When we open a RAW file in RT, the first thing that happens is the image is demosaic’d. Since the color accuracy of the demosaic’d image isn’t precise, “Color Management” is applied. We can see this if we turn off “Color Management” and look at just the base RAW demosaic’d. It’s pretty ugly. So it’s clear something needs to be done.
In principal, “Color Management” fine-tunes the colors to match a known standard. Each sensor can have a slightly different color cast that needs a different set of corrections to get to a known state/starting point. But .dcp files can provide more than accurate color matching, including giving us a starting point on curves (Tone Curve) as well as some kind of color grade (Look Table).
Because .dcp can include so much, in practice, there are subtle/not so subtle differences between various .dcp. Here’s what I understand.
RT “Camera Standard” is a generalized correction that may “work” OK if you’re not trying to, say, match colors from different sensors (ie: retaining a common “look” across various sensors). It’s a pretty good starting point, particularly when we apply things like “Film Simulations” or strong “Curves”.
Camera specific .dcp can match to a color standard, and, as you know from all the previous discussion here, there are details/differences between various .dcp. For instance, if we look at now Adobe lays out their directory structure for the .dcp files we see it’s broken into two. One directory contains “Adobe Standard” .dcp file, one file per camera model. The other is “Camera” where specific camera models are organized as their own sub-directories.
“Adobe Standard” .dcp specifies a tone curve, base table, two point luminance (tungsten and daylight), and “look” that the RentWare has themselves developed. If you have different cameras/sensors, this might be one way to get a common look/feel between systems. For example, Canon DSLR output and Sony mirrorless can be easily made to match using these .dcp. Only you can decide if that’s important to you or not.
On the “Camera” specific sub-directory side, we see several .dcp files in each sub-directory. These are the RentWare’s attempt to match various “styles” or “looks” offered by the camera manufacturer, such as Vivid, Clear, Neutral, etc, and they can use the in-camera jpg as further reference. The jpg reference is “Baseline Exposure”, but since it is not integrated in RT, I never select it as it only makes my images too dark. The selection seems to work only in RentWare.
I got to thinking about all this after someone asked about how to achieve Hasselblad’s “Natural” colors outside Hasselblad’s system of software. Foccus uses .xml files to define colors, including their “Natural” color grade. I couldn’t find an easy way to convert .xml to .dcp to try and emulate the color grade in RT. BUT, I find that the “Adobe Standard” with all the boxes ticked except “Baseline Exposure” comes really really close to matching Hasselblad’s “Natural” colors.
Coming back to RT and .dcp, one of the really great things about RT is that once I’ve sorted out the base settings for demosaic algorithm, color management (Tone Curve, Base Table, Look Table selected), lens, Capture Sharpen (or not), vignetting, “Curves” (I always use “Luminance” to avoid color shift/distortion), the selections are saved as an RT Profile, meaningfully named, of course, so I know which to select in the future. In this way I only have to sort stuff out once and I’m “good to go.” I’ve gone as far as to write a set of RT Profiles, one file each for every .dcp available to me, so if I really want, say, Sony “Vivid” on an A6000, I can quickly grab the Profile and start processing from there.
I hope this helps. Yes, I know I haven’t said anything the other’s haven’t already said. But I hope the organization of what I wrote gets you to the kind of clarity (harumph!) you’re looking for.