A2S DNG files are vignetted!

[brett8883]

Of course I know this, and I know how to do it, but the whole point I am making is that I shouldn't have to go through all that manual post processing effort to correct it. The ability to handle it in Apple Photos and ACR demonstrates that it is quite possible to do it in a utility program rather than "photographing a white wall ..." and such. Unfortunately it appears that most programs utilize the DCRAW library or similar to handle raw conversion and that solution provides limited functionality, certainly in this case with this camera.

Yea well since you want to use only free software your options are very limited. More often than not you get what you pay for.

 

[sarimento1]

i've not noticed any visible vignetting in my A2S still files over the past couple weeks that I've been flying with it. Great drone.
Here is a JPG with no corrections, from DNG, as exported by Lightroom.

 

[sar104]

i've not noticed any visible vignetting in my A2S still files over the past couple weeks that I've been flying with it. Great drone.
Here is a JPG with no corrections, from DNG, as exported by Lightroom.

View attachment 128164

I think it's been established that Lightroom does the correction automatically.

 

[sarimento1]

I think it's been established that Lightroom does the correction automatically.

here's another file, opened in adobe photoshop camera raw. straight save to jpg. no corrections, vignetting scale was at "0". no sign of material vignetting.

 

[arjay3]

Film-based camera lenses don't noticeably vignette, for obvious reasons, so that's not generally true.

Oh yes many of them do.

 

[sar104]

Oh yes many of them do.

Most of them don't; it requires far more work to correct for vignette on film, and is impossible with transparencies. Which was the point of my original comment - to point out that you never had to spend thousands of dollars on a lens to avoid vignetting.

 

[sar104]

here's another file, opened in adobe photoshop camera raw. straight save to jpg. no corrections, vignetting scale was at "0". no sign of material vignetting.

View attachment 128169

Since the only raw image I've inspected was the one posted by the OP, which had obvious vignetting, I really can't comment on whether it was unique to his aircraft or more common. How about posting a raw image from your aircraft?

 

[brett8883]

here's another file, opened in adobe photoshop camera raw. straight save to jpg. no corrections, vignetting scale was at "0". no sign of material vignetting.

View attachment 128169

Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw use the same image processor. They are just different user interfaces.

The embedded profiles are automatic and not user controllable in Adobe products. They can’t be turned off.

It’s been established that Adobe products read the embedded profile and correct the vignette. You’d have to use an image processor not made by Adobe that doesn’t use the embedded profile to see the photo without the embedded vignette correction.

 

[brett8883]

Most of them don't; it requires far more work to correct for vignette on film, and is impossible with transparencies. Which was the point of my original comment - to point out that you never had to spend thousands of dollars on a lens to avoid vignetting.

The vignette is worse the larger the entrance pupil and the wider the lens. As was mentioned already even the most expensive fast ultra wide angle lens have noticeable vignette. It’s due to the extreme angle the light has to bend to get to get down the lens barrel and to the corners of the sensor/film. The only way to solve this would be with a larger lens with more glass. More glass=more money.

The DJI Air 2s has a 7mm f2.8 lens. For some perspective the Nikkor Fisheye 6mm f2.8 weighed in 12.4 lbs and cost $160,000.

 

[sar104]

The vignette is worse the larger the entrance pupil and the wider the lens. As was mentioned already even the most expensive fast ultra wide angle lens have noticeable vignette. It’s due to the extreme angle the light has to bend to get to get down the lens barrel and to the corners of the sensor/film. The only way to solve this would be with a larger lens with more glass. More glass=more money.

The DJI Air 2s has a 7mm f2.8 lens. For some perspective the Nikkor Fisheye 6mm f2.8 weighed in 12.4 lbs and cost $160,000.
View attachment 128182

That's not a valid comparison because of the difference in sensor size. The A2S lens is 22 mm equivalent, not an ultra wide. The issue with these aircraft camera lenses is geometry and weight, not cost. That, combined with the fact that with digital sensors as opposed to film, some vignetting is not a problem since it is easily corrected for.

 

[SkyeHigh]

Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw use the same image processor. They are just different user interfaces.

The embedded profiles are automatic and not user controllable in Adobe products. They can’t be turned off.

It’s been established that Adobe products read the embedded profile and correct the vignette. You’d have to use an image processor not made by Adobe that doesn’t use the embedded profile to see the photo without the embedded vignette correction.

Lightroom allows you to choose whichever profile you like AND disable them if that’s what you want to to. They are enabled by default to use the profile that matches the lens.

 

[brett8883]

Lightroom allows you to choose whichever profile you like AND disable them if that’s what you want to to. They are enabled by default to use the profile that matches the lens.

It’s a common misconception. Embedded profiles cannot be controlled in Lightroom.


The Air 2s has a fixed lens and writes directly to DNG so it has a different process for lens profiles than interchangeable lens cameras and even with those there’s a certain level of correction that cannot be controlled

 

[brett8883]

That's not a valid comparison because of the difference in sensor size. The A2S lens is 22 mm equivalent, not an ultra wide. The issue with these aircraft camera lenses is geometry and weight, not cost. That, combined with the fact that with digital sensors as opposed to film, some vignetting is not a problem since it is easily corrected for.

Btw I’m not saying it would need to be as large or expensive as the lens above on a drone I’m just saying that the wider faster lenses produce more vignette and you need a larger elements to take care of this.

It’s true that manufacturers have decreased the importance of vignetting when designing lenses for digital because it can be easily corrected but there are still physical limitations that can’t be overcome.

 

[sarimento1]

Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw use the same image processor. They are just different user interfaces.

The embedded profiles are automatic and not user controllable in Adobe products. They can’t be turned off.

It’s been established that Adobe products read the embedded profile and correct the vignette. You’d have to use an image processor not made by Adobe that doesn’t use the embedded profile to see the photo without the embedded vignette correction.

here's same image opened by different program, photopea.com. shows some vignetting. for my purpose, not severe. however, acr is just fine for my humble needs.

 

[merak75]

FWIW I've looked at dozens of RAW images taken over the last few days. I don't see any vignetting in Bridge, Lightroom or Photoshop.I do recommend DxO PureRAW for fixing DNGs before they go elsewhere, but they don't have a module for the Air 2S yet. It's coming though.

I sent in a request to DxO but still not here yet, bummer.

 

[Aroesprod02]

I long ago gave up most of my photo editing activities for various reasons, and as part of that have let my Adobe subscriptions lapse. My big issue (like for many) is the subscription cost in order to use light room and photoshop. Now that I have recently purchased my A2S, I was keenly interested in the DNG support, and using other products such as Luminar 4 or something like that to do my editing with.

However, as I start to look at the DNG files, I have discovered that they all seem to be afflicted with a readily apparent case of vignetting. I have used Luminar and I have used RawTherapee, and both seem to agree that there is a vignette on each DNG file. After researching on this board, I saw a similar thread regarding a similar problem with the MA2, and it seemed that the solution was to use Adobe Camera Raw.

To test this, I downloaded Adobe Bridge which has a crippled version of Camera Raw included and took a look at the files through there. Bridge showed me a reduced decoding of my DNGs, and indeed they look perfect - or at least they agree with the JPG files when it comes to a lack of any apparent vignette. As the Bridge version of ACR is crippled, I cannot export the decoded file as this feature is reserved for the fully licensed-ware.

All that I can I conclude then, is that in order to have these files decoded properly, I only have two choices: 1) to just use the JPG files directly as created by the A2S, which is fine for most things except for special attention shots or 2) to re-subscribe back to Creative Cloud which I really don't want to do.

Does anyone have any experience with a raw converter that aside from ACR will actually do a good job on DNG files produced by the A2S, or the MA2 for that matter?

I have the same issue than you with my Air2S and especially LuminarAI
All issues disappeared with photoscapeX!
It’s free version and very very good soft!
I’m on Mac too ?

 

[Dave Maine]

Try Affinity Photo. $50 one time purchase. It compares well with Photoshop.

 

[Aroesprod02]

Try Affinity Photo. $50 one time purchase. It compares well with Photoshop.

Thanks Dave
Are you talking with experience?, are you using it for DNG files from Air2S?
Thanks for additional feedback

 

[Dave Maine]

Not from the 2s, but from ma, p3 4K, and P4 adv. The issue resolution is really to straitenen the barrel distortion as much as you can, and then crop the ragged edges. This is what happens in the drone when it processes the raw image into the jpg. It takes some fiddling around to get it right, and each lens will take a slightly different tweak to get it right, but then it is quite repeatable from one image to the next.
DJI’s lenses are light weight and cheap, although all lenses with that wide a view will have significant distortion which requires digital processing to get close to a rectilinear images.

 

[Bobbogee]

Thanks Dave
Are you talking with experience?, are you using it for DNG files from Air2S?
Thanks for additional feedback

I have used Affinity Photo (yes, I finally spent some money!) and it does do a good job with correcting the vignette from my Air 2S. Affinity is actually quite impressive for its cost, and pretty much has all the imaging tools that you could likely want. Plus Affinity offers other products in their suite such as desktop publishing, etc and it supports PC and Mac, M1 included.

I did explore LuminarAI and it has some interesting features, but didn't really deal with vignette correction that I could see, so I moved on.

After much research, there are also tools that can be used to correct vignette, probably the best are those that require you to photograph a blank white wall with the camera and then generate a mask that is used for vignette correction. This TBH, is way beyond what most people want to get involved with, but if you want to go through all of that rigmarole, that probably works the best. However Affinity is a whole lot easier. Plus, if you keep your eyes open, they sometimes have sales (I think I paid $29 USD) for it in May of this year.

I think this is the best and cheapest way into image editing if you don't want a subscription or have to pony up $$$. The only thing I find annoying (and it's actually a legitimate design) is that when it opens a file, it creates a proprietary "edit" version of your image that you make corrections to. I guess that is similar to an Adobe PSD file. To get your final image, you "export" it.

My opinion of Affinity Photo is "strong buy"