Tag Archives: color

Phase One IQ3 100MP Trichromatic vs Standard Back Linear Color, Part III

Over the last two posts we’ve been exploring some of the differences introduced by tweaks to the Color Filter Array of the Phase One IQ3 100MP Trichromatic Digital Back versus its original incarnation, the Standard Back.  Refer to those for the background.  In this article we will delve into some of these differences quantitatively[1].

Let’s start with the compromise color matrices we derived from David Chew’s captures of a ColorChecher 24 in the shade of a sunny November morning in Ohio[2].   These are the matrices necessary to convert white balanced raw data to the perceptual CIE XYZ color space, where it is said there should be one-to-one correspondence with colors as perceived by humans, and therefore where most measurements are performed.  They are optimized for each back in the current conditions but they are not perfect, the reason for the word ‘compromise’ in their name:

Figure 1. Optimized Linear Compromise Color Matrices for the Phase One IQ3 100 MP Standard and Trichromatic Backs under approximately D65 light.

Continue reading Phase One IQ3 100MP Trichromatic vs Standard Back Linear Color, Part III

Phase One IQ3 100MP Trichromatic vs Standard Back Linear Color, Part I

It is always interesting when innovative companies push the envelope of the state-of-the-art of a single component in their systems because a lot can be learned from before and after comparisons.   I was therefore excited when Phase One introduced a Trichromatic version of their Medium Format IQ3 100MP Digital Back last September because it could allows us to isolate the effects of tweaks to their Bayer Color Filter Array, assuming all else stays the same.

Figure 1. IQ3 100MP Trichromatic (left) vs the rest (right), from PhaseOne.com.   Units are not specified but one would assume that the vertical axis is relative spectral sensitivity and the horizontal axis represents wavelength.

Thanks to two virtually identical captures by David Chew at getDPI, and Erik Kaffehr’s intelligent questions at DPR, in the following articles I will explore the effect on linear color of the new Trichromatic CFA (TC) vs the old one on the Standard Back (SB).  In the process we will discover that – within the limits of my tests, procedures and understanding[1] – the Standard Back produces apparently more ‘accurate’ color while the Trichromatic produces better looking matrices, potentially resulting in ‘purer’ signals. Continue reading Phase One IQ3 100MP Trichromatic vs Standard Back Linear Color, Part I

Linear Color: Applying the Forward Matrix

Now that we know how to create a 3×3 linear matrix to convert white balanced and demosaiced raw data into XYZ_{D50}  connection space – and where to obtain the 3×3 linear matrix to then convert it to a standard output color space like sRGB – we can take a closer look at the matrices and apply them to a real world capture chosen for its wide range of chromaticities.

Figure 1. Image with color converted using the forward linear matrix discussed in the article.

Continue reading Linear Color: Applying the Forward Matrix

Nikon CFA Spectral Power Distribution

I measured the Spectral Photon Distribution of the three CFA filters of a Nikon D610 in ‘Daylight’ conditions with a cheap spectrometer.  Taking a cue from this post I pointed it at light from the sun reflected off a gray card  and took a raw capture of the spectrum it produced.

CFA Spectrum Spectrometer

An ImageJ plot did the rest.  I took a dozen captures at slightly different angles to catch the picture of the clearest spectrum.  Shown are the three spectral curves averaged over the two best opposing captures, each proportional to the number of photons let through by the respective Color Filter.   The units on the vertical axis are raw black-subtracted values from the raw file (DN), therefore the units on the vertical axis are proportional to the number of incident photons in each case.   The Photopic Eye Luminous Efficiency Function (2 degree, Sharpe et al 2005) is also shown for reference, scaled to the same maximum as the green curve (although in energy units, my bad). Continue reading Nikon CFA Spectral Power Distribution