Canon Software Updates

[David]

For those who use Canon's Digital Photo Professional software and have not already been alerted, there was an update published on Canon's UK site earlier this month. The new version is 3.9.2.0. http://www.canon.co.uk/

In addition, EOS Utility and Picture Style have been updated. While the main changes to these two pieces of software are the inclusion of of the new 60D camera and some further data for lenses, the DPP update features some extra editing capabilities, notably the addition of an Unsharp Mask (USM) function in addition to its previous sharpening feature.

I've looked at the USM feature on some test files and have to say that I'm disappointed. It is accessed via the Tool Palette under the box labelled "sharpening". It has three sliders, all with 10 step positions: Strength, Fineness and Threshold. While Strength and Threshold would appear to be the same as Amount and Threshold in other software (including "that-which-shall-not-be-named"), the nature of Fineness is not entirely clear. In other software this would normally be Radius and other web sites I've checked with seem to think it is. However, given that you can only set its value as an integer from 0 to 10, it may be a cruder function of radius. Probably some further work is required to translate Fineness into pixels.

The default settings for the USM are also curious: 0, 7, and 4 for Strength, Fineness and Threshold. With Strength at 0, nothing happens. Increasing it to 2 or 3 shows some effects, but not the type of sharpening we would be used to or wish. IMO, Threshold should be set to 0, Fineness to 1-3, and Strength varied to obtain a reasonable degree of sharpening. In any event, when viewed at 100%, the sharpening looks crude. The original Sharpening control gives a better response.

LCE does not appear possible with this new USM.

Overall, I'm not impressed, but the views of others would be welcome.

David

[Donald]

Thanks David.

Don't use DPP for processing, but the 'Quick Check' is still a great tool for doing the first selections and deciding what migth keep. I see they've puit it as a button on the toolbar in the new version.

[mastamak]

Thanks for that David. I have just downloaded it (after one abortive start when I downloaded the Spanish version - The language is not very obvious on the web page). It looks like it have a few improvements such as a trimming angle tool as well as the unsharp mask that you mention. I have been using DPP quite a lot recently and I think it allows you to do quite a lot of useful post-processing for general run-of-the-mill work
Grant