Remind me please?

[rondo]

can someone remind me the name of the RAW developer that the GRD3 came with?
I don't think anyone ever used the thing, but still curious.
As I also don't happen to have the CD anymore, any place I can download it from?
Thanks!
edit: it wasn't silkypix...maybe i am confusing it with an image manager program that came with the CD. it was solely for Ricoh cameras.

 

[pappa]

ricoh use dng files that are opensource so you can use whatever application you want without problem.

 

[rondo]

thank you...of course, i realize that.
but i am interested the software that was specifically designed for Ricoh. I also remember that it pretty much sucked.
I just need it for another purpose--long story, but i don't need it for editting RAW files, thank you.
(If anyone has their original CD, it was written on the label)

 

[odklizec]

Hi rondo,

It was called Irodio Photo & Video Studio. But if I could suggest you something, forget it This photo editor is practically useless. I seriously doubt there is any "Ricoh-specific" optimization done in this piece of SW.

 

[rondo]

Pavel many thanks..I remember it being terrible too.
Long story, but why not...

Have you ever tried to convert DNGs with Adobe's DNG converter? I thought it was safest thing to do: after all converting from older version of DNG to the new DNG sounds like a safe operation. Apparently not!
I ended up destroying the "maker notes" of my DNG tags thanks to adobe coverter 8.2.
I was very happy to save huge amount of disk space until exiftool gave me an error. Not sure if in practical sense, the "corruption" would make any difference. with adobe software, rawtherapee, silkypix etc the converted DNG files seem fine...
the only way to find the extent of damage is to use it with ricoh specific software and see how it behaves.
then again maybe this irodio thing is not solely developed for ricoh. in that case i wouldn't bother checking...
thanks again.
ps.
I believe the new Ricoh GR DNGs already are lossy! they vary in size from image to image. Unlike the GRD3 files, which always had the same amount of bytes.

 

[odklizec]

Ahh yes, I've read about your incident with DNG converter at DPReview forum. Unfortuantely yes, DNG converter messes up/deletes/does not save the maker notes in the output DNG. I doubt this irodio will show you anything useful. I think you don't need to worry about the lost maker notes. They are good for Ricoh support and if you want to find something interesting in them (if you know what to look for and how to decode these data). But they are most probably not critical for image editing in Silkypix, Lightroom and other editors.

As for the GR DNG, yes, I noticed the size of GR DNG files vary. But it does not automatically mean there is used lossy compression! As far as I know, DNG supports also loss-less compression (ZIP and JPEG-based). So there is always a chance they use these lossless compression techniques. Also here, I think there is nothing to worry about. DPReview GR test showed an outstanding DR performance and highlight recover possibilities! And many GR photos floating around the internet showed how great pictures can GR take. And that's what counts

 

[rondo]

Thanks pavel. you make sense.
I am shocked at the quality of GR. Finally that amazing user interface and great quality lens gets the right sensor!
Still I need more time with the camera, though...As familiar as I am with GRDs I think this requires somewhat a different approach.

 

[odklizec]

I have an update regarding the GR DNG compression. While testing the corrupted GR DNGs, mentioned in another thread, I also checked their EXIF data and I found an interesting piece of information regarding the DNG compression. It indeed appears that the GR DNGs are compressed with JPEG-based compression! There is a section of EXIF data containing some information about full-resolution image and there is also a "Compression" tag, which says "JPEG". The same tag saved in GXR A16 and GRDIV DNG files says "Uncompressed". So it seems that the GR DNG data are compressed with lossy JPEG algorithm. On a positive note, I would not be so scared about lossy compression. See for example this test...
http://francoismalan.com/2011/10/raw-12 ... -lossless/
There is a very little visible difference between 12/14bit and lossy/lossless photos. Even the DPReview GR test says so. So I personally think that saved card/HDD space is greatly welcome, even at a cost of some lost image data.

 

[rondo]

Thank you Pavel, for this very interesting information. Well, we know that raw stopped being raw long time ago...I think it is an acceptabe trade off myself, but why not give the option to choose?
I just read the latest findings on the circles in the shadow thread...looks like yet another example of manipulated raw files. We knew about noise reduction too...I wonder if there are other hidden corrective mechanisms at work. With faster processors it is possible to bake all these to the raw files. Looks like We will never know what the sensor and lens initially captured..oh well....I guess we cannot get all at once: small camera with large sensor, small lens assembly (the gr lens is actually smaller in length than the GRD) there must the a price to pay...