I don’t see how. If PL doesn’t support a camera you can’t open the files. And there’s no manual selection of camera or lenses.
The only way (to try) to do it would be by editing the EXIF data of the files from the monochrome camera, to make then look like they were from full colour version.
It seems going back to Adobe is the only way.
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A poor showing from DXO I think. Raw processors supporting monochrome raw files from e.g. Ricoh or Leica?
Adobe Lightroom? Yes
ON1 Photo Raw? Yes
Capture One Pro? Yes
Darktable? Yes
Can Windows render them? Yes
DXO? No.
Poor show guys, poor show.
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It is actually fairly damaging to DxO. I have two cameras that are not supported (one bayer, the other a Q2M). Because of that it is impossible to select DxO as a complete replacement for Lightroom or Capture One, and DxO is the one that will be dropped if I decide the cost or hassle of dealing with two different sets of software is no longer worth the effort.
Discussions of Bayer colour demosaicing normally miss the point. PhotoLab already handles demosaiced JPEGs and TIFFs. There is no reason why the software could not simply use the OS’s own native demosaicing software for cases where there is no explicit DxO support. I am not sure about Windows, but on macOS this would make many people very happy - it is not as if either LR or COP can use AI de-noise on Q2M files anyway, so DxO would be at no disadvantage.
This would be a very low-effort software change for DxO, since all of the most difficult mechanisms to support it are already part of the software.
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I have to say I agree, Mark.
Of course monochrome cameras are quite niche, but if the other software vendors can support them, it’s very disappointing that DXO have decided not to bother. And like you I cannot believe this would be a huge development effort.
Also like you, I’m not prepared to pay for two raw processors / editors, so unless DXO changes their policy and decides to support monochrome, I cannot use it.
… and vice versa, depending on your needs. Just choose whatever suits YOU best, np.
But that’s for basic RGB editing only. Advanced denoising and certain lens corrections are possible with raw files only (plus some color profile specifics, including WB).
You probably meant Mac decoding of raw files. I’m not sure if demosaicking is provided by Mac OS, but I’m sure DxO wouldn’t use that, unless it was written by DxO one day 
. The next processing step after decoding, i.e. demosaicking, has thousands of possible flavours, differing vastly in computational complexity, atrifacts handling like maze and moire, etc. DxO, per their white papers, uses joint demosaicking, denoising, and lens corrections algorithm, which is their secret sauce. Inevitably, it’s some kind of performance/quality “rotten compromise”. It’s all not that trivial as you seem to think.
That said, monochrome sensors do not require demosaicking in the Bayer or X-Trans sense, but still some special processing should be done for various types of lens chromatic aberrations, diffraction, and limiting other artifacts. It seems there was relatively little scientific effort done for monochromatic sensors in photography context, and there are too few users around to make a positive business decision. But who knows, maybe some day…
Oh, sancta simplicitas
The devil sits in the details…
I would agree with you, but there are many factors given above for that decission. Maybe DxO will get more easy sometime, but “I wouldn’t hold my breath”, as they say.
I was interested myself with monochromatic sensors sometime ago because I shoot a lot in poor light, but the samples didn’t convince me enough, and I still need color for most cases. Personal preferences again…
But you bought it already, didn’t you? And then you a have a so called lifetime license with about 3 years of support (about 0.5 years for C1 Pro perpetual license, to compare). So how come you cannot use it?
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No. Just trying it out on the 30-day trial.
I think it’s excellent - outstanding even - with my Leica Q2 images. But I am retired on a limited income and only shoot occasionally as a hobby. I cannot justify paying for two licences.
I think that you are missing the point. Neither LR nor COP provide anything different for monochrome cameras than PhotoLab provides for TIFF files. If DxO supported monochrome cameras then those that use such Leicas or Ricohs would be able to use DxO for everything with one workflow.
On the Mac, the OS itself provides demosaicing support that includes these monochrome cameras. I can use OS supplied applications to open the files and I can preview the RAW files in the Finder.
There are standard macOS APIs that can load and demosaic RAW files, either applying default corrections or allowing the caller to specify a wide range of options such as white balance, denoise etc. What DxO would do is to use the options to generate 16 bit or float RGB data with minimal processing, including distortion correction if they have no lens profile. After massaging the data format to match whatever they use internally, the image could then be subsequently processed using PhotoLab using the existing TIFF pathway.
Is this as good as writing a RAW decode from scratch? No. But neither is it worse than what any other software is currently doing, and would mean only one software package and workflow would be needed.
This is a huge thing for those of us who would like to use DxO but have unsupported cameras. And on macOS at least, it requires very little development effort.
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This solution that you propose is much better than no support at all. So, please Dx0, basic support for Monochrome sensor cameras.