Highlight and midtone control like Luminar's capabilities

Software RawTherapee
21

If you want to strongly boost midtones & shadows, this looks decent to me. Done with Darktable.

DSC_6210
DSC_6210.NEF.xmp (4.4 KB)

22

Since you don’t care about halos and poisonous vegetation, BAMM:
DSC_6210_R

Do I like my version? Hell, no but I shot everythnig I could find at it! :japanese_ogre::japanese_goblin::space_invader::alien::robot::poop::grin:
DSC_6210.NEF.pp3 (10.6 KB)

3 Likes
23

@Halo I believe the point of your post is that you want a one-slider solution to add contrast to the highlights, and I would like that too. An “Add punch to the clouds without halos in the sky” slider.

As for the instagrammed Luminar challenge,
DSC_6210.jpg.out.pp3 (10.8 KB)

DSC_6210
DSC_62101349×900 530 KB

4 Likes
24

Thanks for your thoughts, everyone. I tried some suggestions. Some came close, but ultimately a few sliders to put contrast and color back into compressed highlights would be hugely useful I think to the majority of RT users who love the interface and control.

RT is the best raw converter I’ve ever used, and I’ve used so many the past decade and a half. I love it, and I hope sometime this feature can be built in. It would perfectly round out the program for all my needs.

25

Today I received an email promotion about upcoming Luminar 2018. I think this post of @Halo is an advertisement because this person seem to be just repeating that Luminar has what he wants and RT doesn’t. I hope @Halo (who joined this forum just a day ago) clarifies this doubt to all of us.

26

For Macphun’renown I hope no, as the processing example provided seems to me very bad and overdone.
Surely @Halo doesn’t fear halos :grinning:

1 Like
27

Easy now guys, let’s keep the accusations to a minimum. The best thing about this forum is that we welcome all people. :slight_smile:

2 Likes
28

I’m not a perfectionist, no, but I also would just be happy if I could get more color and contrast in highlights alone. I don’t need shadow boosting as much.

29

Neither me and sorry for the joke

30

Haha. I don’t plan on buying Luminar 2018 and I would discourage folks from doing so if they don’t need contrast and color boost in compressed highlights. I need it for a very, very limited number of files.

Furthermore, the program is hugely buggy on my machine, and Macphun has been less than forthcoming with a proper solution. For that reason along I will not be buying as product support for a paid product is essential for me.

If that improves markedly, then I’ll spam this board until the very end about the awesomeness of Luminar. lol

3 Likes
31

I did also try to make a result comparable with the example from @Halo.

  • First I made a neutral image" with Rawtherapee.
    DSC_6210.NEF-2.tif.out.pp3 (9.7 KB)

  • Thereafter import in GIMP 2.8 with G’MIC.

Scaled image down to 25%, because of my old pc.

Only three filters:

G’MIC>Testing>Garagecoder>Normalize brightness (garagecoder):

Normalize_Brightness_Garagecoder
Normalize_Brightness_Garagecoder1360×738 392 KB

G’MIC>Details>Tone enhance (garagecoder):

Tone_enhance_garagecoder
Tone_enhance_garagecoder1360×738 446 KB

G’MIC>Details>Local variance normalization (Jérôme Boulanger)
For a little bit sharpening.

Result:

Lumi_scaled_down
Lumi_scaled_down1843×1229 3.68 MB

1 Like
32

Also Photivo can be used to hurt the eyes:

DSC_6210_photipho
DSC_6210_photipho1844×1231 1.15 MB

I think something like Reinhard brightening is used in the Luminar example. But maybe I’m wrong.

For all people here: please forgive me for the horror. I know Halloween is over. But I like to see if I can replicate an example.

1 Like
33

At this point, it looks like an illustration that architects and city planners provide: “This will be what the waterfront will look like my fellow citizens. Now about that tax hike!”

1 Like
34

That’s actually pretty close. What were your settings in Photivo?

Also, do you find that Photivo doesn’t shift white balance well? It’s like it happens after highlight/shadow adjustment/compression.

35

For what is quickly turning into a PlayRaw, a quick spin through RT. Just a couple of sliders and a tone curve.

2017-11-03_whats-luminar
2017-11-03_whats-luminar7370×4916 7.9 MB
2017-11-03_whats-luminar.jpg.out.pp3 (10.4 KB)

FWIW, isn’t HDR the normal approach for getting loud colors out of the darker areas?

36

:boom:

imgur-2017_11_04-11:11:54
imgur-2017_11_04-11:11:541916×607 325 KB

2 Likes
37

I actually didn’t use Photivo for a more then a year. I did a very quick edit (few minutes). I only did pay attention to the glowing grass and palm tree leaves and even lighting of the quay wall and the same kind of color and lighting of the green grass and the green in the water.(because in my G’MIC edit there is clearly not a balanced lighting of this wall, also the green is different in my G’MIC example). But… I didn’t pay much attention to the color balance (in Photivo). I didn’t also not a reset in Photivo, before editing. I used Photivo because I remembered the Reinhard brightening. With that I could make the radioactive green glowing grass.

I will do another try later on (with Photivo). But I think I can’t come that close as Morgan Hardwood did here just above.