Nikon Capture NX

Meercat · Just Over Average User Joined: 24 Nov 2007 Posts: 100

I've spoken to the capture "experts" at Nikon and they seem unable to help, but has anyone on here come across this problem with Capture NX?

I load a RAW image into capture, change the contrast levels usually and do a bit of unsharp mask. Bingo, the photo looks nice and how I want it.

Wait a couple of seconds and the photo changes - the sharpness drops off as well as the contrast. Its not how the original is, but certainly not how I've changed it.

I wonder if I have changed soem settings in Capture, but don't know what. Anyone know how to reset the settings (I could reinstall but I'm not sure if my acccess code will still work).

Worst comes to the worst I'll take the lptop in tomorrow and demonstrate the problem, but hoping that someone here can help in the meantime.

Hamish · Forum Veteran Joined: 29 Sep 2006 Posts: 1011

Strange. Mine doesn't do that. If anything it becomes sharper once the rendering is performed. However, I wonder if you're referring to the image at regular viewing size, rather than 100%? In that case the sharpening may change as it becomes more precise than the preview. I suspect there may not be a change at 100%.

Do you do your sharpening viewed at 100%? Am I barking up the wrong tree?
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Hamish

Meercat · Just Over Average User Joined: 24 Nov 2007 Posts: 100

No I don't. I do any noise reduction at 100% but didn't think it was important to do the sharpening as well.

I'll give thata go and see if the problem still occurs.

Cheers.

Meercat · Just Over Average User Joined: 24 Nov 2007 Posts: 100

Just tried at 100% - seems to solve the problem.

Muchas gracias.

Hamish · Forum Veteran Joined: 29 Sep 2006 Posts: 1011

You should always sharpen at 100%. Bear in mind that sharpening adjusts the edges of the details in particular and it's important to avoid halos. The best size to view is 100%. Sharpening is a really complicated business to get the very best. An approach that I like is a 3 stage one as follows, which lots of photoshop gurus also go with:

1. Do a little sharpening after initial camera/RAW adjustments but before any levels/further adjustments. This is a good idea because sharpening affects contrast and vice versa. A little sharpening at the start means the later adjustments will be less. I use sharpening 3 in picture control on my D200 - I suspect that a setting of 2 may be a better initial setting for the D300 as it's got a weaker AA filter.

2. Once all the other adjustments are done I do final sharpening, viewing at 100%, looking at the areas most likely to suffer from halos. It really depends on the picture. If it's a portrait then I often use the selection brush to only apply sharpening to areas that need it (e.g. eyes & lashes) rather than global sharpening which will make all the wrinkles more obvious. If it's a biking shot then I may only sharpen the rider so that the blurred forest in the background doesn't become more obvious...

Oh, and using Focus -> high pass -> about 1 - 1.5 pixels and blend mode overlay gives nice edge sharpening without noise. Worth experimenting with.

3. Output sharpening - It's often a good idea to oversharpen very slightly for printing. I tend to add a wee bit extra for prints rather than images for the web Also, if you are resizing for the web then it's a good idea to reduce the pic to the size you want and do a bit of final sharpening to get it right. I don't bother with this as zenfolio does a really good job during the resizing but I would if I was using flickr as my portfolio (I don't bother which is why my pics on flickr don't look quite as sharp as zenfolio).

Hope that helps.
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Hamish

Meercat · Just Over Average User Joined: 24 Nov 2007 Posts: 100

That really does help. Thanks. I'll give those tips a go later on.

One more small question though - how do you do subfolders in zenfiolio? Last time I looked you had some on yours (I think). I can't see an option to do it...

Hamish · Forum Veteran Joined: 29 Sep 2006 Posts: 1011

Dunno. I think I just created a folder and then another inside, using the bottons on the list at the left side of the organize page thing. I think that you can also move folrds around using the move option.

Hope that helps.

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Hamish