Has anyone used Xrite Passport or QPCard to profile camera?

[benny_spinoza]

<p>Just curious about these products. Do users find that they make a difference? Right now, the software for generating camera profiles only works for Lightroom or Adobe Camera Raw, but the QP website indicates that they may release versions of their software for Phocus and CaptureOne. I use the latter, but LR sure looks interesting, especially now that its price has been cut.</p>

[peter_cohen]

<p>I use the Passport and it's great with Lightroom 4. Significant differences.</p>

[scott_ferris]

<p>Benny,</p>

<p>I use it in LightRoom, though I find it often fails to recognize the patches automatically and I do it in the stand alone program, that creates profiles from DNG's so any program that can read DNG's should be able to read the profiles. It works very well and gives very good colours. I originally got it for reproducing artwork for artists and the colour accuracy was very important.</p>

<p>I really like LightRoom and have done since version 2 when I swapped from Apple's Aperture.</p>

<p>Here is a before and after camera profile using the X-Rite Passport, it is profiled but not white balanced, that is another beauty of it, you can get WB absolutely consistent.</p><div></div>

[robert_martin5]

<p>I have X-Rite's Passport and have used it to generate profiles for my D700 for Adobe Camera RAW in Photoshop. I also use Adobe's DNG Profile Editor to generate profiles using images of the Passport or ColorChecker. I like the DNG Profile Editor better since you have more options in generating the profile - you can adjust individual colors, which is not available in the Passport software. Adobe's DNG Profile Editor software is free and available on the Adobe Labs site. The current DNG Profile Editor does not allow you to edit the version 4 profiles, but Adobe is working on a new release. </p>

[digitaldog]

<p>I’ll second the other comments that this is a useful product and process. Note that IF you already own a Macbeth 24 patch target, you’re set and can download and use the Passport software for free. </p>

<p>I’ve never had any issues with the software recognizing patches, on the Mac at least. You DO need to use the standalone package to build a dual illuminant profile which can be useful and used most of the time (Daylight+Tungsten). I don’t find the need to build lots of these profiles, for example one for each setup. For odd illuminants like Fluorescent or metal halide, sure, take a shot and build a custom profile. Otherwise a good dual illuminant will do the job well for most images shot under differing daylight/tungsten conditions. And of course you can edit these profiles with the Adobe DNG profile editor. </p>

[Kent Shafer]

<p>A very basic question for which I apologize: To use the Passport software, must one convert raw files to DNG before processing them in Lightroom, or will the profiles work with the native camera raw format (Nikon in my case)?</p>

[scott_ferris]

<p>Kent,</p>

<p>It only works with DNG's, but in the Lightroom plugin it is 100% automatic, just choose a RAW file of the patches and it does it all itself.</p>

[peter_cohen]

<p>And if you don't want to use the LR plugin, you export as a DNG (it's already a preset in LR) and just drop that into XRite's profiler. The whole process takes less than a minute. Note that your exposure must be good for the software to work. If you have blown-out highlights in your color checker image, you will not be able to create a profile. If somebody's found a way around this, I'd love to know how.</p>

[digitaldog]

<p>A DNG is generated for the plug-in (or you save a DNG for editing in DNG profile editor) but the resulting DNG profile can be used with supported proprietary raws that ACR/LR support. </p>

[Kent Shafer]

<p>Thanks all. Andrew, that's exactly what I wanted to know—whether using this system would entail a commitment to converting every image to DNG. I'm glad to hear it wouldn't.</p>

[scott_ferris]

<p>Kent,</p>

<p>Yes, I see what you meant now. It has to create the profile from a DNG originally but that created profile is a .dcp file, that file/profile can be used on any RAW format file via any software that recognises it, including ACR and Ligthroom.</p>

<p>Once you have your profiles they work directly on any (all that I know though maybe not Fuji or some other unusual types) RAW format natively.</p>

[benny_spinoza]

<p>Thanks for all or your responses. I'm still a newbie at digital image capture...but I'm having fun learning about RAW converters and the various tools available for color rendering. I already have purchased CaptureOne, so I'm waiting for the day when Xrite or QPCard ports their product to the CaptureOne software. By the way...w/o using Xrite or QPCard, I'm finding that the color balance is more accurate in CaptureOne than my trial version of Lightroom. Perhaps Xrite Passport or QPCard generated profiles for Lightroom would "even the score"?</p>