D70S unfaithful colour reproduction

[DVEous]

... Obsolete ...

[MCWB]

It seems there are some colours that just aren't reproduced well by digital cameras. Deep purple springs immediately to mind, I haven't experienced it (nor really looked) at brown, but it may be a similar thing.

[Alpha_7]

Does the D70s overstaturate the Reds like the D70, that possibly isn't helping as I'd imagine there is a fair bit of red in the browns.

[DVEous]

... Obsolete ...

[digitor]

Have you tried raw converters other than the Adobe ones? Colours look a bit different (particularly reds) with different converters in my experience. IR contamination can also change the rendering of colours under some circumstances.

Cheers

[MCWB]

If other bodies have these reproduction issues, then I'll learn to accept this major flaw.

They do. It's the same on my D70, D200 and Canon A80, and my wife's Sony Cybershot and Casio thingos. If I were to guess, it would be because these colours have a large amount of red in them, which when put through the white balance algorithm somehow stuffs things up.

[olrac]

VK4CP

You can profile your camera in Lightroom. This may help shorten your PP time.


http://lightroom-news.com/2007/03/28/camera-calibration-panel-tips/

[christiand]

Hi,

my 20 cents:
quite a while ago I took a photo of a purple fringed lilly (Australian native bush flower ) using my D70 - and the first shot turned to be a BLUE lilly.
I then did a manual white balance using a white sheet of paper and took another photo.
This time I got the PURPLE photo of the fringed lilly - just as it should have been.
You may be experiencing a white balance issue.

HTH,
CD

[Matt. K]

Are these colour differences appearing on the monitor or on the prints?

[gstark]

I'd say a combination of wb and perhaps colour space.

[Onyx]

It's the red channel (over)sensitivity.
Purple = blue and red. When the red channel blows, you're left with blue. Upping the exposure only ups the blues (as the red has topped out), and hence unfaithful reproduction. In camera histogram only shows luminosity, so you won't detect that the red is blown (as it's easily prone to do).

Trim it back 1 stop and you'll have a better base to work off. ie. set -1EV in camera for any images featuring predominantly purples, maroons or reds and you'll find the reds won't be blown, and work the overall image's exposure from there.

I'd post samples to illustrate, but I'm away from home...