# Colorchecker passport profiles - skin tones



## quantum (Jan 27, 2011)

Hi
I have been having various degrees of success with the ColorChecker Passport from X-Rite within Lightroom.

Although I have not done exhaustive testing, my results when applied to portrait sittings have not been preferable to those with Camera standard profile.

Using my D3s X-rite produces profiles that have more shadow and skin detail which does not flatter the subject. Worse still there seems to be a rather greenish quality particularly to mid/ shadow areas.

I have had some success with my D3x however, in the same studio conditions.

I wonder what are your experiences and whether you can offer some sugestions. 

Finally am I right in making the profile 1st then applying the grey patch white balance - or should it be the other way round?

Regards

John


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## MoreThanWords (Jan 27, 2011)

Hi John,

AFAIK, you've got the order correct. The thing to keep in mind with X-Rite's profiles is that they aren't meant to give the most pleasing look or color rendition, but the most correct one... In theory, they the ColorChecker should give the best match between capture and what you see on a calibrated monitor. That isn't necessarily the most pleasing (e.g. for skintone). I mainly see big differences in blue and purple areas when you compare the standard and camera profiles to custom X-Rite profiles.


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## sizzlingbadger (Jan 27, 2011)

Th xrite profiles use the tone curve from Adobe Standard, I don't like it. The Camera Standard tone curves are better in my opinion. The xrite will give you accurate colours only. If you use the Adobe DNG Profile Editor you can create a profile using the Camera Standard tone curve and use the color checker to correct the colours. This is far more flexible than the xrite passport plug-in.


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## quantum (Jan 28, 2011)

Thanks Nik, I hadn't realised that they were like the Adobe standard profile, but you are right and yes I don't like them either. I'll have have a good look into Adobe DNG Profile Editor. It looks a bit complicated though, I'm not sure I'm going to be up to it!
So you've found these better than Camera Standard?
Cheers
John


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## sizzlingbadger (Jan 29, 2011)

I use Invariant profiles with Camera Neutral as my default profile (I shoot Nikon). Then I'll change to Camera Landscape, Camera Portrait etc. as I feel is required at the time. I find the Neutral profile is a good starting point to judge from.  I only create profiles in special cases which is fairly rare these days.

Check out tutorial 5 here  http://labs.adobe.com/wiki/index.php/DNG_Profiles:Editor

follow it through to step 3 and then add step 3.5 below..

Step 3.5 you select the Base Profile in the Color Tables Tab, this is the tone curve that will be used. So you can create a Camera Standard, Camera Neutral etc. but colour corrected to your lighting conditions with the xrite chart.

Tutorial 6 shows you how to make Dual Illuminant profiles but I never had much luck with them to be honest.

There is a lot stuff in the editor that you don't need to touch so its not too hard once you have done one. You have to use a DNG image to create the profile but it will work fine on your NEF files once you have created it.

If you want to try Invariant or Untwisted profiles you can download them from my blog

If you want to know what they are then look here you may find using these and just white balancing with the color checker is enough to get good skin tones.


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## Mark Sirota (Jan 30, 2011)

Nik, that reminds me -- a friend asked whether you had neatly packaged versions of untwisted D700/D3 v2 profiles.  I see only the Invariants on your site.


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## sizzlingbadger (Jan 30, 2011)

I don't but will sort them out shortly for you...


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## sizzlingbadger (Jan 30, 2011)

Here you go...   http://www.nikplayer.com/2011/01/nikon-beta-v2-profiles-untwisted.html


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## Denis de Gannes (Jan 31, 2011)

This is what I got creating a profile for my Olympus E510 using the Adobe DNG Profile editor. The test file white balance was corrected using the WhiBal greycard.
LR default Standard profile vs MyProfile. My first attempt using the profile editor so I am not sure if it is accurate, just followed the instructions.


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## sizzlingbadger (Jan 31, 2011)

Looks pretty good to me Denis, just remember that the profile will only accurate under the same/similar lighting conditions. Your blues shift very much like mine did with my Nikon files.


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## Denis de Gannes (Jan 31, 2011)

Thanks. Yes I understand the limitations.


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## quantum (Feb 9, 2011)

Hi Nick, can you tell me in the DNG profile editor do you use a colour checker chart as your dng profile editor image or a nromal image say with skin tones?
John


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## quantum (Feb 9, 2011)

*force colorchecker use different base?*

As I haven't yet had the time to do a DNG editor tweak is there a shortcut - i.e. forcing the colorchecker program to use a different start point. I find the camera standard (lacking in tonal contrast) much better than the adobe standard (mid to shadows are too green). Somewhere in between would be good.

Are we also saying that DNG profile editor should be used for each shooting scenario. I know ideally we should use a color chart each time, but weddings for instance are impossibe.

What I want to aim at is a good overall base profile I can apply. I thought the colorchecker would be the thing.

I am getting lost in tech jargon despite some great help from Mr Badger! What are untwisted profiles? :surprised:
Can anyone help me out with my D3s profiling please??

John


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## sizzlingbadger (Feb 9, 2011)

I use the color checker chart with the DNG Profile editor. I can't see any easy way of forcing the Passport Plug-In to use a different tone curve, its built into its software code somewhere. If you want really accurate results then you need to shoot the color checker in each lighting condition. I doubt you would need anything that accurate for a wedding. The built-in camera profiles in Lightroom that mimic Nikon's jpeg files would probably be fine for most people.

If you created a calibrated profile in daylight it would be useable in most situations in my experience so thats what I would recommend you try.

Untwisted explanation here http://dcptool.sourceforge.net/Hue Twists.html

I spent a lot (far too much) of my time playing with camera profiles and colour calibrations and you end up chasing your tail and going slightly insane. I came to the conclusion in the end that for the most part there were far more import aspects of my photography that required my time than the pursuit of accurate colours 

I use the Invariant profiles now and have made peace with them. I'm using Aperture at the moment but don't tell anyone here


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## quantum (Feb 9, 2011)

Thanks Badger. What the hell is an invariant profile? In a nutshell for someone who really hates chasing their tale...

As I said I am unhappy with the Lightroom profiles, but also with the colorchecker passport which is why I sought advice.

John


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## sandyb99 (Feb 9, 2011)

Hi Guys
New to forum. Have found this really helpful as having similar colour problems.
Thanks again...


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## sizzlingbadger (Feb 9, 2011)

John, check out that link I posted and it will explain untwisted and invariant profiles. You can download the profiles from my website and just try them out. The tone curve in Aperture is very nice BTW


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## Victoria Bampton (Feb 9, 2011)

Hi Sandy, welcome to the forum!  Tell us a little more about the problems you're having?


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## sizzlingbadger (Feb 9, 2011)

Adobe have just release v3 of the Beta profiles.....     http://www.nikplayer.com/2011/02/adobe-release-v3-beta-camera-profiles.html


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## quantum (Feb 10, 2011)

Will these work with D3s, as they only state D3.


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## ario (Feb 10, 2011)

I have only a Color Checker Passport as a reference target and I found  that using the  DNG PE with it, i'm getting a bit of magenta cast, using  the X-Rite SW on the contrary the outcome is a bit  on the cold side.
This is more or lesss constant with all my cameras (Leica, Nikon, Olympus and Pentax).
Can  anybody tell me why the size of the DNG profiles created with the  X-Rite SW is so small compared with the canned DNG profiles?
Cheers,
Ario


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## Mark Sirota (Feb 10, 2011)

quantum said:


> Will these work with D3s, as they only state D3.


 
D3 only.  It may be that the existing D3s profiles already include whatever magic these include.  But the place to ask would be in the linked thread on the Adobe Forums.


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## sizzlingbadger (Feb 10, 2011)

ario said:


> Can  anybody tell me why the size of the DNG profiles created with the  X-Rite SW is so small compared with the canned DNG profiles?
> Cheers,
> Ario




Because they only contain direct offset changes from the Adobe Standard profile. No twisting LUT tables etc...  so they don't adapt to different lighting situations.


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## ario (Feb 10, 2011)

This is what I suspected. 
Will the ability to adapt to different lighting conditions will be mantained by the canned profiles (or by the invariant/untwisted versions) if modified with DNG profile Editor?


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## sizzlingbadger (Feb 11, 2011)

canned adapt during application and develop changes. Invariant adapt just on application. Untwisted don't adapt at all. If you modify the tone curve or the colour mappings in the DNG editor their behaviour doesn't change but you may find hey no longer work as well.


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## quantum (Jan 27, 2011)

Hi
I have been having various degrees of success with the ColorChecker Passport from X-Rite within Lightroom.

Although I have not done exhaustive testing, my results when applied to portrait sittings have not been preferable to those with Camera standard profile.

Using my D3s X-rite produces profiles that have more shadow and skin detail which does not flatter the subject. Worse still there seems to be a rather greenish quality particularly to mid/ shadow areas.

I have had some success with my D3x however, in the same studio conditions.

I wonder what are your experiences and whether you can offer some sugestions. 

Finally am I right in making the profile 1st then applying the grey patch white balance - or should it be the other way round?

Regards

John


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## ario (Feb 11, 2011)

Very clear, thank you.


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## quantum (Feb 11, 2011)

Clear as mud to me! ;-0


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## mfcamera (Feb 15, 2011)

*Re: Color Checker Passport Dual Illuminate*

I am having problem in creating the dual illuminate DNG profile in Lightroom or the Color Checker program. It will take the first file then the second file always come up with error that is not a valid DNG (I tried many different DNG files). It is the same error on Windows 7 machine and Vista machine. I reload The CC Passprt but still the same problem. Any help will be much appreciated.


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## Victoria Bampton (Feb 16, 2011)

Hi mfcamera, welcome to the forum!

Have you tried the full DNG Profile Editor to create the profile instead?


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