Have you ever asked yourself, "how could I get all the benefits of shooting in RAW without having to try to figure out all of the frustrating tool sets of most RAW converters?"  If you have, the following tutorial might be for you.  If you are using iCorrect EditLab Pro, you already know how fast and easy color correction and color editing can be with its four tabbed SmartColor wizard approach.  Hopefully, this will help simplify your workflow when your work calls for capturing your images in RAW format.

Undoubtedly, there are many advantages of shooting in RAW, unfortunately, the color editing tools within most RAW converters are somewhat less than intuitive, straightforward, or easy-to-use.  The following tutorial will show you how to get the most out of your images with RAW capture while streamlining your workflow with either iCorrect EditLab Pro Plug-in or iCorrect EditLab ProApp.

The following workflow accomplishes the main objective of creating images of the highest quality while minimizing the frustration, simplifying the process, and reducing the time required to enhance and fine tune them to suit your preferences.

Step II: Exposure  

The second important advantage of RAW capture is that  RAW offers the ability to recover from exposure errors.  This is explained fully in the two articles referenced above.  Figure 3 provides an excellent example of this in the bright highlight area of the clouds in the upper left.  With the RAW conversion, Camera Raw limits the brightest value to R=241, G=241, B=241.  But with a JPEG capture of the same scene (Figure 4.), the highlights are blown way out to R=255, G=255, B=255, resulting in a loss of detail that can never be recovered.  Based on our testing, the default algorithms in Camera Raw do an excellent job of optimizing the exposure for the Raw conversion while providing plenty of "headroom" for further fine tuning in iCorrect EditLab Pro Plug-in or iCorrect EditLab ProApp.

Figure 3.

Figure 4.

Now that you've established a good baseline for color balance and exposure, you should address sharpening, and luminance and color noise reduction.  Although Camera Raw's sharpening tool is rather unsophisticated with limited parameters and options, one could make the argument that in the interest of an expedited workflow, even its default setting serves its purpose well as shown in comparison figures 5 and 6.  Notice the enhanced detail in the lions' manes and shield.  If your work requires extra attention to sharpness or need to address specific problem images, then you should sharpen post-conversion.

Figure 5. (no sharpening)

Figure 6. (default sharpening)

With respect to luminance noise and color noise, the best time to address these is during the RAW conversion since it is generally faster, more effective, and less destructive than doing so in Photoshop.  Notice how well it cleans up the squares of the GretagMacbeth ColorChecker Chart in comparison Figures 8 and 9.  Finally, see how crisp and clean the overall image is in Figure 10.

Figure 8.

Figure 9.

Figure 10.

Since the tool sets within most raw conversion programs for fine tuning images can be rather complex, cumbersome, and confusing, we would recommend using iCorrect EditLab Pro Plug-in or iCorrect EditLab ProApp at this point.  Its four tool sets are logically arranged from left to right and offer a wizard-like approach to accurate color and really eliminate the frustration of color correction and color editing.  The tool sets are designed in such a way that as you progress from left to right, the tools will not, and in fact cannot affect any of the tools to its left.  This alleviates the common problem of correcting for one thing while throwing off another.  With iCorrect EditLab Pro, one pass through the tools and you are finished.

Let's take a look at the four sample images and see easily iCorrect EditLab Pro transforms them from basically sound Raw captures to stunning images with that extra "pop" we are always striving for.  The initial image is the final result after iCorrect EditLab Pro, and the image you see after moving your mouse over it is the basic raw conversion.

Sample 1. For the first sample, all we had to do was click SmartColor which adjusted the Tonal Range in Tab2, and we were finished.

Sample 2. For the second sample, we also started with SmartColor which adjusted the tonal range in Tab 2, and then moved to Tab 4 where we were finished by tweaking the lawn with the Foliage Green Memory Color and making it more realistic by adjusting its brightness and saturation on a hue-selective basis.

Sample 3. For the third sample, we manually adjusted the tonal range as well as the various brightness and saturation controls in Tabs 2 and 3.  We then moved to Tab 4 where we corrected the sky with the Sky Blue Memory color.

Sample 4. For the fourth sample, we relied on SmartColor to modify the tonal range in Tab 2 and then slightly adjusted the overall brightness and saturation in Tab 3.  Then we boosted the saturation of the lions on a hue-selective basis in Tab 4.