And this is also problematical: "Linear capture has important implications for exposure. If a camera captures six stops of dynamic range, half of the 4,096 levels are devoted to the brightest stop, half of the remainder (1,024 levels) are devoted to the next stop, half of the remainder (512 levels) are devoted to the next stop, and so on. The darkest stop, the extreme shadows, is represented by only 64 levels—as shown above."
This ignores the fact that cameras almost always have enough noise to properly dither the ADC inputs. Maybe in Bruce's day, they didn't, but I doubt it, since in his day were were mostly talking about CCDs with off-sensor ADCs.
I remember Mike Collette used a similar approach in one of his introduction to raw capture talks. I approached him about it, and he said that it wasn't really germane, but provided motivation to give generous exposure, which is what the takeaway should be. "Hmph," I replied.
True. On a funny note, 6 is not the same as 5 (p.2, fig. of linear distribution vs. gamma-corrected distribution). Those and other raw things in the article were pointed out to Bruce and Adobe many years ago, but...
You're entitled to call them as you see them. I've watched scientific and technical experts argue over a great many things — but that's not really helpful to a beginner.
What is helpful are experts able to write and present concepts in a manner which is easily understandable to non-experts.
“It can scarcely be denied that the supreme goal of all theory is to make the irreducible basic elements as simple and as few as possible without having to surrender the adequate representation of a single datum of experience.” Einstein.
I work with the raw file in Lightroom Classic. That experience, over time with thousands of repetitions, has informed how I interpret and use the JPEG preview image and histogram as references in the field.
How would RawDigger contribute to that goal in a way that my current workflow does not?
I'm intentionally framing this within the context of the photography I do. If you or others find that app a useful tool in your respective workflows, I've no desire to challenge that. My sole objective, here, is to better understand whether or not RawDigger has any potential benefit to me.
I'm confident the workflow I've developed does well at supporting my overarching goal of making a pleasing, high-quality image. While I'm skeptical RawDigger would make a significant contribution to that effort, I'm open to being persuaded otherwise.
The only way to tell if it's going to help you is to try it. take a file that you think is perfectly ETTR. Look at it in RawDigger. Is there extra headroom? How much? Is there clipping?
Could be, but since this is a beginners area, they can find some basic concepts which are written and illustrated in a manner they can understand pretty easily. Errors are not all of the same degree of importance and range from minor to major. Some will attempt to make mountains from molehills in that regard, but that's life.
If you're aware of something which needs to be corrected, you can always let the author know.
I do not find LrC's histogram very useful. It does not tell me much about raw data but about the modified image, image modified by selected profile, WB, etc.
Rawdigger's histogram tells me about the raw data. I need the information about the raw data to find the optimal exposure in a sequence of images and to locate if and where the highlights are blown and where LrC will attempt to reconstruct the data using unclipped channels.
The problem is that it contains wrong information that will misinform beginners (e.g., the chapter about diffraction). According to the discussion on DPR, the author has been repeatedly informed about the errors without taking action.
