Repeated crashes, why and the broader implications
Before we start, please recognise that this is very long and be satisfied that I thought Capture One good enough even to bother!
Unfortunately, this is a crash report and very much more. It is so very long partly because of the crash itself even though I think I may have succeeded in figuring out what went wrong, why it happened and in the short term what to do about it. Since it occurred, I have finally recovered use of Capture One on my own and it remains to be seen if this is maintained or if it happens again for the same or another related or unrelated reason. However, not only is there the problem and it’s direct cause that dismays me, but also the implications.
There appears to be an underlying root cause at least in part that I quickly became aware of ever since I first discovered Capture One and scanned through the pdf Users Manual before deciding to install and use it on a trial basis. It is the quality of the documentation and assumptions possibly made in the actual design which I’ll get to later. If it is suitable mainly for high volume professional batch users, then fair enough, except that you have not said that.
So, before I get into the meat of this problem, let me say that I am looking for a comprehensive response from you on all accounts and one that reassures me sufficiently. (I imagine your contract has the usual “take it as-is†cop out.) Otherwise, I may not buy after all where between this and my earlier message about your recommendations for a book on Capture One earlier this morning, I was actually on the verge of going ahead with the purchase. After this saga, I will leave it to my 30 days right up to the wire and see what else is a problem, if anything.
1) I believe my problem may be “Sessions†and that alone. I had had a crash right at the very outset when I tried to import image files from my hard drive before identifying a session the first time around. The reason for this was that the concept was new and unfamiliar to me and I would not even have wanted to use sessions had I known and understood. However, if that’s part of the design, fair enough and I quickly got over that hurdle – until this morning.
“Fair enough†– well not really, as it later turns out. Far from it. I think Sessions still are the problem. Let get to the three or four crashes I have had this morning and the apparent reasons from my perspective.
2) Having to use sessions in Capture One (against my will), I set some up and was merrily using them until last night. As I am a newcomer to Capture One and indeed new to my Nikon D300 acquired only two weeks ago, I was methodically investigating my options how to get round the fact that Photoshop CS2 cannot access NEFs from this camera unless you use the Adobe DNG Converter on them first or another alternative to Camera RAW altogether. I did not want to upgrade to CS4 and pay a large amount just because of that.
[Previously, I had tried the DNG converter but I did not like Adobe Camera RAW. I still would not have liked it had it not frequently hung with the result that, when I tried to close down Adobe Bridge from which I had invoked it by trying to open some DNGs, a message said it could not shut down because it was waiting for a response from me. This is nonsense because nowhere, not even hidden under other windows, was there anything to respond to. This has happened many, many times and I expect to run into now every time I use it.]
3) Am I getting into something similar in Capture One as with Adobe Camera RAW? I hope not but that remains to be seen after three crashes this morning. After since appearing to find my way around the problem, here is my diagnosis whether true or false!
Within Capture One, on Sessions there is the option to create them, open them, open a recently used session or, under the pull down for the last of these, clear history. After using the last, the list of existing sessions was empty, not even the Capture One default is shown but, from Windows Explorer, I could see they all were still there. Resulting from that, I think I was reasonable in assuming, it meant the references within Capture One had been deleted by clearing history, so I deleted all of them instead of the one I had set up on its own afterwards and used before I exited Capture One. If I was wrong to have done this, then tell me why the manual says nothing whatsoever about deleting sessions, not even about the functionality of the option to clear history? If you cannot delete sessions, then why have an option to clear history? Why say nothing in the manual about this and why not build into the software the capability to deal with this without repeated crashes?
4) Nonetheless. The first time I tried to use Capture One this morning, it opened normally as it should because I had left it last time with one session remaining which I had set up after clearing history and used successfully since. Why could I not clear specific sessions? Why is it all or none? Very odd. Why was the one I has set up after clearing the history and used not good enough?
(a) Even though Capture One this morning opened normally the first time, it still soon crashed. The first time, that was when I pressed Ctrl-V to hide the Viewer, having previous set that up in previous use where up to then it had worked fine. I suspected that was the reason, but was not sure why. However, I was wrong because successive attempts to open and use Capture One also led to a crash. [Your manual on custom shortcuts is totally lacking, so is the functionality because you cannot even back out if you choose one which already is in use elsewhere.]
(b) However, subsequently, the system as it first began to load said it could not find my session and did I want to select one or use the default? The first time I said the former which still led to a crash. The next time, I said the latter and it still led to a crash. The fourth time, I said the latter and then discovered before I tried to use anything and it crashed again that, not only had the system failed to link to my one remaining folder, it also had lost the record of where I had put it on my hard drive. I have reinstated that, reinstated my chosen folder there and so far so good. That may be the end of the story, except…
5) Even if it is, there are several loose ends.
(a) Firstly, if Capture One sets up its own files in session folders and elsewhere, as it appear to do whenever you create and use particular sessions, then it ought to sever those links and no longer need them when you use the clear sessions history option, at least those files and subfolders in the session folders.
(b) Secondly, if Capture One still needs information in folders that you have cleared from history, the manual ought to say fully and clearly what you can and cannot do. After all, even a dormant session in the hands of a busy professional user is not going to stay in use for ever, certainly not necessarily. So, either way, why does your manual say so little about sessions and nothing whatsoever about clearing history and how to safely delete sessions globally, selectively or both?
6) I could go one at length but let me just say this. Earlier this morning before all this, I asked for you to recommend any really excellent books in hard copy? I saw the need for that very early, even before I installed and started to try out the system. Like Adobe Lightroom but not as bad, it was not easy to see even how to start using it, especially if the formal concept of workflow and sessions built into the logic was a new and largely unfamiliar concept in this context.
Take stock of my first forum enquiry “I do not want to save, only manipulate†whereby you might appreciate that low volume users, certainly some amateur low volume photographers may have no interest in sessions or batch processing, merely wanting straight in and out to process a single picture at a time or something more in that direction. So why so little in the manual, making it an exercise in seeing around corners for the first time user unless he fits into your predominant customer profile (in the non-technical sense of that word)?
7) So far, my perceptions of Capture One are that it handles conversion from RAW and basic manipulation well, its GUI is superb and the flexibility of the GUI is excellent even without moving around bits of toolbars, which I have not even tried because, as a low volume amateur, no way I would pay the extra for the professional version. I was very disappointed about the HDR controls and similar tools which seemed next to useless compared to Nikon ViewNX which is free, either that or I failed to figure out how to use them effectively because your manual saying nothing beyond mentioning that they exist.
Regrettably, the manual is in stark contrast to the product.
Before I get to that, let me cite a somewhat similar personal experience which I recall as I am about to write what I think about yours. I spent forty years in Information Technology - is that also what you call it in Denmark? - and at one point I was coerced into writing a manual for a software house which, at the time was very successful. I had no idea about the software concerned either technically or from a business perspective - nor any prospect of first rectifying that - but the manager who was behind this exercise quite aware of that gave me a long and detailed list of headings and subheadings and merely wanted me to write a few lines of convincing rubbish so as to go through the motions and to appear, to the unsuspecting buyer of the software, that the system actually had comprehensive documentation.
9) No #8 because your system thinks it is a smiley! How much better is your documentation of Capture One than that and how well can I manage without it or more crashes? Whether I go ahead and buy Capture One will largely depend upon your answer, further experimentation on my part and other software as an alternative which is as good, or if not cheaper. Raw Therapee is amazing for free and I would have chosen it had it not been for it failing to output 16 bit into CS2 when I asked it to!
10) So finally, is Capture One a good or possibly even a brilliant product let down by poor documentation? If so, it certainly will not be the first. Forty years of Information Technology in the finance and commercial sectors and the poor standards that are virtually universal (and not just in Britain as I lived abroad for twelve years) unless you work for NASA (possibly even then) and I am not surprised but very disappointed. So answer me honestly and comprehensively and tell me about those excellent books on it.
Are there any? I and other readers of this may be very interested in your reply to this.
Unfortunately, this is a crash report and very much more. It is so very long partly because of the crash itself even though I think I may have succeeded in figuring out what went wrong, why it happened and in the short term what to do about it. Since it occurred, I have finally recovered use of Capture One on my own and it remains to be seen if this is maintained or if it happens again for the same or another related or unrelated reason. However, not only is there the problem and it’s direct cause that dismays me, but also the implications.
There appears to be an underlying root cause at least in part that I quickly became aware of ever since I first discovered Capture One and scanned through the pdf Users Manual before deciding to install and use it on a trial basis. It is the quality of the documentation and assumptions possibly made in the actual design which I’ll get to later. If it is suitable mainly for high volume professional batch users, then fair enough, except that you have not said that.
So, before I get into the meat of this problem, let me say that I am looking for a comprehensive response from you on all accounts and one that reassures me sufficiently. (I imagine your contract has the usual “take it as-is†cop out.) Otherwise, I may not buy after all where between this and my earlier message about your recommendations for a book on Capture One earlier this morning, I was actually on the verge of going ahead with the purchase. After this saga, I will leave it to my 30 days right up to the wire and see what else is a problem, if anything.
1) I believe my problem may be “Sessions†and that alone. I had had a crash right at the very outset when I tried to import image files from my hard drive before identifying a session the first time around. The reason for this was that the concept was new and unfamiliar to me and I would not even have wanted to use sessions had I known and understood. However, if that’s part of the design, fair enough and I quickly got over that hurdle – until this morning.
“Fair enough†– well not really, as it later turns out. Far from it. I think Sessions still are the problem. Let get to the three or four crashes I have had this morning and the apparent reasons from my perspective.
2) Having to use sessions in Capture One (against my will), I set some up and was merrily using them until last night. As I am a newcomer to Capture One and indeed new to my Nikon D300 acquired only two weeks ago, I was methodically investigating my options how to get round the fact that Photoshop CS2 cannot access NEFs from this camera unless you use the Adobe DNG Converter on them first or another alternative to Camera RAW altogether. I did not want to upgrade to CS4 and pay a large amount just because of that.
[Previously, I had tried the DNG converter but I did not like Adobe Camera RAW. I still would not have liked it had it not frequently hung with the result that, when I tried to close down Adobe Bridge from which I had invoked it by trying to open some DNGs, a message said it could not shut down because it was waiting for a response from me. This is nonsense because nowhere, not even hidden under other windows, was there anything to respond to. This has happened many, many times and I expect to run into now every time I use it.]
3) Am I getting into something similar in Capture One as with Adobe Camera RAW? I hope not but that remains to be seen after three crashes this morning. After since appearing to find my way around the problem, here is my diagnosis whether true or false!
Within Capture One, on Sessions there is the option to create them, open them, open a recently used session or, under the pull down for the last of these, clear history. After using the last, the list of existing sessions was empty, not even the Capture One default is shown but, from Windows Explorer, I could see they all were still there. Resulting from that, I think I was reasonable in assuming, it meant the references within Capture One had been deleted by clearing history, so I deleted all of them instead of the one I had set up on its own afterwards and used before I exited Capture One. If I was wrong to have done this, then tell me why the manual says nothing whatsoever about deleting sessions, not even about the functionality of the option to clear history? If you cannot delete sessions, then why have an option to clear history? Why say nothing in the manual about this and why not build into the software the capability to deal with this without repeated crashes?
4) Nonetheless. The first time I tried to use Capture One this morning, it opened normally as it should because I had left it last time with one session remaining which I had set up after clearing history and used successfully since. Why could I not clear specific sessions? Why is it all or none? Very odd. Why was the one I has set up after clearing the history and used not good enough?
(a) Even though Capture One this morning opened normally the first time, it still soon crashed. The first time, that was when I pressed Ctrl-V to hide the Viewer, having previous set that up in previous use where up to then it had worked fine. I suspected that was the reason, but was not sure why. However, I was wrong because successive attempts to open and use Capture One also led to a crash. [Your manual on custom shortcuts is totally lacking, so is the functionality because you cannot even back out if you choose one which already is in use elsewhere.]
(b) However, subsequently, the system as it first began to load said it could not find my session and did I want to select one or use the default? The first time I said the former which still led to a crash. The next time, I said the latter and it still led to a crash. The fourth time, I said the latter and then discovered before I tried to use anything and it crashed again that, not only had the system failed to link to my one remaining folder, it also had lost the record of where I had put it on my hard drive. I have reinstated that, reinstated my chosen folder there and so far so good. That may be the end of the story, except…
5) Even if it is, there are several loose ends.
(a) Firstly, if Capture One sets up its own files in session folders and elsewhere, as it appear to do whenever you create and use particular sessions, then it ought to sever those links and no longer need them when you use the clear sessions history option, at least those files and subfolders in the session folders.
(b) Secondly, if Capture One still needs information in folders that you have cleared from history, the manual ought to say fully and clearly what you can and cannot do. After all, even a dormant session in the hands of a busy professional user is not going to stay in use for ever, certainly not necessarily. So, either way, why does your manual say so little about sessions and nothing whatsoever about clearing history and how to safely delete sessions globally, selectively or both?
6) I could go one at length but let me just say this. Earlier this morning before all this, I asked for you to recommend any really excellent books in hard copy? I saw the need for that very early, even before I installed and started to try out the system. Like Adobe Lightroom but not as bad, it was not easy to see even how to start using it, especially if the formal concept of workflow and sessions built into the logic was a new and largely unfamiliar concept in this context.
Take stock of my first forum enquiry “I do not want to save, only manipulate†whereby you might appreciate that low volume users, certainly some amateur low volume photographers may have no interest in sessions or batch processing, merely wanting straight in and out to process a single picture at a time or something more in that direction. So why so little in the manual, making it an exercise in seeing around corners for the first time user unless he fits into your predominant customer profile (in the non-technical sense of that word)?
7) So far, my perceptions of Capture One are that it handles conversion from RAW and basic manipulation well, its GUI is superb and the flexibility of the GUI is excellent even without moving around bits of toolbars, which I have not even tried because, as a low volume amateur, no way I would pay the extra for the professional version. I was very disappointed about the HDR controls and similar tools which seemed next to useless compared to Nikon ViewNX which is free, either that or I failed to figure out how to use them effectively because your manual saying nothing beyond mentioning that they exist.
Regrettably, the manual is in stark contrast to the product.
Before I get to that, let me cite a somewhat similar personal experience which I recall as I am about to write what I think about yours. I spent forty years in Information Technology - is that also what you call it in Denmark? - and at one point I was coerced into writing a manual for a software house which, at the time was very successful. I had no idea about the software concerned either technically or from a business perspective - nor any prospect of first rectifying that - but the manager who was behind this exercise quite aware of that gave me a long and detailed list of headings and subheadings and merely wanted me to write a few lines of convincing rubbish so as to go through the motions and to appear, to the unsuspecting buyer of the software, that the system actually had comprehensive documentation.
9) No #8 because your system thinks it is a smiley! How much better is your documentation of Capture One than that and how well can I manage without it or more crashes? Whether I go ahead and buy Capture One will largely depend upon your answer, further experimentation on my part and other software as an alternative which is as good, or if not cheaper. Raw Therapee is amazing for free and I would have chosen it had it not been for it failing to output 16 bit into CS2 when I asked it to!
10) So finally, is Capture One a good or possibly even a brilliant product let down by poor documentation? If so, it certainly will not be the first. Forty years of Information Technology in the finance and commercial sectors and the poor standards that are virtually universal (and not just in Britain as I lived abroad for twelve years) unless you work for NASA (possibly even then) and I am not surprised but very disappointed. So answer me honestly and comprehensively and tell me about those excellent books on it.
Are there any? I and other readers of this may be very interested in your reply to this.
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wellll....as this comes from across the pond, excuse the brevity...but this is a user-to-user forum, not a give and take from PhaseOne.
If your question could be stated briefly as ..."is the documentation great?", my reply as a user would be that, just as the product...it's a constant work in progress...not so much a manual as a guide, and needs to be used in conjunction with the videos, and other resources such as this forum.
As the program contains optional ways of dealing with a workflow, there is probably not a proper workflow...rather a workflow that fits your needs, which might be quite different from mine....just as there are different tools to do basically the same thing in Photoshop.
I truthfully know of noone who has learned to use Photoshop by a read of the manual, this program is less complex, but certainly more complex than say, Canon's DPP...and it is that complexity that actually makes this the better choice IMHO...
...in any event, welcome to the forum. A specific question might get a less general response which will also be more beneficial.0 -
Thank you but I am far from impressed. Please see my answer to your second reply about "I do not want to save, only manipulate". 0 -
[quote="keepreal" wrote:
Thank you but I am far from impressed. Please see my answer to your second reply about "I do not want to save, only manipulate".
Wow, pardon me. FWIW, I was not trying to impress you......0 -
This comes from a fellow D300 user. I have been a CO user for the past two and a half years, and have owned my D300 for almost a year now. I first started using CO 4 when it was a beta, and have not seen a crash since 4.1. Actually I hardly had any crashes at all even in the beta stage. You mentioned that it is your belief the crashes are related to the use of sessions, or shall I say not using them, but personally I can't support that claim since I have never used sessions, and I am a CO Pro user.
IMHO it is something completely non-related. Most of the time in this forum, when someone has a crash issue, it can be traced to the computer set-up or OS. CO 4 is a bit resource intensive, but it does provide you with the best image possible from your D300. So instead of throwing away a great camera software combination, tell us about your computer hardware specifications, OS, and CO version/build your are using. The more specifics you share, the better the folks here can help you. Sometimes it can be a not so simple software conflict.
By the way, did you file a support case on Phase One's website. That is the best way to solve the problem.0 -
Thank you very much for all of that. However, I have already un-installed having decided against Capture One. You clearly are trying to be helpful, so I will be also and I'll say why this is later but first as to the reasons for the crashes.
With due respect, I think you are wrong because the very first time I tried to do anything after installing C1 it crashed and I quickly discovered it was because I had not set up a session. Once I had, all was OK. The software said I had to have one. This is 4.8 on a trial basis which I think therefore means the Pro version.
It was only when I started to remove sessions that I no longer wanted that the repeated crashes occurred and they appeared to have stopped once I retold C1 where sessions I had not removed were again and which one to use next. Having previously exited on one of them and up to then it working fine, C1 failed to find it again when I started it up again. Of that, I am quite certain, so I think it is buggy, unless you never use recent sessions/clear history and leave them on hard disk whatever. Ridiculous, it becomes a bit like a virus taking over my hard disk, what with all those caches and system files everywhere.
So I think that the problem may be lack of facilities designed to remove sessions and the side effects of using recent sessions/remove history and then deleting them in Windows Explorer. I vehemently object to redundant files all over the place and through deleting them (even if I “shouldn’t†from Capture One’s perspective) I discovered that C1 sets up caches and other junk all over the place. Well not junk really, but for me who wants to focus on one frame at a time, I can do without all this baggage.
However, regardless of that, what about the ludicrous unfinished logic for customising shortcuts? Probably that’s not all that is unfinished, I don’t know because I had not tried that much yet. That and the inability to delete sessions selectively, the poor documentation, Jonh4’s attempt to turn that into a plus, I’d say the product probably is superb in some respects like the GUI but somewhat unfinished and liable to stay that way for a while.
However, the key fact for me is that it is not true that the results are superior – not in the one regard that I was concerned about. I say that because, with all this hassle and John4 not answering my concerns, I reworked my tests and comparisons carefully and for what I wanted, actually found Nikon ViewNX best.
Here's why, but first of all what I wanted.
1) To interface from D300 NEF with Photoshop CS2
2) To make adjustments in the NEF when shots with too long a lighting range made it necessary. When shooting a landscape in brilliant sunshine with clouds, for example, one may need to handle the sky separately. In fact, I have found that shooting in the cameras at up to –2 and bringing up the shadows and midtones again from the NEF works well and possibly is safer than trying to restore burnt out highlights in a normally exposed NEFs. One can sometimes afford to lose a little detail in the shadows near to maximum black in the print but never in the highlights. However, I need much more experimentation before deciding on whether to under-expose and boost exposure, how much and when and when merely to recover highlights without first under exposing in the camera.
With all the products I tried, as well as Capture One, I eventually discovered that adjusting the exposure slider and leaving all the others like brightness, shadow and highlight alone worked best. Those for HDR in Capture One I found useless because everything else also is affected regardless of the settings. With ViewNX, the exposure slider just does not appear to have ANY side effects, not how I used it anyway.
My intention is to save one or more converted files from the NEF, the first without any exposure changes one or more adjusted in pre-processing when the circumstances demand it, then to recombine in Photoshop using layers for each and use the “see through†capability by erasing holes in the layers as appropriate.
I do not want to do anything more than adjust exposure before I go into Photoshop as I go there anyway and prefer to do it all there along with other changes on selective areas or otherwise.
What I found was:
Capture One – settings affecting exposure fiddly but worked well. Other sliders, less so especially highlights and shadow. Colour balance excellent.
VewNX - exposure slider works brilliantly, so much easier to use and just as good and often better. Usually does the job well without touching anything else. Colour balance excellent.
Raw Therapee - very fiddly but worked well but it only would open 8 bit into CS2 directly even when I said to save 16 bit TIFs. Colour balance very good.
Bibble – disliked so much that never really got into it and did not find it worked at all well.
Lightroom (on a trial download) – as Bibble but more so. If Capture One sessions etc make for complications, then why not go Lightroom and really turn a non-event into something? I think this usually is called marketing. CS4 versus CS2 is also a bit like that!
CS4 via Camera RAW (on a trial download) - worked but difficult to use and exposure and other sliders all caused side effects. I think Camera RAW is crude and mine in CS2 keeps freezing.
CaptureNX (on a trial download) – the way you define areas for selective changes takes for ever and since it does what I want no better than ViewNX, what’s the point?
John4’s unwillingness to answer my query about the crashes and what he said about the lack of documentation, plus my suspicions of unfinished software and regular releases just to throw me the occasional curve encouraged me to do my testing again and having discovered that the no cost option ViewNX suits me best, many thanks to John4!
I have now as a result also devised a workflow using View and CS2 with a file storage strategy along the way that is simple and works brilliantly for me. All I have as excess baggage after generating PSDs in Photoshop are the converted TIFs that I cannot avoid from ViewNX as they are the stepping stones, of course, as they would have been with Capture One and most other software. But no caches, no other spurious files, no crashes, no reliance on on-line support (who may even sometimes answer the question) and nothing to purchase.
So thank you, Phase One for stimulating me in figuring out how to live happily without you and not missing out on the end results either.
I am very analytical, a completer finisher, and I may be very pedantic but that is because I am thorough and try to communicate in detail for the benefit of others in case they learn from their perspectives on it. I don’t need to do this, like now. And they have a choice whether to read it – if it’s there.
You may be interested in what I said in my last entry for “I do not want to save, only manipulate†but then again you may not be.
So there we are, I am sticking to ViewNX.0 -
>>>Thank you very much for all of that. However, I have already un-installed having decided against Capture One. You clearly are trying to be helpful, so I will be also and I'll say why this is later but first as to the reasons for the crashes.
With due respect, I think you are wrong because the very first time I tried to do anything after installing C1 it crashed and I quickly discovered it was because I had not set up a session. Once I had, all was OK. The software said I had to have one. This is 4.8 on a trial basis which I think therefore means the Pro version.<<<
No, Paul 1921 is right on. I have NEVER used sessions under V4. There is NO MANDATE to use sessions, V4 COne does not crash here. It has not crashed in well over a year under either XP 64 or Vista 64. I KNOW that your crashing is not related to not using sessions....0 -
Thank you John4, I thought I was loosing it. I have never used sessions, and never experienced a crash since 4.1. For the most part, the beta was smooth sailing for me.
I have a hunch why he is experiening problems that no other users are. It is Windows reliance on a registry. I am the curious type, and love trying out new and different software, but when I do, my system runs slower, and sometimes a bit less stable. Remember, when you install or uninstall software, you could be removing or modifying files and or entries that another piece of software needs. By the look of it, Keepreal has tried most every RAW developer known to man.0 -
Paul1921 says "By the look of it, Keepreal has tried most every RAW developer known to man."
As to RAW development software, that is somewhat the case because every company likes to make claims about the quality of their results or the media does on their behalf, which leaves one guessing which is going to work properly. What with colour management and different RAW profiles for virtually every camera using RAW, it is bound to lead to issues and confusion unless every software developer applies all of them rigorously, which I very much doubt.
This lack of uniformity in profiles is a daft idea. Without the full facts, what else can one do but try them out? No point spending the earth on a D300 and then not getting the best out of it.
Paul1921, I cannot dispute that you may well be right about the registry under Windows. Another daft idea. Even when it does not lead to a crash because of some abuse, it is bound to slow everything down. Had I known about that when I got my first PC and that Apple does not use it, I would have gone for Apple. Definitely. Now, to move across, I imagine some of my existing software would have to be replaced and that would be a nuisance and an extra cost.
I was a professional programmer back in the 60s and 70s and as a hobbyist up until the Millenium and in the early days technology was very limited but a crash was very less likely. Today the stability of software sometimes is less good. And, as you say, the interdependencies the registry creates makes matters worse. Never mind, Bill, you made your billions anyway.
John4, << There is NO MANDATE to use sessions, V4 COne does not crash here. It has not crashed in well over a year under either XP 64 or Vista 64. I KNOW that your crashing is not related to not using sessions.... >>
Thanks John4 for now actually saying something constructive. A bit late now, isn't it? You could have said this in the first place.
Well it does crash on my machine and it behaves itself when I use sessions and leave them there undisturbed. It may not be Capture One's fault but maybe its the way Capture One uses the registry along with other things that also do and my particular suite of software both new and extant. However, Capture One was the only application on my machine that uses .NET Framework. I had to install it just because of it.
Paul1921 makes a plausible suggestion why. I have noticed what a mess an uninstall can leave behind. I hope Capture One is not one of them.0 -
Actually I can't say how Capture One uses the registry, or what it leaves behind after an uninstall. I have never compared my registry before and after a CO install. I think where John4 was coming from in his first post was the lenth of yours, most people in these forums don't like to type as much as you do. 😄 But being a programmer, I guess you got really good at it.
If you ever do a clean install of your computer with a supported OS of CO, I'd hope you'd try it out again. The result this software gives me for my D300 file are incredible, and believe you'd see the same. I know many pros in the industry who use this software, and make a lot of money with it.0 -
In the Phase One knowledge base there is an article on uninstalling CO4 from WinXP and Vista.
http://www.phaseone.com/HOME/Content/Su ... 20-%20Main0 -
First of all may I thank Phase One’s tolerance because this thread is… Well you know what I mean.
However, I choose to carry on a little because more recent replies have been constructive and I do not want to accept defeat with Capture One if my problems are unusual.
Paul1921 <<…The result this software gives me for my D300 file are incredible, and believe you'd see the same. I know many pros in the industry who use this software, and make a lot of money with it...>>
So far, all I am aware of with Capture One that is of use to me (not other people) is being able to open NEFs for the D300 and interface TIFs from them into CS2, where necessary, first using the exposure slider but only in moderation because its bandwidth does not cut off quickly enough like ViewNX IMHO, browse NEFs far better than with anything else by a huge margin with their fabulous GUI and that’s it. That’s not because Capture One can do only that, that’s ludicrous, of course. And one should also give an honourable mention because of how fast refreshes are after each change because of it displaying interim using the embedded JPG rather than doing it for real there and then, which is very clever.
As I explained earlier, sometimes I will interface two or more versions generated from Capture One from the same NEF shot in my camera and use elements from each recombining them with layers in Photoshop. Anything else Capture One can do I am not interested in because I do it in Photoshop anyway and will continue to use Photoshop predominantly because I always tweak some things in parts of the shot, sometimes quite a lot. What can you do better in Capture One that you can also do in Photoshop? Can you articulate what’s so incredible or is it too subtle?
Convince me and I might change my mind, reinstall my PC and give Capture One another try. After all, Paul, you could well be absolutely right, for I really do not believe a company renowned for the quality of its digital backs and more recently the Capture One software are not fully deserving of most or even all of the praise. I probably am unlucky and probably partly at fault for having a lot running on my PC and some more things that I have tried and uninstalled again. I did try many RAW processors its true, but that is not the kind of thing I usually do. It was only because of my doubts about how well any RAW processors match to individual profiles that I thought I should.
Note that if I do re-install, I may go quiet for several weeks (please?) because Dell own a part of my PC and I am not sure how much cooperation I will get from them; it has not been good in the past. Their machines are excellent value for money but I do not like the subsequently learned fact that they installed a controlling partition which I did not want, understand or know how it affects a reinstall or whether I could safely eliminate with one.
Paul E. Steunebrink <<In the Phase One knowledge base there is an article on uninstalling CO4 from WinXP and Vista.>>
I also address John4:
Sorry, I was joking about that. Quite seriously, can we start again?
Can you guarantee that I can use Capture One without sessions? Can I select a folder on my hard drive and open it without having a session defined first? Because that is what I could not do, not because I did not know how or a bug but because on my PC, I got a Capture One message actually saying precisely that the very first time I ran it. I fail to see how my installation could result in Capture One doing that simply because of something freakish about it.
I was using Capture One 4.8 which I downloaded only last week and installed on a trial basis on my PC. That is a Dell Intel core two duo CPU NE4600 2.4 GHz, 3GB RAM 1.20 GHz, XP Professional SR3 with .NET Framework fully up to date, 2 x 320 GB hard drives and mostly free space on both drives. About two weeks ago I defragged the disks and the registry, so I think that fits your specs.
2) Can I simply do this:
Open a RAW file in C1, make a few adjustments, open it in CS2 from Capture One (whether directly or via the TIF), maybe do all of that again on the same frame at other settings and when I am finished in CS2 (first combining the results of iterations into Photoshop layers where there is more than one for a single shot) delete all the TIFs and all the cached data and other intermediate files, if any, including saved settings that defined the NEF parameters with the adjustments I made in Capture One in the same or any other folder on my hard drive that does not form part of the total application rather than being NEF file or folder specific, so that I am not accumulating data of any kind which will be never ever be needed again? If I was ultimately unhappy with my results, quite literally, I would elect to start over completely from the beginning in absolutely every instance. That’s the way I work. Admittedly, that would suit few users but it does suit me.
3) If you documentation was better I might have not even had to ask you this but a brief mention In the manual of a feature such as sessions or recipes, IMHO does little to explain their function and nothing to explain how to use them.
Also, there definitely are holes in your software like the functionality for the customisation of shortcuts and being able to delete one or more individual sessions individually rather than just all of them and maybe more oversights I had not yet discovered. However, if Capture One is as good as its reputation suggests, I’d be the first to admit that those weaknesses may be relatively unimportant.
4) Since your manuals will not answer these questions, how do I proceed without having to keep bothering you? For if I do it by trial and error, as John4 suggests and normally I would be quite happy to do that, sooner or later I am bound to remove some data from past and now finished work but liable to get side effects because, for example, I will remove what looks like a cache or other files which I think is now entirely clutter and get it wrong. Your manual does not help here, you can if you want to, but I do not want this kind of reliance on you as we both have better things to do. The creation of circumstances where this is liable to be necessary even if I had not had crashes, frankly is where I think Phase One may have got it wrong.
The rest is totally off limits except that it arises indirectly. So I’ll continue unless asked not to next time:
Paul1921 again <<I think where John4 was coming from in his first post was the length of yours, most people in these forums don't like to type as much as you do. But being a programmer, I guess you got really good at it.>>
Actually, I am a lousy typist. But he still could have tried to answer my problem with crashes.
I explained earlier why I write at length, not because I want to impose myself unreasonably, but I am trying to be helpful. Indirectly, these exchanges can lead to insights of use to others. Otherwise I could email Phase One privately as I considered doing at the outset. Maybe that would have been the better option. Difficult to decide. I cannot be objective on this. And as you said earlier, I think, maybe I am asking in the wrong place anyway.
This is not entirely relevant but only some will see any relevance in the point I am making:
BTY, I will soon be writing at the DP Review Forum and apologising to someone there I had a discussion with some considerable time back because he was right and I was wrong. We were discussing the merits of the D300 versus film with HDR. The point in this instance, and I briefly add it in here, is that the D300 is more like 10x better than film generally, not just 2 or 3x as one might infer from incisive reviews such as those in DP Review. Now having the D300, I discovered that the dynamic range is huge compared with film [and here’s the key – after manipulation] provided that you do things in a particular way. Many people still say film is better for HDR, so I want to tell of my experiences and counter the conventional wisdom on this point. Because of the lack of people speaking out before I discovered this, I lost out delaying to buy the D300 for nearly two years. There is a lot of misinformation about and I think it would be selfish not to let others hear the other side of the story. It may help some of them.0 -
I am running short on time, so I'll peobably have to make this a two part post. Part 2 will be later this evenning, and if you are in thr UK, you'll be sleeping.
OK, I think I have figured something out here. Reading your post, it appears you are accessing your RAW files directly in Windows, or Explorer. If that is the case, that may be causing your crash. Most users, if not all (as I do) use CO's file browser within the program to bring up the RAW. It is the file icon in the top left.
Now, after you process your image to TIFF, CO can automatically open it in CS2 if you have the option checked off. You can't make edits in CO to a RAW, and have them transfer to CS2 since CO used non destructve editting on the RAW. Nor any edit you do in CS2 (ACR) can not show up in CO.
The reason I prefer CO, and was sold on it versus Lightroom which was my first RAW software was the details in the shadows. I remember taking a few photos of my girlfriend who has very black hair, and Lightroom was unable to procuce the details in the hair while keeping the color black CO had no problem dealing with it. So first and foremost it is the details I get across the bandwidth. Others are the color quality, and something about the image just seems to have a greater dynamic range than other RAW products out there.
Will post more.0 -
I can guarantee that you do not have to use sessions. I never have, I think the advanatages accrue to tethered shooting..it is an option. I also do not import into COne, I simply use the COne explorer function as Paul said, and point to a folder of images to load, edit and process.
As to Point 2, Cone does not write adjustments to or change RAW files (unless you are using DNG or a PhaseOne back and wish to do that). The adjustments and COne previews are stored under the image folder, each folder loaded will have those sidecar files. They can be deleted if you wish...and that would be the sum total of COne files added to your computer to perform COne's function as a RAW converter.
COne Pro allows you to process files to a standard default location OR using the process recipes...to always place those in a subdirectory of the RAW image folder from which they were processed. That was the default with all prior versions through the 3.x releases, and that's how I use it.
In brief, if you use a default directory to place your develops, and in the workflow you described, you would not need to use variations. Just develop the images into a single folder as you do the adjustments, they will automatically be renumbered in sequence, combine them into your Photoshop sandwhich, save that...and you can then delete all the files in your default directory (those being the COne develops.)
If you then delete the folder "Capture One" in the image folder (after moving the COne browser from that folder)...you will have removed every trace of COne's processing and adjustments, unless you browse to that folder again. If you open that same Cpture One folder, you will see the two subfolders.."Cache" which contains the generated previews, And "Settings" which contains the adjustments to image files..That will be the last adjustment made to an image unless you use Variants.
Hope that helps.0 -
John4,
Your explanation helps enormously and what I had figured was probably the case proves largely to be correct. If you do not believe me then read what I have jusrt written in response to Paul1921 and was about to post and will now do so without changing a single word.
Regards and many thanks.
Paul1921,
That's splendid of you already. Yes I am in England and I look forward to what you more have to add.
<< OK, I think I have figured something out here. >>
I approached file access in the C1 browser view with whatever button on the left, I think it was the second one from the left and used the folder tree within it to select my folder in C1, clicking on the actual frames in the thumbnails to open one of them in the viewer, which I also had displayed.
Then I used tools to make adjustments and clicked on the button (I think it was) Process. Having set the option to open it CS2, it then generated the TIF, saved it as far as I can tell and also opened it up in CS2, always.
No the crashes were as soon as I clicked on a folder within the C1 tree or, as far as I went, four crashes in succession, caused by clicking on anything or using a keyboard shortcut. That was until I was successful in setting up a session again, telling C1 again where it was located, and then all seemed fine again.
<< You can't make edits in CO to a RAW. >>
With respect, I think you can, only my semantics may have been the issue, not what I actually meant. The changes on the viewed image are virtual and they become real on the TIF made from the RAW with the adjustments applied to the TIF, never the RAW itself, but only after you press "Process" to commit.
The way it does it is clear to me in that it generates a separate file to the RAW with all adjustment parameters in it and so avoids needing to change the RAW itself. If you make further edits, it merely updates the parameters and displays the effects of them in adjustments to the displayed image (probably starting from the JPEG embedded in the RAW), so you can see what you are doing. When you press "Process" it saves the latest parameters, generates a new TIF and, in my case, opens that too in CS2 regardless of whether I had any previous images there from the same frame because of earlier commits on the same image in C1.
That's what so clever. It "pretends" to do it but the pretence is that JPEG, showing in real time what you are about to get, rather than what you already have.
Unless I am not as computer literate as I believe myself to be, I am convinced it does it this way, and this is consistent with what little I found on the matter in the manual.
<<The reason I prefer CO... was the details in the shadows. ... So first and foremost it is the details I get across the bandwidth. Others are the colour quality, and something about the image just seems to have a greater dynamic range than other RAW products out there. >>
Exactly why I tried so many alternatives but in particular my interest in the exposure adjustment. I am increasingly critical of Adobe, even though I think some of Photoshop is wonderful and so easy. I think the ploy the example I am about to cite is typical of many software manufacturers.
Many of the advances in successive versions of Photoshop seem bogus to me and I even wonder if some of the newer features, which were destructive but are no longer was a ploy from the outset to justify further releases and revenue from upgrades. I can manage without.
[All I do to get round this is simple as illustrated by this example. Highlight and Shadow in CS2 is superb, except that it is destructive. So if I have doubts beforehand about my use of it, I make a copy of all the existing layers so far, merge them because H&S works only on one layer, and then you are. I can keep it or ignore it at will just as if it was non-destructive even if not on revised adjustments to individual layers in the set I had copied and merged, but certainly up to that point. What's more I can vary the opacity of the merged layer on which I applied the H&S so that, with the originals underneath I can moderate the H&S changes. Which means it is only semi-destructive.]
I have a conundrum. Why would Nikon produce a RAW processor that is sub-standard? Because, if they do, it not going to enhance sales, is it? Secondly, is Capture NX2 better quality wise than ViewNX or merely much more powerful? I spoke to Nikon today, twice and two different people because I bought a second battery yesterday and either it or my charger is faulty. So on that call I asked "If I use ViewNX, will I get out of my D300 less than it is capable of or is the only restriction in it the lack of adjustments you can make with it?" They insisted the latter and I believe them because I could see small differences with it, Capture One and the best of the rest but I could not say the results of conversion from RAW to TIFF was signifcantly better with C1 versus ViewNX. And believe me, I am hugely critical of quality and have been in 56 years of photography. That's why I throw away most of what I make and have very little to show for a lifetime of this hobby. What's the point of anything than the very best when I know it could be and should be better. One is naturally inclined to think that the more it costs the better it has to be, but that is not necessarily true is it? So maybe ViewNx is the cat's whiskers provided you leave most of its adjustments on the defaults, which is what I want to do anyway.
Yes Capture One is super to work with, a very elegant and effective tool. But I judge by my results alone and am not influenced by much else. Nikon told me they update ViewNX and Capture NX2, that 1.4 has just been released for the former. They also said it is not just to add further profiles for new camera models but also to make improvements benefiting owners of existing ones. That only leaves the question of how good they are at doing it compared to companies like Phase One.
You are very much inclined to say Phase One are better, but judging from my own eyes and carefully comparing 58 shots through each I made last Saturday, I am not quite sure.
Can I add this to the debate as a further illustration? I have only just now given up film but I gave up making colour prints by the wet process in favour of a Nikon Coolscan IV and digital printing in 2003. Much easier and better. In my setup before this I had a dichroic colour head on a Durst enlarger but previous to that I had been using Y, M and C gelatine filters in a model, which had a slot for them in the light path. The situation would arise with portraits which I was very much into of how to move from 35Y 20M to 40Y 20M let's say. You could do this by replacing the 20Y, 10Y and 5Y that made up the 35Y by adding another 5Y but every book on photographic technique on this planet would say you should use the minimum of filters, so change the 10Y and the 5Y for a second 20Y. Well I was very fussy and found I could never make small adjustments to the colour balance in skin tones and get it right, until I figured out to add the 5Y and ignore the whole world. For what I realised and easily proved was this. Gelatine colour filters had impurities in them (an accepted fact) so that a small change to a filter pack minimised the changes in the impurities whereas changing more of them and the change in the impurities was bigger. Once I did it my way, it worked.
I am not saying I always get it right, anything but. But I do believe in challenging the conventional wisdom across the board. In life today we have wonderful communications with the Internet but too high a proportion of it is rubbish, fraud or porn. So much of what you learn through any of the media today is so misleading that I often think of the technology component as Misinformation Technology rather than Information Technology (which here at least is the term that superceded Data Processing years ago). Those who are the perbetrators are scum but so may people are conned by them including those supposedly in the know. I am sure you know the story of the king’s new clothes and the claim before and in the days of the credit crunch up to last autumn (sorry, fall) that globally derivatives are not risky because the market is self-regulating.0 -
good luck moving on...I'm going to ignore any future posts as you seem adamant on the matter and life's too short..etc... 0 -
I reread your prior post hoping to respond to your points more clearly.
I can absolutely guaranty you that you do not need to use sessions to use CO. I have no idea why you experienced the problems you did, but they are quite unusual.
I use CO’s controls all in moderation. Sometime the exposure control is way over board, so I use the shadow. Sometime the shadow does not give me the result I am looking for, so I use the curves. You really have to play around, and experiment. Many times it is a combination of all three.
I stated a few reasons in my previous post why I prefer CO over all others, but since I was running short on time, I forgot the most obvious. THE INTUITIVNESS. Granted, many criticized the GUI when it was first introduced, but I found it so easy to understand, and work with. I truly believe Phase put a huge amount of effort in to researching, and creating it it. It was so natural to use.
I took a picture of a small café here in NJ, and exposed properly for the café, but the sky and an off white building the background was completely blownout. Heck, the building was gone completely, but through the use of curves, highlights, levels, and color editor, I was able to restore the blue sky, and building to what it looked like when I took the photo without the use of Photoshop. Further more, the subject café remained unchanged. Now granted, Photoshop could improve it some more, but it was clearly fixed as a RAW through CO alone. I can only assume it is CO’s dynamic range ability that made it possible.
To your point number two, if I understand you correctly, it seems that is what I generally do, but I keep all the cache files CO makes. This is specifically what I do.
1. Import photos from my camera into Expression Media. I have a separate RAW only catalog as well have a separate 750gig HD where I keep my RAWs, and yes, cache files.
2. Open CO, browse to the folder just imported, and do my adjustments. Sometimes on a second look, I hate the results, and delete the cache folder, and start over. I never delete anything in the program directory. Being a XP Lite user, I like to keep a tidy system, but sometimes it has its downfall, applications sometimes rely on the oddest stuff you just ripped out.
Your conundrum is one of amusement. Many Canon shooters (if not most) hate the Canon software for RAW, but they nonetheless sell a ton of cameras. It certainly does not hold their sales back any. As to your conversation with Nikon, I believe what they said as well, why would any company would use different algorithms for the same feature in an upgraded more feature packed edition of their product. Although I never tried View NX, I did try Capture NX and found it to be very unintuitive. I could not just look at the GUI and make adjustments as needed as I could with CO. Actually now that I think of it, I tried every RAW solution out there except what came free with the camera. How funny is that?0 -
I am going to reply to the last two entries, those from John4 and Paul1921 and then end my exchanges on this thread. I don't want to take this beyond the law of diminishing returns.
However, your last reply, Paul 1921, is particularly interesting. Very many thanks for everything you have said, because it all adds a tremendous amount of value.
From what you now have said you appear to be very similar in outlook to me, only judging differently how much to delete afterwards. I totally agree that to delete from application directories is an absolute crime.
Your account in detail of your experiences and observations, without responding to each of them individually, is very much what I would have expected to hear and obviously I and other readers benefit from actually hearing it.
The only surprise to me was what you said about Canon software but since I am an ardent Nikonian anyway (though I have owned a Canon A1 and then a T90), only the broader implications of what you said about them is pertinent to my reasoning and your raising a valid reason to suggest it may be suspect.
I will need a few days to pass to be sure, but my subconscious appears to be telling me that I have probably already decided not to reinstall my PC across the board yet. It is so much hassle to do and far from proven that I need to, though of course it could entirely be all I need to fly with Capture One. Who knows? If that it what I do decide, I will reserve Capture One as the only way to go if I do not stick to ViewNX, for I have not found anything remotely as attractive for all the same reasons you have given, Paul1921.
In closing. let me say that, my only regret is that John4 sees fit to judge that I am unwilling to be influenced by the facts and what I can learn of them from others with more knowledge and experiences of them than I in certain areas. That is quite understandable, except he is wrong.
The fact I bring to the table, adding slightly to what I have said already, is that these days one needs to have a healthy degree of scepticism because of what I have already said before. So I will not repeat myself. Why I like to write at length and hear several replies from those who choose to make them along the way, apart from the reasons I have already given, is that it gives more opportunity to judge what credence to give to what each personality brings to the debate.
I also have reread everything in this thread, Paul1921 and John4, and I cannot see that anything I have said was unreasonable, given my knowledge and awareness of the facts from my own experiences and those expressed by others. Certainly I have certain prejudices, don't we all and for a variety of reasons? It is human nature.
I do not think John4 has been unreasonable, even in his presumptions about my intransigence, though he actually is wrong. The fact that he sees me one way and Paul1921, you another is a necessary part of the discussion because it all helps one put into perspective and reach the bottom line in a thoroughly reasoned manner, or as near to it as each one of us is capable.
So Paul1921 in particular and everyone else including John4 as well, very many thanks. This has helped me enormously even though there are still some doubts left (that's nobodies fault, just a fact of life) but it does mean we have I hope gotten something very useful out of this, including other readers who may have kept quiet but read with interest or amusement.
If we could have gone straight to what Paul1921 has said in his last reply, I think that on its own would have been more that enough. It says it all doesn't it? However, none of us need apologise for taking a very circuitous route. It is part of the human condition, isn't it?0 -
If you are the "ardent Nikonian" as you say you are, I thought you might like this site from a photographer who is the same.
http://www.bythom.com/
Also if you do decide reload your PC, you might want to look at Image For Dos. It is software that will image your C drive in Dos. Since I like to try various software, I run this to restore my PC to a freshly reloaded state, and wipe out the garbage the trial and error left behind.
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/image-for-dos.htm
Wish you well in your endeavors.0 -
[quote="Paul1921" wrote:
Thank you John4, I thought I was loosing it. I have never used sessions, and never experienced a crash since 4.1.
Same here...0 -
Frankly I do not care about all this bibble babble. the fact of the matter is I have a very robust system with a multitude of applications that do not crash. Capture 1, every version of version 4 crashes. I do not know what the problems is and what maddens me is that while other have no problems many do and they are not addressed. .Net frame work or not I don't care. The fact is the application is unreliable. Maybe not for everyone but if it is unreliable on a system with XP and 2GB Ram and no other application crashes it is not the systems fault. Perhaps it cannot be used on systems with AMD processors? I don't know. What I do know is that if it was reliable it would be great but it is not.
Yesterday I was simply cropping and it would fault with this error:
Error processing file _DSC3292.NEF - Error. I really don't care if it is a registry problem or a session problem or a .net problem. The Windows Registry seems to cause no problems for other applications. I would say it is Capture One's the use of the regisrty that causes the problem if it is a registry problems. Blaming the registry or the functioning OS is like blaming the bowl for spilling the water. Just cut the BS and re write it so it works with windows.
Thanks
Andrew0 -
This is definitely going to have to be my last reply. As my email address is changing, I will soon not get notification if there is a further post here.
Like Andrew, I have strong suspicions about Capture One. I cannot be sure but everything else seems to work OK on my PC but not Capture One. I will never be sure but I can say that Nikon's ViewNX does everything I need, given that I use Photoshop CS2 for most of my processing anyway.
ViewNX is nothing to make a fuss about. It is quite limited and on the slow side but it does provide compatability with my D300 and CS2 and enable me to save NEFs adjusted for exposure better and more easily than Capture One does (when C1 works). Moreover, I do believe Nikon when they say ViewNX works as well as Capture NX2 within its limited scope and that's good enough for me.
Besides, I did not find results with Capture One were any better, so that's an end to the saga. At least for me. I now have a simple and effective workflow without spurious files and caches all over the place on my hard drive. I feel I have control of my hard drive back and however well Capture One had worked, I would not have liked its way of working in that regard. Yes, the user interface is suoerb but one need's more than that.0 -
Writing software for a Windows environment is far more challenging than it is for a Mac for the simple reason that Windows is truly an open environment. There are far more hardware and software options for Windows than there are for Macs, and there lies the problem for Windows users. Granted, with the introduction of XP, software conflicts are largely a thing of the past since XP had system file protection. Many software companies took shortcuts to programming and modified system files to conform to their software instead of conforming their software to the system files.
Unfortunately many problems still do exist. Microsoft, Intel, and AMD release exact specs (standards) to developers, but in order to cut costs these standards are not always met exactly. Motherboard manufactures are notorious for taking shortcuts. Case in point, I had a problem a while back with MS Office crashing on a new computer I built. I could not find anything on Microsoft’s website about my problem, and the same version of Office worked fine on my old computer with similar software installed. I was completely stumped. As a last chance effort I chose to tried a different make motherboard, problem solved. Although I do not remember the brand that gave me the trouble, the Intel board ran like a champ.
These problems do not exist with Apple since it is a closed platform. For this reason I do not buy off the shelf computers from the Dells or HPs of the world since I do not know what they put in it. I am simple, Intel processors, Intel motherboards, and a very popular brand of memory. Since I have used this philosophy, my computer headaches are largely obsolete.
Making these crash problems even a worse nightmare for Capture One is the install base. There are far less installs of CO than there are lets say for MS Office leaving CO developers far less data to go on. Therefore it becomes far more imperative to tell Phase every little detail about your system, not just highlighting the specs. XP SP3, 3 GHz processor, 2 gigs RAM is not a lot of information to go on. However if we all told Phase the model of processor, motherboard, memory, hard drive, and video along with all the other details, they just might see a pattern that can be resolved.0 -
Paul1921, your comments are very illuminating. I will not be buying another Dell and your comments add a great deal to reinforce this judgement. So may thanks for that. If only I had got a Mac years ago. It seems that their approach is altogether technically more sound. Now the problems is the cost of so much PC software to replace and learn about if I made that change when I get my next computer.
How, unless you know enough to build your own PC do you determine that the PC is clean? When I bought my Dell desktop PC, I chose a business machine but that did not stop them from messing around with the system software. And they had the audacity to say on their website that this did not have extra junk!
My two PCs are both Dell, a laptop and a desktop and I must admit I have similar reservation about them as you. They work fine (I think) except I get the occasional small issue with one or two features in Microsoft Office 2000 which I have not had before on other PCs.
They are good value for money but there is a lot of Dell junk on them. I cannot see the point of their support since, whenever I had tried to contact them, they ignored my messages - even within the first few weeks after purchase.
More seriously, Dell seem to have created an extra partition that appears to be to allow a roll back to how the system was set up at the time of delivery. Trouble is that to do a Dell reinstall requires a program that on the desktop (I have not looked on the laptop) appears to be missing. So, I am scared of reinstalling partly because of that and partly because of other traps Dell may have set for me.
The Windows XP restore feature does not work. Every restore I selected was not usable, so maybe Dell are responsible for that. Fortunately I have not actually had to restore or reinstall on these Dells. I have never had a serious crash that I could not solve without a restore or reinstall. That at least is an improvement on earlier PCs I owned. I only wanted to use restore to revert to an earlier copy of the registry that would not have had the junk from the latest program I tried and then abandoned. One of the last, as it happened, was Capture One.0 -
If you don’t want to take on the task of building your own, find a local retailer who custom builds computers to your specs. Yes you will pay more, but what extra you spend on the computer, you’ll save on migraine pain reliever. 🤓
What you’ll get is an OEM Windows install disc, and the install discs of whatever software and drivers you ordered with it. If you want to reload, you have all the discs needed to do so, or you can do what I do. Have separate hard drive so you can store all the updated drivers and software for your machine. Also I go one step further and use Image For DOS so I can restore my computer to a freshly loaded state incase something goes wrong. All of my data is stored on a separate patrician so I do not have to worry about loosing it when I restore my system.
Something else I used which worked well was an uninstall utility (Total Uninstall I think) which monitors the installation process of software and creates its own uninstall process which is far better than what the software companies provide. Basically the process deletes the registry entries, directories, and files the install created, therefore you have no remnants of software you don’t want. It was also a great tool to use to see what exactly the software did to your system, and the loads of registry entries it made.0 -
You really are a helpful guy as well as very knowledgeable. I will probably take your advice next time I get a computer. I may well consider starting again with Mac but oinly after investigating and agonising!. Perhaps a bit like giving up smoking for most people, although I was not addicted at all and had no trouible when I did so.
The only surprise in all that you have said since we started talking is that you did not try ViewNX. Because its free? I would be interested to know what you thought of it but only for the quality in what it can do. However, I ought not to encourage you to do so unless you need it for the very reasons you give in some depth.
However, if you do, I may only be aware that you have replied for another 13 days, the change in my email (not by choice) being the reason.0 -
Thank you for your kind comments. Everything I learned about computers came from desire to play, and experiment. I have truly "blown-up" more computers than I care to admit to.
Since I work with photographers, I knew about Phase One quality, and the reputation Phase One had with their backs and their software well before my first digital camera, a D80. Then when I purchased my D80, Phase One was offering Capture One LE for free as a SanDisK promotion. So from day one, I was using Capture One. I do remember the salesrep that sold me the camera telling me that View NX had very rudimentary RAW support, and if I planned to do much with RAW that I'd should use Capture One so I never really gave it much thought at all.
Since we have been talking, I have become curious about View NX myself, and will give it a try. Sometimes I want to do a quick and dirty edit of a RAW file which never happens with CO for it has so many options available to tweak the image.
The next time you buy a PC, if you have one built with an Intel Processor and motherboard, with a good popular brand of memory, I do believe you'll be quite pleased with the results because you are buying the parts from the companies who write the standards for others to follow.0 -
I am keen to see this through to the end even though this is a Capture One forum and… So I have now registered as keptreal and can use my new email address to tell me when there is another entry here. However, this still is keepreal really.
Paul 1921, if you give ViewNX a try, with very limited objectives, you might actually like it. The latest version is 1.4 which you probably will mainly find on the Nikon website.
We seem to have a lot in common, though interestingly, I worked in Information Technology for 40 years yet you clearly know more on the technical side than I do. Mind you, all my PCs have had Intel boards so, regarding the problems we have been discussing, that can only be one of a number of factors.
Regarding ViewNX and alternatives. I think a lot may depend upon two key factors. Firstly, is one’s volume high such that one is looking for the minimum of image processing per frame and, where possible doing it in the RAW converter and ideally in batch? I am not one of those, so far at least. I like to throw away most of my shots early on and work like crazy to make the best of a few single images that look promising as a real picture in Photoshop, one at a time. Much of what I want to do requires selections of part of the image, not global adjustments, although I often want to do that too.
Given that, my first step is to batch convert to jpg without any modifications except size which I reduce a little so that my image viewers are faster and less space is used on my hard drive. These are only made so as to have proofs from which to determine the few I wish to work on seriously. With these, the next step one at a time is to read NEF into Photoshop and since I have the D300 and Photoshop CS2, some means to interface with it. Inevitably that means also making minimal adjustments of the RAW image before I lose information in the TIF used as the go-between, one or more copies at different exposure settings. So far I have found that the Exposure Compensation setting is the most useful, but sometimes the Shadow or Highlight Protection.
Given this scenario, ViewNX has everything I need except it is rather slow and a GUI as good as Capture One would have been much more to my liking. However, ViewNX does everything I want it to do better than most because the bandwidth for an adjustment has a better cut-off so that other tones are hardly affected, the interaction between those three adjustments (I usually employ only one or two), generally being minimal. In my experience, everything else lacks this including Capture One. However, that could be partly because of the kind of lighting range I favour, though I am not sure that that actually is the case.
Of course, my photography may well change because of the great capabilities of the D300. A few weeks ago I took 58 shots on a 1GB card that was supposed to have room for 37 but had capacity for another four after that! These shots were to finally check out if I was happy to stick to ViewNX for RAW conversion and abandon all the other alternatives including Capture One. I was.
For all these shots I used the Nikkor 70-300 VR. My exposure was set by a spot reading on a midtone, locked so that I could reframe and also retain the reading for the next frame, if I so wished. Part of the beauty of the D300 is being able to set options to do this kind of thing. Not that it was part of the test, but quite a few of the shots were taken at 300mm and I could not hold the camera even remotely steady without trying very hard, and on this occasion I didn’t! Nonetheless, focusing is lightening fast (I use the AF lock button and turned off the release button focus lock) and every frame was perfectly sharp. This experience leads me to believe I may well get into candid shots and action (using AF-C and possibly even matrix exposure metering where speed is of the essence) taking many more shots than I currently do. I still think most of my shots will be quickly discarded though, if not, my requirements of the RAW converter could change.
I had been using film for 53 years before the D300, most 35mm but a few 12 on 120 and even a pre-war wooden Sanderson quarter plate camera which I successfully converted to 8 on 120 by castrating an old film camera and grafting it onto a slide frame intended for a glass plate. What I used to like about cameras with low shots per film, especially the Sanderson, was that you knew what the result was going to look like, often very precisely. That was because one put a great deal of care and forethought into every shot. Even with 35mm I used to do that right up until April of this year, so I often would go on holiday with six cassettes but came home with only two exposed, often even less.
Heaven knows what the D300 with 2 4GB cards and one 1GB card is going to change. Certainly the quality in A3 prints now being routine instead of a struggle. But possibly not the volume, in which case ViewNX will suit me fine.0 -
If your computers are Dell, I would be surprised if the motherboards carry the Intel brand since those boards are a bit pricier, and Dell shoots for the lowest price, although I haven't cracked open a Dell in a long time. The other hunch I have is if Dell is using their own proprietary version of Windows just as Compaq did back in the days of Windows 98. If you had a Windows 98 disk from Microsoft, you could not install it on a Compaq system, you had to have the one from Compaq.
Years ago Dell Started out with very generic computers, now they are big, they have moved more in a proprietary direction. I just do not know how far they went. I'll ask my guy who I buy my computer parts from.
Paul0 -
[quote="Paul1921" wrote:
If your computers are Dell, I would be surprised if the motherboards carry the Intel brand since those boards are a bit pricier, and Dell shoots for the lowest price, although I haven't cracked open a Dell in a long time. The other hunch I have is if Dell is using their own proprietary version of Windows just as Compaq did back in the days of Windows 98. If you had a Windows 98 disk from Microsoft, you could not install it on a Compaq system, you had to have the one from Compaq.
Paul
There is no such thing a Dell proprietary version of Windows. Every OEM - including Dell and HP etc. - receive exactly the same OEM version of Windows to which they add:
- hardware-specific device drivers
- their own proprietary or "free" applications
- drive partitioning schemes etc.
Dell then prepares various OS "images" from those bits - which are proprietary - for each model that is sold to a consumer and then mass images computers as they come off the hardware assembly line. The recovery disk that you receive from Dell contains the model-specific image that was used to manufacture your Dell computer and that is usually the easiest way to restore a damaged installation.0 -
Last night I had the opportunity to try ViewNX, and on my first go round with it I was not impressed at all. You are correct, the user interface is not good, IMHO it is horrible, probably one of the worst I have seen. The application is very choppy, and slow, it does not run smooth at all. The sliders stick constantly. The other thing that drove me nuts is why do you have to save your work while CO just updates all your changes in real time?
Now for the most glaring issue I found upon loading my first image was the color. Certain photographs I loaded into ViewNX looked very unnatural, while other photographs looked better. It seemed the higher the ISO, the more unnatural the photos looked in ViewNX while CO always had the color dead on. Then after searching for the color profiles ViewNX installed, it seems as though the program uses a separate color profile for each ISO setting. ViewNX's ability to to correct and control color is very rudimentary to the point of useless while CO gives you the world at your fingertips. I was unable to take a photo and match the natural colors I get in CO.
Sorry if I seemed so critical and harsh, but I was completely frustrated with many of the results the program gave me. After many attempts, not one of the photos I tried could match or come close to the results of CO. I guess the what through me was the first image I opened was a 1600 ISO image that looked truly way off color wise, and I tried to correct it so it looked natural as when I shot it, and I couldn't do it.0
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