# Canon RAW image task sharper than Lightroom?



## redford (Jan 3, 2015)

Hi
I am starting/learning with LR. 
I have my CR2 from G9 developed in Canon Raw Image Task, so far.

I like the features of Lightroom, but I cannot get the sharpness of the pictures like Canon RIT developed.
Here is link to zip, where is RAW and JPG from Canon RIT with default settings http://ulozto.net/xtJPKypE/canong9-zip.

In this example, I have been playing with noise reduction and sharpness in LR half a day, but could not get as sharp as the JPG from RIT.
Maybe I am missing something.

Could you give me some tips, or maybe download and try it on my example?
If you are willing to try to develope my RAW, I appreciate very much. For detail comparison, look at the sharpness of the cars on the left part of the bridge and the noise in the shadow side of the column.

I am developing with Camera Standard profile process 2012, As Shot WB.

Thank you
R.


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## Tony Jay (Jan 4, 2015)

Hi Redford, welcome to Lightroom Forums.

You do pose an interesting question.
I did download your images and play around with them in Lightroom.
I was able to easily improve on the result (using the JPEG as reference).

Perhaps one of the best ways to explain what you are aiming for is to introduce the term 'acutance'.
Acutance is the perceived detail in an image and sharpness is only one way of improving acutance.

In essence it requires manipulation of all the tonal and colour controls in Lightroom as well as both optimal application of sharpening and noise reduction.
I increased both contrast (a global manipulation) as well as clarity (gives one a midtone contrast boost). Colour was enhanced by increasing vibrance.

With regard to sharpening perhaps the key was to recognise the absence of a lot of high frequency detail - this due to the hazy atmosphere. So, I used a higher radius setting than I would usually do. Sharpening was set higher as well but the detail slider was pulled back to reduce the haloing from the high sharpening setting.
I pulled the mask slider up to accentuate the strong edges.
Settings as below:
Exposure: -0.2
Contrast: +57
Clarity: +32
Vibrance: +39
Sharpening: 66
Radius: 1.7
Detail: 23
Masking: 50

Tony Jay


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## redford (Jan 4, 2015)

Hi

Here below are three pictures.
1.My original attempt
Sharpness 40/1.8/30/0
Luma noise 30/0/0
Color noise 10/50/50





2.Canon




3. Tony Jay settings  plus I added 10 luma and 10 chroma denoising. (but this setting moves the color of the photo completely away from the original)






Even when I remove the noise reduction from my photo (1.), still there is more sharper detail in the Canon RIT. And then the tiny noise is really ugly.
I mostly check the results on the bottoms of the two white cars, the borders, gradient on the left car, the white waves, white dots on the red bridge. 

Any more ideas?
Thanx
Redford

EDIT: when you open pictures in different windows and switch quickly, you'll see.


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## davidedric (Jan 4, 2015)

I guess it's in the eye of the beholder.  Personally, I much prefer the look of the image produced with Tony's settings


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## redford (Jan 4, 2015)

davidedric said:


> I guess it's in the eye of the beholder.  Personally, I much prefer the look of the image produced with Tony's settings


The look... yes.
Because there is added contrast and vibrance.
But I can add the contrast and vibrance to the canon jpg.
This is not I am looking for.

Can it really be, that canon knows its RAW better and therefore can sharpen better?
Or it just has different sharpening algorithm?


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## Jimmsp (Jan 4, 2015)

redford said:


> The look... yes.
> Because there is added contrast and vibrance.
> But I can add the contrast and vibrance to the canon jpg.
> This is not I am looking for.
> ...



I downloaded your files, and then took a crack at the raw in LR, including some noise reduction (Lum = 31) and sharpening (amt=30, radius = 1.3, mask = 38).
I then took the same raw, minus noise reduction and sharpening into PS where I applied two plugins- Noiseware (default which is fairly gentle) and Topaz Detail which seperates out fine detail and large detail to sharpen differently. This is the tiff that you see. I then put these side by side in LR Compare, and took screen shots shown here.
You should focus on comparing the sharpening of the bridge structure, especially beneath the cars, not the cars which are moving. 
My conclusion - LR and the tiff are about the same, and each somewhat better than the standard jpeg. But the jpeg is pretty decent.


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## redford (Jan 4, 2015)

I must say, I prefer your CR2 to your Edit.tiff file.
TIF may be somewhere sharper, but has overburned whites somewhere (eg SUV)
And I'd prefer do all the work in LR, too.

What is the rest of your detail settings (Sharpen Detail, Noise Detail Contrast Color...)?
I will play with it more tomorrow.


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## Jimmsp (Jan 5, 2015)

redford said:


> I must say, I prefer your CR2 to your Edit.tiff file.
> TIF may be somewhere sharper, but has overburned whites somewhere (eg SUV)


All I did was make a virtual copy, and reduce sharpening and noise reduction in LR to 0. Then "edit in" PS.
The final tiff histogram did show a bit of brightness which a reduction in highlights (-12) in LR got rid of.
I don't understand where that came from.



redford said:


> What is the rest of your detail settings (Sharpen Detail, Noise Detail Contrast Color...)?
> I will play with it more tomorrow.


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## redford (Jan 5, 2015)

Jimmsp said:


> All I did was make a virtual copy, and reduce sharpening and noise reduction in LR to 0. Then "edit in" PS.
> The final tiff histogram did show a bit of brightness which a reduction in highlights (-12) in LR got rid of.
> I don't understand where that came from.



It might not be out of dynamic range, but too white anyway. (so it looks white instead of shades of grey)


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## redford (Jan 12, 2015)

redford said:


> What is the rest of your detail settings (Sharpen Detail, Noise Detail Contrast Color...)?
> I will play with it more tomorrow.


I think chroma noise can be decreased to 10,
but I must say, it is hard to improve such settings

Does anyone have some best practices to balance noise/sharpness?
When I am setting color noise I decrease contrast, clarity and maximize luma denoise, vibrance or saturation. Then I can easily decide the levels of chroma denoising.
But luma noise and sharpness? I don't know how to set it efficiently.

PS: Can LR somehow quickly (without slightest delay) switch between two versions of the photo? So I can compare which setting is better?


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## Cerianthus (Jan 12, 2015)

Select 2 or more messages and press C for compare view.


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