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RAW Convertors as Plug-ins
I’ve still not had time to sit down and analyse the editing plug-in SDK properly, but as far as I know the plug-in can request the RAW file, not just an Aperture-rendered TIFF.
In theory, this means that camera manufacturers could write their own plug-ins for Aperture using their own RAW conversion code.
We’d still be dealing with TIFFs instead of parametric Versions, but it would be a lot easier than exporting a RAW file, converting it in the manufacturer’s software, importing the resulting file back into Aperture and manually stacking it with the original...
I know that the editing SDK allows programmers to write custom tags back to the original image or retrieve metadata (such as the version ID) from the original. So it might even be possible to re-edit an image via a plug-in without making cumulative adjustments to the image - the plug-in could read metadata that it embedded in the TIFF, grab the RAW data from the original again and do the conversion from scratch with the same settings.
On the other hand I can see a few problems - what would happen once the file had been through the hands of several plug-ins from different companies, and would any of the camera manufacturer’s be prepared to write plug-ins? Nikon’s Photoshop plug-in for NEFs suggests that it might be possible, but I’m not getting my hopes up...
Ian
I really can't see this ever happening - there's no logic to implementing your own RAW converter for each plugin.
It would be nice if some plugins such as noise ninja were like Bibble plugins - adjustment blocks in the normal workflow, rather than a convert to TIF external editor type plugin. That would work well.
Unless they share the same RAW recipe what you suggest would not be practical. Even if you can hand the raw file to a plugin, and that plugin process the file with it own raw recipe, when it come back to Aperture it will have to be as a TIFF. Just because too may cook spoils the soup... too many raw recipe been discarded as they get pass from plugin to plugin.
I do not mind the NIK software plugins be the way the are. Maybe a "smart filter" or some type of layer would be nice but that would be getting into Photoshop domain. And if ain't broke, don't fix it.
The only plugin I would love to see working in the "raw" would be the dodge and burn that is already part of Aperture. I don't wee why Apple could integrate that into their raw workflow.
For the rest of the plugin, they are fine as they are right now.
You both don't really get it, or? Ian did not ask for all or most plugins to be raw converters but for all those raw converters which exist as separate programs (a single digit number probably) like Capture NX to become plugins.
What you want is one the one hand real-time processing (to avoid the tiff) and access for the plugin to a very 'raw' rectilinear image. You don't need access to the raw file for either. Real-time processing makes a lot of sense in the raw processing stage but it also makes a lot of sense for numerous other image manipulations.
Obviously I didn't write clearly. :-(
I wasn't talking about other RAW convertors being integrated into every plug-in, that would be insane.
Enough people ask on the various Aperture lists about easier ways to integrate the conversion results of CaptureNX or DPP in the cases that they want to process a few images using a different convertor, that I wondered about the possibilities of third-party RAW conversion via the editing SDK. For the people that do this, exporting the Master, converting to TIFF outside Aperture and then imprting the results is not a good workflow compared to the automatic stacking etc. of using a plug-in. That was all.
Obviously this would result in a TIFF, or I wouldn't have written 'We’d still be dealing with TIFFs'...
Ian
I think we should all just go to the Aperture feedback page and start requesting a mechanism for raw conversions like the new DNG profile capability (the profiles work for both manufacturer's RAW formats as well as DNG). My preliminary testing shows that the beta profiles for Canon and Nikon mimic or duplicate the result of the native RAW converters when used with DNG 4.5 or Lightroom. I would love to see this kind of thing for Apple's CoreImage RAW conversion engine or better yet... How about CoreImage plug-in's so that anyone (including the mfgr) could supply the raw converter and feature sets.
Take a gander...
[urlhttp://www.rwboyer.com/RB_Design/Blog/Entries/2008/8/10_Adobe_Lightroom2_and_DNG_camera_profiles.html[/url]
RB
ooops...
[url]http://www.rwboyer.com/RB_Design/Blog/Entries/2008/8/10_Adobe_Lightroom2_and_DNG_camera_profiles.html[/url]
Sorry bout that.
RB
Sorry Ian, I misunderstood. If I remember correctly, I heard Joe Schorr said that it was possible. I am going to see if I can find out the podcast. I would love to be able to use Capture NX once in a while.
I'd love to see somebody do this, particularly given the glacial speed at which Apple supports new cameras. The D700 has been shipping for nine weeks and still isn't supported. What are these people thinking?
>> The D700 has been shipping for nine weeks and still isn't supported.
Yikes.
AFter I bought my D300, I got so tired of waiting for Aperture support that I went out and bought Lightroom and switched to it for a couple months. Apple loses photographers with this kind of schedule.
(Then I missed Aperture and switched back when it finally supported the D300.)
Okay, I'm off topic here.
Andreas, checkout the Aperture USer Group website and you will find a solution to your D700 situation.
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