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Double RAW Processing in Aperture? #1
Bob Miller's picture
by Bob Miller
February 8, 2012 - 9:10am

Excuse my ignorance here, but I hear a lot about double raw processing. What exactly is it and how do you do it in Aperture? Thanks for any help here.

Bob

PhotoJoseph's picture
by PhotoJoseph
February 8, 2012 - 11:56am

Bob,

Never heard of it. And it’s not technically possible. RAW processing is the action of taking the raw bits from a RAW file and drawing them to screen. Once they are drawn to screen, they are no longer RAW, so can’t be “re-processed”.

Feel free to link me to an article or discussion.

cheers

@PhotoJoseph
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PhotoJoseph's picture
by PhotoJoseph
February 8, 2012 - 12:11pm

Bob,

I had to google it… sounded too odd. I see what it is now; it’s basically a form of HDR (correct me if I’m wrong). Users are processing their images in two different ways and combining the results in Photoshop.

You can’t do this in Aperture, I’m afraid. You could process the image in two different ways, yes, but then you’d have to export and combine in Photoshop.

@PhotoJoseph
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Bob Miller's picture
by Bob Miller
February 8, 2012 - 10:58pm

Thank you Joseph,
I just couldn’t see how it was possible in Aperture.

Bob

PhotoJoseph's picture
by PhotoJoseph
February 9, 2012 - 2:51am

Bob,

I had to try this out myself this morning. You do get a cool look in Photoshop by doing this double-raw technique (I tried it following these steps at glyndewisblog.com) but the result was remarkably close to what I already had done in Aperture with a little curves and enhance adjustments. I put the two side by side and was able to reproduce the look very very closely in Aperture; of course which is “better” is entirely subjective.

The end result is a high contrast image, high saturation image with lots of sharp details pulled through from the shadows. I don’t know that the technique actually benefits from the double-raw processing itself. The technique of layering a high-contrast B&W version of an image on top of the original and using the Luminosity blend mode isn’t new, and doing that from RAW images vs TIF or PSD originals doesn’t, in my mind, give any benefit.

If it’s the look you’re after, try an s-curve, increased definition and if necessary, adjust the midrange with either the curves or the gamma on levels. I think you’ll be pleased at what you see.

@PhotoJoseph
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Bob Miller's picture
by Bob Miller
February 9, 2012 - 7:41am

Joseph, would it be possible for you to post the comparison?
Thanks,

Bob

PhotoJoseph's picture
by PhotoJoseph
February 10, 2012 - 2:56am

Here you go Bob.

These three screenshots show all three images; the original RAW as processed by Aperture, the double-RAW as processed by Photoshop CS4, and the RAW Aperture file with my treatments. I’ve even saved the settings as a preset, although you can’t expect this to work on all images — the settings were very dialed to this specific shot.

Zoomed out: [screenshot]
Close-up 1: [screenshot]
Close-up 2: [screenshot]

To download the preset, click here.

Of course I want to point out that while I do know Photoshop very well, I’m no expert. So there may be more that could be done with this double-raw technique in Photoshop.

@PhotoJoseph
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Bob Miller's picture
by Bob Miller
February 10, 2012 - 3:38am

Thanks so much Joseph,
Your preset seems to work very well!! Seeing as I don’t have access to P.S., it’s nice to see this done with-in Aperture.

Bob

Mark Alderson's picture
by Mark Alderson
February 11, 2012 - 11:29am

So, looking at what you did Joseph, continues to show the flexibility of Aperture. Very interesting!

Kenny Poulsen's picture
by Kenny Poulsen
February 11, 2012 - 5:49pm

Yep, Aperture is “flexible”, in many instances even thinking of Photoshop is waste of time … :-)
But this thread make me think about another Aperture possibility to eventually do some “wonders” in Aperture…hmmm…..i think i need to go into my Aperture lab for some time :-) Maybe some smoke is getting out on a later stage…..

Tonemapper's picture
by Tonemapper
February 12, 2012 - 6:06am

Maybe I’m missing something but it looks like you are losing shadow detail in that process. I prefer the un-filtered Aperture process but probably with some added punch….

PhotoJoseph's picture
by PhotoJoseph
February 12, 2012 - 6:07am

Daniel,

Do you mean losing detail in mine vs. the Photoshop way, or just in general? I’m sure I could tweak it to bring back some shadow detail; I just happen to like the crunchy look for most of my photos.

@PhotoJoseph
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