Pixtus - Photography Forum, Photographers, Photo Tips

srwatters · **Capture One Digital Workflow Software -** 07-01-2009, 11:29 PM

Who is using it and what do you think about it?

Mostly interested in comments on the current version (4.8.1) on the Mac platform, but tell me what you think?

Pretty pricey for a RAW developer, but adding the batch processing, tethered capture, and library functions, it might be worth it.

Discuss...

The Loft Studios · 07-02-2009, 12:05 AM

Definitely worth every penny.....

jeffkohn · 07-02-2009, 12:15 AM

I gave 4.8.1 a try. I didn't like it at all. I guess I just find the whole paradigm of the workflow non-intuitive compared to what I'm used to. Their way of copying settings from one file to another is downright clunky compared to Bridge/ACR, and I use that feature a lot.

Also, the file browser is extremely primitive. There's no useful filtering. Being able to filter based on EXIF and other metadata in Bridge is extremely useful for my workflow. For instance, I might shoot a bracketed set of images for a pano, and with bridge I can filter on exposure time to work with the images from each bracket as a set when applying ACR settings. I couldn't find a way to do that in C1.

I do think the demosaicing is better than ACR on high-ISO Nikon images; ACR has some built-in noise reduction that can't be disabled. But for low-ISO images I haven't found any difference in demosaicing quality. Color rendition is good, but no better than my custom ACR profile using DNG Profile Editor. I find the tonal controls in ACR better than C1, but that probably comes down to what I'm used to.

The pro version supports tethered shooting, I can see how that would be useful for some photogs in a studio but it's of no interest to me.

billbunton · 07-02-2009, 04:45 AM

I've used C1 off and on since its inception. Early on there was a period when they couldn't do yellow right (I mean, yellows were absolutely horrible!). Aside from that I've always sort of liked their demosaicing. Their workflow has always been absolutely awful.

These days I wouldn't think they're worth it, unless you need the tethering, or shoot one of the cameras ACR/LR has real problems with (i.e. Sony A900). 'Course, I bought it back in the day when your choices were pretty much DPP/NC or C1 and 4.x is my last free version upgrade off that initial purchase :-)

Scott, have you tried Raw Developer? I think overall it does just as good a job on raw conversion, though it does a better job of preserving detail, the workflow isn't any worse, and it's a lot cheaper.

srwatters · 07-02-2009, 09:42 AM

There were quite a few users in the demo that I attended and all of them were asking for better browser tagging and filtering options. I think they will get there since Phase One appears to be listening to the users. I'm perhaps a bit unique in that I rarely will process more than two images from each set that I shoot. I'm looking for the one killer image and that's all that I need.

The main reason I'm looking at C1 is to match to a Phase One P25 digital back. Hopefully later this summer I'll be picking one of those up for my Hassy. It would be nice if I could use the same workflow both the Nikon and P25. Once I get some RAW files from the P25 and evaluate ACR vs. C1, I'll know which I will end up going with.

Thanks for your opinions and I'll have to check out Raw Developer.

Joe_Lorenzini · 07-02-2009, 11:00 AM

I'll let you know. I get to crack it open for the first time when the M8.2 gets here tomorrow.

d2creative · 07-02-2009, 11:17 AM

I've used it a couple times but I just can't like it.
Its standard raw processing is awesome, i'll give it that.
But with software like Lightroom, I just can't imagine using it. Lightroom makes everything so easy, so quick, it's so intuitive and it can do so much in one software package, that it makes the TINY difference in raw processing goodness not worth it to me.
I wish that somehow they two softwares could be combined, but until that happens, I'll stick with Lightroom.