Lack of DNG support needs to be adressed

@zkarj
Maybe we should not mix other image formats with the image file formats compliant with Adobes XMP-metadata standard. DNG-, TIFF- and JPEG-files are the formats supported in that case for now. That will just boost the confusion even more.

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While that is an undeniably correct statement, I think it is where the misunderstanding comes from.

Rather than “partial DNG support” I would say (and indeed DxO say) that PhotoLab supports RAW files from a defined list of devices, including DNG conversions of those, and the special case of DxO’s own DNG intermediary files.

In other words, the support is defined not by what it lacks but the limited scope it includes. By the same token, I would not say that PhotoLab’s ‘RGB’ support is incomplete because it does not support PNG files. I would say it only supports JPEG and TIFF.

There need be no confusion as to partial support of anything if we just read DxO’s statement on what it does support.

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Why is that a problem?
And to be a bit cynical - what does that have to do with DxOs PhotoLab?

They chose DNG as.a format a long time ago - why are you giving DxO the blame for the worlds museums decisions?
You are for sure allowed to buy or rent and use the application of choice.
And as I have used and stoped using some applications as I haven’t been happy enough or felt they lacked what I was looking for.
Thats ok. That’s life. That’s different brand positioning, different user base in which I did not felt at home or did simply did not wished to pay for functionality I didn’t use.

I didn’t really need PL 6 either - PL 5 was more than enough for me but I like PL. IT supports my workflow and give me an amazing return of quality in regard of time invested in editing.
So I felt I wished to keep supporting DxO so they can keep on delivering quality software.

Let’s hope PL 7 might offer something you might be happy about - otherwise the market is overflowing with raw converters and developers. Today it’s not difficult to find one that do work great.

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@Required
Of course it´s a problem!

I support the stance of JAmedia and I don´t think it´s too much to ask for that Photolab like Lightroom can read, open and handle even for example Vuescan DNG-files. It´s fine that Deep Prime might not work for these RGB-files. It´s highly inconvenient with exceptions and limitations like this that will force people to use several different converters. The real problem is that Photo Lab refuses to handle files at all that it doesn´t have ready made camera-profiles for.

Photolab doesn´t in general have any problems at all technically to handle serialized DNG. So why not letting people decide for themselves if they want to start their editing without any profile and the access to Deep Prime? It´s all we are asking for.

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I have written a mail to Ed Hamrick at Hamrick Software and suggested they shall cease to use the misleading RAW-expression in their Export-Tab labels when it´s not what photographers mean by RAW-data in the files of Vuescan…

Quote:
" Dear Ed,

I wrote to you earlier about the problems some RAW-converter applications like Capture One and Photolab have to handle the serialized or de mosaiced DNG-files that comes out of Vuescan. This is because limitations in these programs but there is also some semantics in the Vuescan-labels we ought to talk about.

The problem is when photographers in general are talking about RAW-files, they mean one thing and when you are talking about RAW-files in Vuescan you mean something else really. In your case a RAW is really an RGB-TIFF in a DNG-container and that is not what photographers in general mean by RAW.

In Vuescans Swedish Export-Tab labels the word “Rå” is used, I think seven times and that word means literally RAW (or unprocessed) if I translate it into English and that is not what your DNG-files are containing. So, it is misleading with the RAW-concept in Vuescan DNG because it doesn´t contain RAW-data as photographers in general see it.

If I convert a Sony ARW, I can choose to convert it as a DNG in mosaic format as a “RAW” or I can create a serialized RGB-file that is not really a RAW-based DNG with RAW-data. The differences in that data has important implications that not everyone seems to be aware of when they open it in Photolab. If the DNG-file contains “RAW-data” it will be possible to use the markets best denoise function called Deep Prime XD (that demands mosaic data) but if the data in that DNG is RGB-data, all the three variants of Deep Prime are greyed out and only the oldest and least effective denoise “High Quality” will work. HQ is the one we use for serialized DNG, ordinary TIFF-files and JPEG-files.

So, my suggestion is that you cease to use RÅ/RAW as a prefix in the Export tab of Vuescan, because that definitely makes a lot of people unnecessarily confused now and find a better expression that harmonize better with what’s actually contained in Vuescans DNG-files. In English Adobe and others are using “Serialized DNG”. That is a little technical to be understood by many. Another suggestion might be “DNG containing RGB-data”. Someone else might have a better idea but I felt I had to lift the problem."

End of Quote

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I 100% agree.

I have created a(nother) feature request to try and force DxO into bowing to popular demand and provide what most people agree should be a very simple function to introduce.

The Feature Request can be found here: Allow ALL linear DNG files to be opened and edited in the same was as JPG and TIF files

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I 100 % support!

I have voted and suggest all others who agree on this to do the same! Thank you for your initiative Keith.

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I have allready raised it with Dxo Tech sUpport (see responce in this thread) as have others. The answer was basically “not intrested”

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Dont foget this is the firm that busted itself with the one phone so forwarded sensible planning wasn’t pressent then or I fear now either.

A DNG file holds a raw file and other meta data. The meta data can include edit info etc. if the original raw file is from a camera that is not supported by PL then PL can’t open it.
Why would you think embedding that unopenable raw file in a DNG would suddenly make it readable?
If the original raw was converted in some way to make it readable then it would no longer be a raw.

Because every other app that supports DNG can open it. IT is not an “unopenable” RAW file it is just that DXO chooses not to open it if it is not in the list.of cameras supported.

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Exactly those of us, I suspect most PL users, are forced process phone DNG in other programs. Highly processable just blocked by DxO.

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Not just phone users. Virtually all the world’s museums, art galleries, collections etc use DNG. as the archive standard. This means that no matter what camera is used the same file format is used. However it is not just Cameras but scanners as well. There are Billions of old photos, documents, newspapers that have been scanned to DNG. Dxo won’t read any of these.

The “Standard” program for scanning is Vu Scan ) it is the one that Nikon recommends for their slide scanners) and is in effect the universal Scan program that works with virtually all scanners.

No, it is not practical for all the worlds museums, art galleries, collections etc to convert the billions of DNG images to another format. It just means that Dxo is excluded from a huge global market.

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Strange that strategy, as PhotoLab seems to be exactly the sort of software those mostly pedantic, systematic and nostalgic museum curators would like. I mean that in a good way. PhotoLab is still a relatively pure image processing tool, which does one job very well in a highly structured interface which lends itself to systematic work.

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Perhaps then the worlds museums could approach DxO with such a request if they have the desperate need of getting into DxO software suites.

I’m sorry if I sound harsh but repeating the museum customer base time after time and time again - is more tiresome then the actual lack of the support the repetitiveness calls for in the first place. :smiley:

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a decent museum needs the whole setup , that is delivered by the likes of https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/ not by some raw converter vendor…

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Why? They have other solutions. It is just a huge market Dxo Is turning its back on.
I haven’t updated Dxo in several versions because of the lack of DNG support and will eventually stop using Dxo

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You have to ask them about their business decisions. :slight_smile:

That is why this, and several other similar threads, exist. So that Dxo can see what the users think.

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And ignore I fear to there and our cost

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