Phocus 3.4

[galoubet]

Phocus 3.4 has just crashed my Windows 10 laptop. Something no other version of Phocus has managed to do. Thanks Hasselblad!

[Domip]

Works like a charm on Mac !

[Juan Pascual Garrido]

Certainly, Domip, BUT try it working with several adjust layers. It´s faster than before but not like a professional software

[bdp]

Happy with it so far - the new tools are great.

However I preferred the old clarity algorithm for some shots - it's a shame you can't use this with the V2 controls. C1 has a dropdown to select a different type of clarity, I wish Phocus could do the same.

But the new highlight recovery is awesome.

[Juan Pascual Garrido]

of course bdp, nowadays CaptureOne is perfect. Maybe we´ll have those tools that in 2023

[Greg]

Just played around with Phocus 3.4, and the eyedropper tool in the Color Corrections does nothing.  It shows the point in the color wheel, but when you try to drag the arrow, nothing happens.  What am I doing wrong? 

[sortvitt]

The new Clarity function is a massive disappointment. I'm not sure who would benefit from the new algorithm, it certainly is useless for portraits/beauty - reminds me of LR's Clarity feature. Uninstalled 3.4 and back to previous version with it's excellent Clarity handling. I'm not keen on adding C1 to my workflow and certainly hope the previous algorithm will be back in the next update.

[jeff.grant@pobox.com]

I use an Eizo CG240 which I don't let Phocus manage. Everty time that I start Phocus, I have to wait for the self-calibration tab to appear a coiple of times. I was hoping that this may have been fixed but it's still happening.

[bdp]

The new Clarity function is a massive disappointment. I'm not sure who would benefit from the new algorithm, it certainly is useless for portraits/beauty - reminds me of LR's Clarity feature. Uninstalled 3.4 and back to previous version with it's excellent Clarity handling. I'm not keen on adding C1 to my workflow and certainly hope the previous algorithm will be back in the next update.

Yes, it's pretty harsh. I have played around a bit more and I think it's best if used subtly - low values, and with the detail slider right down to 0 for people, up higher for landscapes maybe. It uses a much smaller radius for local contrast creation rather then the previous version's large soft radius that made halos sometimes. But yes, there should be a choice in v2 to use both types of clarity.

[BradP]

All reports on the first day are obviously preliminary!  With that caveat, I'll chime in.

* On my new Windows 10 desktop computer (it's very powerful), I'm not having any major problems yet and am generally very happy with the improvements overall.

* I'm liking what I see with the new recovery slider especially, but also the shadows.  Before both seemed to affect mostly the upper and lower parts of the histogram.  Now they seem to do so much more evenly.   And the old highlight slider in my opinion was usually worthless above a setting of 25 or 35, and it was a destroyer of highlight detail at high levels.  The new functionality seems like a huge improvement.  This was my biggest bugaboo with previous versions of Phocus.  I was just actually about to make the decision to migrate all my raw development workflow back to Camera Raw or Lightroom because of that.  For me anyway, this update will forestall that decision if not eliminate it.  I've always had a feeling that in many ways (particularly color) Phocus does a noticably better job on Hasselblad files.

* At first anyway, I'm liking what I see with the two new clarity sliders.  The detail slider is basically microcontrast, and the normal clarity slider now basically is localized contrast (a larger contrast radius than the detail as someone pointed out).  Nice tools to have at the raw development stage.  Works very well for dialing in micro and fine detail in landscapes.  I also tried it out on a few portraits.  There if anything, I'd probably dial these to the negative side (which they have) to reduce blemishes and pores.  On a test image I just went through I actually liked the affect, although one needs to take care not to overdo it for losing eye detail and the like.  There are better tools to use for that in Photoshop of course, but if only using Phocus that's what I'd use it for.  So at this point, I'm a big buyer of clarity and detail changes here.

For things that seem to need fixing,

* Like Greg, I also had a problem with the color neutralization tool not working at all now.  I imagine that will be promptly fixed with an update because it's a must have.

* I use curves a lot, and I noticed that with the update I'm now having more trouble than usual switching between close "control points" (as I'll call them for now) with my mouse.  Forgot the right name for them, but they are the little white dots one clicks on and drags around to adjust the curve.  The work around for now seems to be to use the tab key to rotate between control points.  For very high dynamic range shots where one still needs to recover more details than the shadows and recovery slider allow, I often use two of these control points very close together at either or both of the extreme black and white edges.  For example, I'll put one one at the far right to immediately yank down highlights and a second offsetting point right next to the one on the far right, pulling the second one in the opposite direction to offset the first point and straighten out the curve.  (The opposite of that works too at the black end.)   It's a cool trick and squeezes out more dynamic range out of the file.  If you haven't done it try it, you'll like it.   I'll need to do that less now with the more powerful shadows and recovery slider, but I can see with one of my favorite test images that It still works to bring in more data in the new version and I'll still want to do that quite often.  A workaround until that's fixed seems to be to use the tab key, but hopefully H can give some attention to that in the next update.

* When zoomed in and making adjustments, sometimes parts of the image disappear and look like a colorful version of a television not tuned to any channel.  They go away with time, but it's weird and I thought whatever is going on there is usually in my mind associated with instability.   Although neither my computer nor the program crashed, I'm nearly 100% positive that's a Phocus program defect because I have a new and freshly loaded computer right now and haven't seen it anywhere else.

[BradP]

Oh no, not in Thailand again without the latest toy!   Well at least do say you have your 120mm this time! 

I'd try reinstalling the new version if I were you before giving up.  You likely will want the more powerful sliders when you get back home and they'll force you to reprocess everything to some extent.  I'm going back through my images already!

[Eric Borgström]

Returned to 3.3.7. 3.4 has problems on my 2011 iMac.

[Greg]

Returned to 3.3.7. 3.4 has problems on my 2011 iMac.

Me too!  Same iMac.

[Juan Pascual Garrido]

Greg says: "Just played around with Phocus 3.4, and the eyedropper tool in the Color Corrections does nothing.  It shows the point in the color wheel, but when you try to drag the arrow, nothing happens.  What am I doing wrong?"

I thought the same, but the Correction Color works right, but the point selector choose a wrong color. You have to choose the color in the wheel without using the point selector

[Alex]

vers3.4 Windows 7x64

Scene Calibration is not really working at all on 6s Multishot files - causes a brightness shift in Equalise intensity - but not equalising brightness, changes the character of the cast but doesn't correct it. At least with previous versions although not showing in the preview (except when at 100%), at least it applied the correction. Creating and applying the scene calibration in an earlier version and then outputting via 3.4 messes the calibration up to 3.4vers. standard.
Also DNGs from Multishot files exhibited artefacts when viewed in Lightroom.
Generally it runs faster (but doesn't work) than 3.3.6. - so a bit of another brief and disappointing climax in the annuls of Phocus for my work

I'm sticking to 3.1.5 for workflow and then outputting with 3.3.6 once all the necessary modifications are made.

Btw on the Hasselblad website, only the Mac version of previous versions (of Phocus) seem currently available to download not Windows.

Roll on the weekend