Conflicted. Adobe looks better than Capture One's edit

[Irene McC]

Sigh. Deeeeep sigh. I used to be a huge evangelist for Lightroom but when I switched to using mainly Fuji, I bought into Capture One (2017) and invested heavily in annual
upgrades for a perpetual license. I currently have only really old Photoshop and don't intend to go on the monthly subscription but I've got current Capture One.
I'm struggling to process hundreds of automotive images I took during the past week of a 1000-mile rally (tribute to the Mille Miglia).

I will post below the same image edited in Capture One (above) and in Camera Raw / Photoshop (below)

I prefer the Adobe version by a country mile. What to do? (and I don't want to start with another different software, I'm aware there are many others around)
If I were to go back to doing all edits in Lightroom / Photoshop, then my entire file structure from over the past 7 years will change. I suppose that can be done, but it's such a shlep

Join to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

Join to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

 

[Irene McC]

For what it's worth, here is the SOOC jpg (the above two were edited from RAW)

Join to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

 

[Herman]

Strange? Colors changing...

 

[Irene McC]

yes that's my fault for attempting to white balance (there was a lot of blue in the images in the shady areas)
So by counter-acting the blue, the yellow has increased. The Auto-WB in Camera Raw did very well though

 

[doobs]

Interesting.

I don't have any words of wisdom for you, but the SOOC seems to have a green cast to it.

Why would your file structure need to change if switching software.

I'm guessing you are using LR v6.14 as it's the last non-subscription version. I wouldn't have thought you could open the Nikon Z files with that. Was there some sort of intermediate process? (DNG conversion).

I'm not at my computer so I'm going from memory. Is C1 assigning the proper profile to the RAW's?

Good luck

 

[Irene McC]

Why would your file structure need to change if switching software.

It's my personal OCD file structure I mean 🙊

 

[john m flores]

I don't have CaptureOne but it looks overprocessed, like the kind of overprocessing that phones do these days.

Can you dial it back?

Separately, do you carry a grey card with you to set white balance with?

 

[Irene McC]

I don't have CaptureOne but it looks overprocessed, like the kind of overprocessing that phones do these days.

Can you dial it back?

Separately, do you carry a grey card with you to set white balance with?

Yes I agree that's it's over-processed. No, I don't carry a grey card; it's all very fluid, from one location to another with moving vehicles

 

[ibd]

It seems to me you can match Adobe's output by dialing back the shadows and making the WB warmer.

 

[Irene McC]

It seems to me you can match Adobe's output by dialing back the shadows and making the WB warmer.

I think you're right. Adobe spat that out as its auto white balance and it looks correct and lots better than the SOOC white balance. Capture One's Auto WB didn't look as good

 

[Irene McC]

Adobe did a lot better with the tone of the people's faces

 

[TNcasual]

That first one almost looks like an attempt at HDR. The shadows are all pulled way up, and the WB looks off.

 

[Irene McC]

That first one almost looks like an attempt at HDR. The shadows are all pulled way up, and the WB looks off.

That's my fault entirely

 

[turnip]

I had a similar experience with DXO. I switched for about a year, but upon trying out Lightroom again, I found I was getting output I liked more. It doesn't really make sense to me - I'm just pushing around the sliders in either program, but apparently I'm more likely to get an image to the place I want it to be in Lightroom.

 

[Irene McC]

I had a similar experience with DXO. I switched for about a year, but upon trying out Lightroom again, I found I was getting output I liked more. It doesn't really make sense to me - I'm just pushing around the sliders in either program, but apparently I'm more likely to get an image to the place I want it to be in Lightroom.

Exactly, I'm starting to feel that way too.

 

[gryphon1911]

I started out with ACDSee - all I could afford at the time. When I finally was able to get Photoshop and the time to learn it, going to Lightroom was easier. I left ACDSee because at the time, their DAM module could not handle the volume of files I had and looking anything up was painful via keywording.

I've basically been using Lightroom since the OG Lightroom. I know it and love it.

The big thing is that are you willing to make the change. It is a commitment.

I like Lightroom because for me I can go through thousands of images from a shoot in a short amount of time. It is not as quick as Photo Mechanic, but it works for me.

So, keep with Capture One and see if you can master it?
Switch to Lightroom?

I had Capture One fort a while to use with my Fuji files. I didn't like the Lightroom sharpening for Fuji files. I did find out that I could get around that by using Topaz Sharpen for the final step. Outside of that, I found Capture One a bit clunky (for me).

 

[John King]

Irene, as for costings, when I did them a few years ago, the Adobe Photographer's package was the cheapest of them all, over a 3 year period. Surprised me, somewhat.

I upgraded from CS6 Premium to the subscription model, and have never regretted it.

As for folder organisation, I put all my images under one head folder, "_All_Images" then break them up by camera, then card number.

Bridge is a fantastic organisation/DAM program.

 

[tilman]

If I were at this stage in editing on a bunch of my own photos, I’d hit the “reset” button in C1 and use the Lightroom result as a visual guide, to see whether I can achieve the same look with a few basic adjustments.

Once you went too far overboard on a photo-edit, it’s best to start over. 🙂

If you want to keep the current version as an option, you can create a new “variant” instead of resetting the current version.

Having said that - in case C1 simply won’t work:
If Lightroom CC (or whatever they call their online version these days) is sufficient - doesn’t that offer the new option of working with files in a folder structure (rather than forcing you to import into catalogs)?

 

[doady]

Looks like all the sunshine and yellow car and yellow building tricked the camera in setting WB too much of the opposite colour, blue (cyan + magenta). So to make it more yellow (red + green) in C1, you need to increase Kelvin (cyan vs. red) and reduce the Tint (green vs. magenta). Once you correct one photo, the others should be very quick to correct since you now have Kelvin and Tint values that you can use as a reference, or even as a new preset.

 

[Irene McC]

Once you went too far overboard on a photo-edit, it’s best to start over. 🙂

Totally agree!

I used Lightroom for over a decade and have a huge huge huge LR catalog from way back .
At the time I was technically very proficient using LR and was appointed as technical go-to troubleshooter on a LR group at the time.
I made the switch to Capture One in 2017 when I started using Fuji and loved the demosaic-ing from C1.

Now I'm back to using a mix of Nikon mirrorless along with my Fuji bodies (less so the older Nikon dSLR's) so going back to LR is not entirely out of the question.

It's just such an adjustment to make another switch.