Today I found a severe problem, that affects all my pictures that I have converted using PureRaw 4:
When DxO PR4 processes my camera RAW files for exporting DNG files (on my Mac) I get DNG’s in the P3 color space —> WTFFFFFF DxO!!! What do you guys drink during work???
When DxO PR4 processes my camera RAW files for exporting JPG files (on my Mac) I get JPG’s in the AdobeRGB color space —> WTFFFFFF DxO!!! What do you guys have in your head during work???
Please correct this failure asap, otherwise your product can be considered as broken and I would like to get a refund.
Besides all the RAW files that I already have deleted after the conversion which I can not bring back!!!
Unbelieveable!!! Really unbelieveable!!! A company that is advertising with the best color conversion and processing does not have a consisten product and quality test process.
EDIT: On Windows DxO PR4 generates DNG’s in the sRGB color space. I really don’t know what to say anymore …and JPG’s are „uncalibrated“ and there is no color space defined in the EXIF file.
This is mostly a user forum and bugs need to be filed directly to DxO and not posted here, not to be missed by DxO staff.
And for the future remember to never ever delete any raw files.
2 Likes
stuck
(Canon, PL7+FP7+VP3 on Win 10 + GTX 1050ti)
3
Please note this is a user forum. While DxO might read your post, they are unlikely to respond to it. To express you frustration to DxO you must submit a support request via this page: https://support.dxo.com/hc/en-us/requests/new
Meanwhile, I don’t have PureRAW so I am not familiar with the Export process in that application but in PhotoLab when you export:
a DNG, choice of ICC profile is not available, i.e. you can apply whatever profile you wish so when you reopen the file in another application you can still decide on the colour space for the image.
a JPEG or TIFF, you can choose which ICC profile is embedded in the exported file.
The implications of these two points are:
a) your DNGs are in P3 colour space because whatever application you are opening them in is using P3 as its working colour space
b) your JPEGs are in Adobe RGB because you have not noticed that was the colour space set in the Export dialog.
HOWEVER, as already stated, I don’t have PureRAW, only PL, so I may be completely mistaken in what I’ve said.
Hopefully another PureRAW user can give you more definitive answers.
Sorry to say, but maybe you have no bug because you didn’t understand the purpose of linear DNG files or even what linear DNG files are.
Linear DNG ≠ DNG
Because linear DNG’s are not anymore „RAW“ files. Linear DNG’s are already calculated for a particular color space and the color space is written into the EXIF files. And if you check it with EXIF Tools, then you will see that there is already a color space defined.
There is no option anymore for the viewer to decide how it would like to render it. The reason is quite simple: Because DxO PR has calculated an image where each pixel is calculated with its RGB values. And as soon as you do this (basically the demosaicing step) you need to map the pixel values (which I assume are 16 Bit in PR’s linear DNG case) to a certain color space. At least a working color space (e.g. ProPhoto etc.). So you need a reference for these RGB values. And therefore you need a color space. And therefore the preview app can not choose anymore in what color-space it would like to display the photo.
So I think with your post you just have acknowledged that you also have the bug.
And
many applications use P3 color space by default to render DNG file
is simply not correct. „Only“ Apple is using this weird color space which can be labeled as „display only color space“. P3 has absolutely no meaning or importance in the photography world. Neither in print, nor in soft proof and not even for the camera manufacturers.
Which colour spaces do you expect to get in these cases?
Stenis
(Sten-Åke Sändh (Sony, Win 11, PL 6, CO 16, PM Plus 6, XnView))
8
That is not true at all - quite the opposite I would say. I am pretty surprised to read something like that 2025 with all these miljons of iphone-photographers out in the world. Or is photography for you just something done with system-cameras configured for Adobe RGB?
I have prepared both files for display and prints with my Display P3 calibrated monitor on my Windows 11-computer several years now of several reasons. For the first I happen not to like the “blue” preponderance of Adobe RGB at all. I prefer the more “natural bias” of Display P3 over Adobe RGB. For the second I have standardized on one single color space instead of two which eliminates the confusion users often are facing that have problems to keep order on their files and filesystem. Maybe the most common mistake in printing is poor control of ICC in the files resulting not just in poor printing results but also a lot of confusion.
If you are doing your own printing you can print in the color space of your liking. Some even print in ProPhoto despite it is far wider than needed for prints and printers. I print in Display P3 because it is far more efficient for me to use one single standardized ICC-workflow than two or more and gives me much less problems to handle compared if I should have used sRGB plus Adobe RGB. I even use P on my Samsung TV and even on all pictures I upload to the internet in the things I publish without any problems. The days when sRGB was the only sensible choice for monitors/displays are since long gone. The only case for me when Adobe RGB would make sense is when outsourcing printing to print shops.
I hear several voices repeating what always is repeated in cases like this but that doesn´t make it is more “RIGHT” because of that. It is just a sign of the square like conformism that is so common when people stops to think for themselves what might be a better solution even for others than me. There is not anything like “one solution fits all” even in printing today.
All people using Apple-devices and monitors and are printing by themselves ought to test to print in Display P3 too, just to avoid the dubble job in converting their files to Adobe RGB, because that is absolutely not necessary. As a spin off you will never end up confusing sRGB for Adobe RGB or vise versa.
Stenis
(Sten-Åke Sändh (Sony, Win 11, PL 6, CO 16, PM Plus 6, XnView))
9
… and P3 is not just P3 but also Display P3 which happen to be a little bit different. P3 is cinema related but Display P3 has a wider use than that, hasn´t it?
stuck
(Canon, PL7+FP7+VP3 on Win 10 + GTX 1050ti)
10
I’m not an expert but my understanding is that when people just say, “P3”, they are being sloppy in their language because they are not making it clear if they mean:
‘DCI-P3’, which is the colour space as originally defined
or
‘Display P3’, which is a variant developed by Apple
Just for my curiousity: why does the DNG color space matter? Shouldn’t the DNG processor be able to convert whatever color space the DNG is in to the output color space? P3 (whatever variant) is pretty wide and 16bit has high accuracy, so there shouldn’t be any visible quality loss in the process.
For example exporting a DNG with Lightroom, I can still pick the color space. Also it is not displayed in P3 but using the right monitor profile.
For linear DNG I would expect either ProPhoto RGB (or eventually DxO WideGamut, but not preferred) or AdobeRGB (if DxO is consistent with their color science story and beeing able to convert colors in a way that they avoid clipping).
For the JPG format there is only sRGB possible and usefull. Anything else for a 8-Bit format dosn’t make any sense. And the purpose of exporting JPG’s out of DxO PureRaw is mainly for publishing/sharing directly without any further post processing.
Why do you expect that. If one accepts the existence of different color spaces why is that important. Just take care that the working color space is bigger as the destination color space. For that reason P3 in whatever notation is ok.
My friend, we are in the photo world here!
Not video.
DCI-P3 is useless for any photo related task. It just looks nice on your Mac, looks better in the Apple marketing becuase they are „different“ and you feel better due to this. While, at the same time, not having an idea which color space you are looking at when you are browsing trough the internet.
And Display P3 is nothing else than DCI-P3 with a D65 white balance.
Any „P3“ color space is only there for Displays and therefore for „shining“ or „illuminated“ colors, as P3 color space is easier to manufacture than a display with AdobeRGB color space.
AdobeRGB color space is covering more of the „printable“ colors and therefore colors which are visible based on a reflective and non illuminted medium → Paper.
The color space for exporting linear DNG’s from DxO PureRaw matters, because (as described in one of my previous posts) the data is demosaiced and not „raw“ anymore. This means the values needs to be mapped to a particular color space. And because DxO PR4 is just a tool that is dooing the Demosaicing and De-Noising, you want a linear DNG file with a color space as wide as possible so that you can further edit and process it without any loss of data and relation between the colors.
And unfortunately in DxO PR4 i can not choose which color space should be used for the export.
→ Because I don’t want DxO-PR4 shrinking my data on a smaller color space and cutting or clipping away the colors and the fine nuances between the colors (especially for soft color gradients). The linear DNG coming out from DxO-PR4 is just an intermediate file that needs to be further processed and then at the end you are exporting a JPG with a sRGB color profile or a TIFF with a AdobeRGB color profile limited to the printable colors that the target printer + paper combination supports.
George please google a little bit and check color spaces and printer color spaces. Then you will understand that P3 is useless for photo.
I think you are missing some basics and it is getting hard here to give an overview about color models, color spaces, sampling schemes, bit width, container formats etc…
I think it’s a misconception that a bigger color space gives a better result. On the contrary. The more difference in gamut between working color space and output color space the more problems you get.
The nuances between colors are more dependent on the bit depth. I mentioned several times before but the larger the color space the larger the minimal steps are, with an equal bit dept.
And what you see is always in the monitors color space.
…and JPG’s are „uncalibrated“ and there is no color space defined in the EXIF file.