed the raw sensor data. What is the remaining RAWness that you are afraid to loose by converting linear DNG to TIFF?
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  • OddS.
    [quote="Jonzinator" wrote:
    Since I don't have an in-depth understanding of how the DNG conversion process works


    There is a lot of information on DNG on the internet, and much more on TIFF. You may perhaps find useful information in Peter Krogh's article on dpBestflow.org http://www.dpbestflow.org/DNG

    The first step of interpolating raw sensor data is already done, you can not undo it. Linearization may have added an adjustment or two to the rgb values before saving, adjustments that you can not undo regardless of you continuing processing in DNG or not.

    Then there may be nondestructive edits added by your image editor software at the time, such as presets applied at import and edits done manually slider by slider. If you use that same image editor to (batch) export the DNG images to TIFFs, chances are that the non destructive edits will be applied before creating the TIFFs. Those edits can not be undone in the TIFF. The image editor software may provide you the option to manually remove edits and then batch export, or possibly to select export without edits. There may be function name nuances here, "save as" may not do the same thing as "export" for example.

    If you use a different tool for export to TIFF, just about anything other than the non destructive image editor, the export tool is most likely not able to add the effects of nondestructive edits to the TIFF image, the best it can do is to copy the linear data.

    From there, I believe a 16-bit TIFF without nondestructive edits baked in, will have adjustments latitude on par with a linear DNG. You can of course always keep the DNGs if you ever need to verify that TIFF works ok.

    Let's hope those more knowledgeable forum members will chime in with better information. In the mean time I think you should just try with copies of some DNG files and see for yourself.
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  • Spicyjello
    Thanks for the explanation! I have read a lot but putting all the info into context for my issue has been the difficulty.

    I will dose testing and see what the results are.

    Thanks again!

    Troy
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  • Spicyjello
    So playing with converted the offending DNG to TIFF has been pretty good so far. After removing all the adjustments in the DNG and exporting to TIFF, I don't feel I have lost much if any adjustment latitude at all.

    The next challenge is, how do I find the linear converted DNG in mass? Is it possible to search for them some way?

    Thanks again for all the assistance!

    Troy
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  • OddS.
    [quote="Jonzinator" wrote:
    ...how do I find the linear converted DNG in mass? Is it possible to search for them some way?


    Searching the web is of course possible. So far, I never had to convert linear DNG to TIFF and I have no hard facts.

    My guess is that Dave Coffin has solved that with his dcraw software. It is a command line tool, but dcraw is embedded in quite a few other image handling products that come with a graphical user interface. Those GUIs rarely include all the menu items, buttons, radio buttons or check boxes required to fully utilize the command line tool they build on.Thus, GUI front ends capabilities may vary even if dcraw is the common factor.

    The Wikipedia article on dcraw may have useful information, I see known front ends listed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dcraw

    There is a linear DNG page at this link http://www.barrypearson.co.uk/articles/dng/linear.htm where you may want to take a quick look at the soap box citing Eric Chan before continuing, and some front ends are also listed.

    What about Lightroom, as in: create a new database, import the DNGs, select all and export?
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