A look at RAW conversion in DxO Optics 5.3

Image converted with DxO

I have wanted to see what goes on inside the mysterious engine of DxO Optics 5.3 so I took a test image and converted it with DxO with all the corrections off, and also converted it with UFRaw, doing my best to make them as close as possible.

Image converted with UFRaw

The image was Shot on a Nikon D40 at ISO 1600 so that there would be a reasonable amount of noise in the image to see how well DxO handles noise in the conversion.

I used bilinear interpolation in UFRaw so that I could see if DxO did anything with the pixels that came from the camera as well as filling in the gaps between pixels of the same colour.

Regions of interest in the image

The first region is an out of focus light grey area. Firstly the DxO Conversion, then the UFRaw conversion

Region 1 DxO

Region 1 UFRaw

Now just the luma for each conversion:

Region 1 DxO Luma

Region 1 UFRaw Luma

And the difference between the two luma conversions:

Region 1 Luma difference

Here I have enhanced the contrast and then split the image into different scales of detail. You can see there is some difference at scales larger than 1 or 2 pixels.

Region 1 Luma difference, contrast enchaced, at differnt detail scales.

And the chroma:

Region 1 DxO Chroma

Region 1 UFraw Chroma

The second area; A pile of thumb tacks.

Region 2 DxO

Region 2 UFRaw

The Luma of region 2:

Region 2 DxO Luma

Region 2 UFRaw Luma

Region 2 Chroma:

Region 2 DxO Chroma

Region 2 UFRaw Chroma

Region 3, pencils.

Region 3 DxO

Region 3 UFRaw

Region 3 Luma:

Region 3 DxO Luma

Region 3 UFRaw Luma

Region 3 Chroma:

Region 3 DxO chroma

Region 3 UFRaw chroma

Region 4, Out of focus black and white photo:

Region 4 DxO

Region 4 UFRaw

Region 4 Luma:

Region 4 DxO Luma

Region 4 UFRaw Luma

Region 4 Luma difference

Region 4 Chroma:

Region 4 DxO Chroma

Region 4 UFRaw Chroma