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Erik36545164gcm6
Known Participant
May 23, 2025
Answered

Creating DNG HDR from resized DNG from Fujifilm RAW files discards/loses the lens corrections

  • May 23, 2025
  • 1 reply
  • 3783 views

I do real estate photography and a new work flow proces in my company has discovered a strange behaviour/bug in Lightroom Classic which causes a rather irritating time waste. I use Windows 11, LrC 14.3.1 and Camera Raw 17.3.1.

We shoot 3 brackets -3, 0, +3 - I use Fujifilm so I get Fujifilm raw fileformat RAF.

The proces is as follows for delivery of DNG-HDR to post production.

 

1. Convert the bracketed RAW files to DNG resized to 3000x2000px. The converted DNG files retains the lens correction. (this can be done in stand alone camera raw or through LrC - it makes no difference to the end result).

2. Import resized DNG to LrC, autostack and merge the resized DNG to DNG-HDR.

 

The problem now is that the DNG-HDR that is created, has lost the lens corrections and it cannot be (re)applied throught LrC. So there is vignetting and barrel distortion visible in the final.

 

My colleagues using Canon, Sony or Nikon do not experience this problem. I and my colleagues that use fujifilm all do.  Except when we create DNG-HDR files from full sized non converted Fujifilm raw files (but this is very time consuming - roughly 4x process time!)

 

Does anyone know what the problem is or how to prevent LrC discarding the lens correction in the DNG-HDR merge process?

    Correct answer johnrellis

    @Jao vdL, thanks for pointing out you need to select Lossy Compression in Export to reduce the size of the exported DNG.

     

    @JohanElzenga, reduced-resolution DNGs created by Export and Photo Merge are both linear-raw DNGs (I was surprised by the former), and they have the full suite of lens profiles available.

     

    @Erik36545164gcm6, I filed a bug report here:

    https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-bugs/lens-corrections-don-t-work-with-hdrs-merged-from-dngs/idi-p/15339904#M61360 

     

    I selected sample raws from five cameras in my test database: Canon EOS R6m2, Fujifilm X-T5,  Nikon Z 7_2, ODS OM-1, Sony ILCE-7C.  All the raws except those from the Canon have embedded lens profiles, while LR supplies the profile for the Canon.

     

    All five cameras exhibited the same problem: HDRs merged from reduced-resolution DNGs didn't have lens corrections applied correctly. In addition, for the Nikon, the HDR merged from full-resolution DNGs also didn't have lens corrections applied correctly. 

     

    Thus, this isn't specific to Fujifilm cameras.


    I timed merging HDRs from 15 sets of 3 Fujifilm X-T5 raws on my Macbook Pro M2 Max, which is pretty fast.

     

    Method 1: Photo Merge > HDR applied to the raws.

    Total time: 255 seconds.

     

    Method 2: Export the raws to 3000-pixel long edge lossy DNGs, then Photo Merge > HDR applied to them.

    Time to export: 47 seconds

    Time to merge: 108 seconds

    Total time: 155 seconds.

     

    Thus merging the full-sized raws goes 1.6 times slower than producing and merging reduced-resolution DNGs. That is, the latter goes 39% faster.

    1 reply

    GoldingD
    GoldingD
    Legend
    May 24, 2025
    Convert the bracketed RAW files to DNG

    Using what software? You sort of indicate you may be accomplishing that in camera, but also imply the possibility in LrC. Some Fuji X users absolutely hate Adobe Camera RAW around Fuji X images and might instead use Iridient X-Transformer.

     

    The steps you are using are important to understanding what may be going wrong. Not all forms of DNG conversion follow the complete Adobe concepts for DNG (Adobe owns DNG), and some options in various methods might strip info.

    resized to 3000x2000px

    Probably not the cause of your issue, but why resize outside of LrC? Hard drive space constraints?

     

    E
    Erik36545164gcm6Author
    Known Participant
    May 24, 2025

    As written in my post, I have done the proces with converting from RAF raw file to resized DNG with Adobe Camera Raw stand alone program or through LrC on windows. Same result - the created dng-hdr discard lens correction either way. 

    I transfer the raw photo to computer and use Adobes programs for the entire process. 

     

    I have tried Iridient and it actually works - when making dng hdr from dng made in Iridient the resulting dng hdr retains the lens correction, but, since I'm am using windows the Iridient app for Fuji it does not allow me to resize/change the dimensions of the original raw file. Only Iridient developer for Mac allows you to resize. So nothing is gained by using Iridient since I cannot resize.

     

    And yes adobe for fuji is not my preference. All work that is not real estate work is processed in CaptureOne. 

    J
    Community Expert
    Jao vdLCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    May 25, 2025

    Here are one shot - 3 bracketed raw files for you to experiment with.

    As written: Creating HDR from orignal RAF is no problem aside the time consumption.

    Creating HDR from resized DNG discards lens correction even though it is present in reiszed DNG before HDR merge. This does not happen with Canon, Nikon or Sony resized dng's.

    https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1QMHw2d8maSF8E2RCcVaO4kF2tGhgfAg-?usp=sharing


    Thanks,

    I tried to reproduce. I imported these three raf files. Exported them to lossy dng v16 with long side at 3000 pixels

    to same folder with automatic reimporting them to the catalog. Hit create HDR on the new files and the result came in fully corrected with the lens correction set correctly as you can see in screenshot below

    LR Classic 14.3.1 on MacBookPro M1 Max. 

    This seems to work correctly on my machine at least with the release version of Classic.

    Also tried this in Cloudy and it comes in fully corrected with the right profile:

    No clue why this wouldn't work correctly on your computer. Perhaps a hardware dependent bug.

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