Procedure for generating profile

[philsexton]

I have downloaded the profile target.
Should I print it and take a picture of it?
Or should I take a picture of it on my monitor screen.
Having taken the picture, should I make it into a grayscale? Or should I keep it as a full RGB?
Should I try to match the RGB numbers of the image to the numbers printed on the squares?
Should I just do a rough measurement on the midrange box and then start the automatic fine tuning?
Will the resulting profile be "best" for all shots taken with the same ISO? Or will I get better results by profiling each image independently?

[NITeam]

I have downloaded the profile target.
Should I print it and take a picture of it?

You can either print it and then shot it OR just shot it on the screen.

Having taken the picture, should I make it into a grayscale?

No, there is nothing like that in the instruction.

Should I try to match the RGB numbers of the image to the numbers printed on the squares?

No, you don't need to do that.

Should I just do a rough measurement on the midrange box and then start the automatic fine tuning?

Right. You can do the fine-tuning in this way, or you can do it manually.

Will the resulting profile be "best" for all shots taken with the same ISO? Or will I get better results by profiling each image independently?

The profile will not be the best but good enough for all shots taken with the same ISO. For the best result you need to build a new profile for particular image. However, the generic profile built with the calibration target is good enough most of the time.

Please check the user guide (part related to building profiles) for additional information.

Hope this helps.

Vlad

[philsexton]

Let me add some complexity.
Suppose that I typically use a standard sharpening and color intensifying scheme on (almost) every shot. Is it better to develop profiles for the image just out of the camera and *then* apply sharpening and intensifying? OR is it better to do the sharpening and intensifying and *then* generate a Neat Image profile?

[NITeam]

Depends on several things..
Please take a look at this thread where a similar question was raised recently: http://www.neatimage.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=27

Vlad

[taob]

Here's my take on the matter: in any kind of digital sample, you have signal and you have noise. Presumably, you want to boost the signal and eliminate the noise. Operations that enhance the image (such as sharpening, saturation, levels, etc.) tend not to differentiate between the signal and the noise. I prefer the eliminate as much of the noise as possible first, so that subsequent operations work just on the signal.

Sometimes, the noise is something I want (e.g., if I'm keeping just one of the channels, and I oversharpen to get a very gritty look), in which case running NI at all would remove the part I want to keep. But that's the exception and not the rule.

[r21]

To make a device noise profile, all i need is the ISO settings? The aperature f-stop doesn't matter? Wouldn't temperature to the CCD play a big role on my ISO settings, cause I can see a big difference in noise during the summer at ISO 200 compared to ISO 200 in the winter. Does the temp really matter? Just wondering?

[NITeam]

Regarding your first question, please check the pages 12-13 of the user guide. Yes, aperture doesn't matter much. Temperature does matter but your have no way to track it. - Camera manufacturers need to incorporate temperature sensors in their products.

Hope this helps.

Vlad