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Travel photographer Philippe Tarbouriech talks about his workflow incorporating DxO Optics Pro and iView MediaPro.

Like many other photographers, since moving to digital, I have had to go through different ad hoc solutions before settling on one that really works for me and for my way of shooting.

Green eyed girl in Sonargaon, Bangladesh. Canon EOS 1Ds + Canon EF 24-70f2.8 L Lens

The transition to digital brought about a number of changes and opportunities. It took a few years for the dust to settle and for a process to emerge that helps me save time while improving the quality of my images. This is how I use DxO Optics Pro to improve image quality and iView Media Pro to keep track of all my images and achieve the results that work for me and my clients.

Shooting portraits with a Digital SLR has helped transform the relationship between subject and photographer, as the images do not just disappear into a black box for no one to see, but can be shared instantly. Being able to shoot images for purely social purposes, just to show the image or just to relax the atmosphere really emphasizes the need to efficiently edit the images, as the keepers can easily be drowned in a mass of random images.

Smiling Tibetan girl, in Muktinath, lower Mustang. Canon EOS D30 + Canon EF 17-35 f2.8 L Lens

Managing the shoot with iView MediaPro

In order to speed up the editing, I generally shoot both RAW and low-res JPEG, with the intent of editing on JPEG and processing the selected RAW files as I would print a negative if I were shooting film.

When I return from a 1 or 2 months trip in the field with thousands of images that I store on a portable digital photo storage, I first copy them all to a RAID5 file server and back them up to DVD. I then proceed to create a catalog of all the files in iView MediaPro (pointing to the files on the server) before rendering a full-screen movie of the slide show from the JPEG images. I can view the movie created by iView MediaPro on one screen while rating the RAW files in the catalog on the second screen.

Editing the shoot in iView MediaPro

When the amount of images is more limited, I also often use iView Media Pro’s Light Table to quickly rank and identify the keepers. Indexing, setting copyright and other informational fields is done at this stage. Everything is then synchronized to the original files so the data is carried over to the files themselves, even through DxO Optics Pro processing.

Improving Image Quality with DxO Optics Pro

Image Geometry

From the images edited in iView MediaPro, I then create a project in DxO Optics Pro with the RAW files in my shortlist. DxO is the only software to automatically adapt its image corrections to the lens and camera body used on the shoot. It is quite mesmerizing to see the effect at work, in particular on wide-angle lenses. The impact of distortion on the emotional content of an image has often been overlooked, but for me, digital imaging finally gives photographers an opportunity to take back control.

I generally let DxO Optics Pro operate on "automatic", except for the new anamorphic correction that I sometimes use in DxO v4 since it is specifically dependent on the content of the image.

Image Enhancement in DxO Optics Pro

Exposure Optimization

I generally tend to under-expose my images a little bit to make sure they do not have over-exposed highlights. Even then, sometimes it is not enough, but luckily DxO Optics Pro allows me to "save" the images that until then would have shown disgraceful highlight clipping. If the image is slightly under-exposed, I push it up a little, checking that nothing gets blown out. All this attention to exposure is important as it sets the stage for pushing the contrast with DxO Lighting feature in DxO Optics Pro.

Managing Contrast

DxO Lighting has become part of my typical workflow as it allows me to push midtone contrast to the level I am interested in without risking over or under exposure, yet without having to spend a lot of time doing contrast masking in Photoshop.

White balance

Since I like to push the contrast, getting the correct white balance is key. My favorite trick in DxO Optics Pro is to temporarily push the saturation really high, while I tune the white balance. This amplification allows me to see if the white balance is off, even by a minute amount. Once correct, I can return saturation to a reasonable level.

After processing in DxO Optics Pro, I save the images as 16 bit TIFFs and add these to my "output" catalog in iView MediaPro. The metadata (index, copyright...) is all carried through the iView-DxO workflow and can appear when the images are used.

Web Gallery Creation with iView MediaPro

I often use iView MediaPro to create a small HTML Website with the selected images that I can upload to my server before sending the link to my client. This lets them quickly decide what is of interest and I can focus on producing the files they want or can offer them alternative images.

Daughter of algae farmers in Nusa Lembogan, Indonesia. Canon EOS 1Ds + Canon EF 16-35 f2.8 L Lens