NX-D

[Andrea B.]

Here is the foto I was working on. The NX-D rendition is very very good. Excellent detail. And I managed to control the highlights in the steam and water.

But the scene needs to be brought into a more realistic view. The trees are not that dark. The sky is not intense enough. There needs to be more light in the foreground. And NX-D lacks a dust bunny tool to deal with the dried spray across the lens that happens when you shoot thermal features all afternoon. Didn't notice it of course until I got back to the hotel later.

So I popped the NX-D TIFF into NX2 for those minor edits - all made quickly with colour or selection points. And the dust bunny brush.
BTW, while in NX-D, the TIFF can be sent to the next app of your choice by creating an app menu in NX-D preferences and then right-clicking the app icon to choose which one. Nice feature.

[1] Beehive Geyser, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, USA. After NX-D before NX2.
This geyser, behind the mound of Old Faithful, erupted immediately after Old Faithful finished. A double treat!
Yes, this scene is a bit boring. But is had some subtleties which are a good test for a converter - fine detail, strong contrasts, part high sat, part low sat.
[2] Blue sky splatter from steamy thermal springs.
[3] Beehive Geyser. After additional tweaks in NX2.
The scene could perhaps use slightly more contrast, so I may take it back into NX2 later.

[Ron Scubadiver]

NX-D is slow.  I tried PN, and did not get better results than ACR, but I might not know what to look for or what to do.  PN is also slower than ACR and requires an extra step to make local adjustments.

[Frank Fremerey]

Yes.

So Nikon does not have a solution and most of the other camera makers like Canon. Fuji. Olympus. Sony. They all do not have a real solution.

What do we do?

Spend half of our live waiting for some RAW to develop?

I see
I shoot
I want to print and show!

Currently I try to cope with PN.
D......A......R.....N
S.....L......O.....W
but PN rewards the patience and I get a great TIFF to put into PS CC and GOOGLE NIK COLLECTION

plus everything I know about Photoshop after Dan Margulis and 11 years.

[Anthony]

Frank, you do not need a tiff to get from PN to CC.  You can set PN up as a filter so that the image moves directly from PN to CC with no intermediate stage.  It is a big time saver.

[Frank Fremerey]

Thank you Anthony. I read that PN can be used as a kind of plugin
for Photoshop. I did not yet dig into it because since I use presets
in a sensible way things got much faster. Only batching is very
slow even compared to CNX2.

What I really like is I can use NEF and RAF mixed and do not need
two programmes. As I got accustomed to PN I really like what I can
do with it.

[arthurking83]

So Nikon does not have a solution and most of the other camera makers like Canon. Fuji. Olympus. Sony. They all do not have a real solution.

......

Nikon did, but seemed to follow in other manufacturer's footsteps then.
CNX-2 for me was more than enough more often than not.
(my only major gripe with CNX-2 was the lack of a proper clone/heal tool)

CNX-D would have been a great upgrade for ViewNX2, considering the more plentiful tools CNX-D offered compared to VNX2.

So for Nikon to announce CNX-D as the successor to CNX-2 was a major step backwards.
Then they announced the replacement for ViewNX2 a short while later, which is now ViewNX-i. (I think the i represents the idiot in idiots edition!)
This was another 2 steps backwards .. which makes for at least 3 steps backwards from Nikon from the point of view of software support.

My major gripe with Nikon's new software solution, is that of tagging raw files via the IPTC framework.
Where CNX-2 and VNX-2 added IPTC/keyword tagging into the NEF file(among other data that could be added later) .. with CNX-D, you can't add any embedded tag info at all .. and ViewNX-idiots edition only adds tag info via it's proprietary sidecar file system only.

And as others have mentioned, CNX-D is slow .. sorry make that verrrrry slowwww!.
Prior to my update to Win10, on Win7 I could only get CNX-D to actually run every 10 or so attempts to make it so via the click of it's exe icon.
All 9 other attempts would cause a crash of some cryptic beginnings .. appdata crash with no meaningful info. Then when it did run, it was slow.
Now at least it does run, but not that I want it too, as it's even slower now on Win10(I feel).

I've tried very hard to like LR(v4 at the moment) but still have a (philosophical) issue with the way it's workflow begins.
I have my own system for tagging cataloging, and don't need LR's obstructive input.
Otherwise I'd take the time to use LR more and more, I've tried a few others too, C1, which was nicer to start with, but not 100% enamoured with the total output quality. I reckon I may learn to massage that tho with time.
So I've decided it's easier to just not update the camera to a newer model ... until I finally decide which software I'll end up migrating too(if I ever do).
It's easier this way .. less time wasted with a chore I don't particularly like much anyhow(PPing).

[Andrea B.]

Arthur, the Photo Mechanic app has a very good IPTC capability. And it writes to the NEF not to a sidecar. I've used Photo Mechanic for years for ingesting, naming, and culling photo files. After those chores I use PhoMech to view "contact sheets" and to call my converter/editors.
You may not want/need such a namer/viewer app, but I did want to let you know about its IPTC feature.

******

The non-CNX2 workflow for me from now on will have to feature two apps: Converter followed by Local Editor.

Currently, for my Nikon D810 fotos, this would be Photo Ninja as converter followed by CNX2 as local editor. But now I use CNX2 on the D810 TIFF (or any other TIFFs) produced by the Photo Ninja conversion. (And I'm testing other D810 workflow.)

I've also made a preliminary foray into Affinity to use as a one-stop converter/editor app. Or maybe as just the local editor for any converter output. Affinity is certainly well-stocked with tools and layers.
Affinity is way too complex for my needs after using the simple CNX2 for so many years, but I am trying to persevere because I think it is important not to get "stuck" knowing just one or two convert/edit systems.

Unfortunately CNX2 is going to fail to function at some point in the future when I have to upgrade from my current OS and find CNX2 no longer supported. Before anyone writes in to suggest virtual machines, Yes, I know I can do this if it becomes that important to preserve CNX2.  "-)

I wish Nikon would just make the CNX2 source code into some kind of open source project and let us out here in HackerLand (white hat of course) have a go at preserving it for future Nikon cameras.

Added Later:  I am not entirely certain that I will entirely refuse to use the horrible CNX-D because it does preserve all Nikon in-camera settings. And if I had to totally give up preservation of those Nikon D810 in-camera settings, then why bother to use Nikon cameras at all?? I'm not crazy about my results so far for the D810 from Photo Ninja and from Affinity. Methinks that if D810 workflow becomes a huge Pxxx in the Ahyy, then there are lots of intriguing other cameras out there to try!!!

[arthurking83]

Arthur, the Photo Mechanic app has a very good IPTC capability. And it writes to the NEF not to a sidecar. ...

Thanks Andrea.
I must have tried just about every other program but this one then! :p

I know I could cobble up some script or whatever and use Exiftool or something like that, but there's nothing like a GUI for lazy folks like me

FWIW too tho, because of the fact that CNX and VNX are about to become totally redundant, I've been trialing many software for various reasons(some personal).
I also used to use IDImager for many years but that software went south!
But for the past few months I've been using the most innocuous software to help with cataloging .. and that is Microsoft's Photo Gallery.
Made me laugh when I realised that it could also set tag info into a raw file in the same way that Nikon's software does. It also has some unique searching abilities too.
It's very slow to start, and I'm assuming that this is something to do with it's database loading, as it feels like it's getting slower and slower over time. But once it's loaded up it's fine in terms of operational speed. The only caveat is that Nikon's NEF codec needs to be installed for it to work on NEF files.

I'll have a look at PM too tho.

The only beneficial aspect of CNX-D (now) is that Nikon have finally allowed it to read all our old CNX-2 edits made onto raw files. So like VNX-2, you can see the edits made via CNX-2 .. but you can also create a child file into either a jpg or tiff file type if needed(VNX-2 never had the ability to do a conversion!)
So the situation is (now) that unless you feel there is a need to re edit any files edited in CNX2, CNX-2 isn't required any longer to view or convert any CNX-2 edited raw files.
CNX-D can now do that.
I think it's the only reason I actually keep it on my PC, and can't really remember using it for any serious editing purposes(only because it's so slow and tedious to work with).
I prefer it's array of editing tools over VNX2 any day of the week tho.

[Andrea B.]

VNX-2 never had the ability to do a conversion

Minor correction. Yeah, VNX2 *can* convert to Jpg or Tif. Just so you know in case you ever have to use VNX2 for that. 
Look for this Menu Item:  File > Convert Files > { JPEG,  TIFF(16 bit),  TIFF(8 bit) }

[arthurking83]

VNX-2 never had the ability to do a conversion

Minor correction. Yeah, VNX2 *can* convert to Jpg or Tif. Just so you know in case you ever have to use VNX2 for that. 
Look for this Menu Item:  File > Convert Files > { JPEG,  TIFF(16 bit),  TIFF(8 bit) }

Ah.. misinterpreted!

ViewNX2 can't convert a raw file, if it's been edited by CNX-2.
If you follow that conversion routine in VNX2 on a CNX2 edited file, the 'conversion' option is greyed out.
CNX-D (now) can. It initially couldn't either, but with one of the later versions, Nikon added this ability. Conversions are almost perfectly identical to a conversion made in CNX-2 itself.
But if you have any healing/bandaid editing created in CNX2's raw file, it's not perfectly translated by CNX-D. It's good enough, but not pixel for pixel identical for some reason.

One of the things I'm retentive about is uneccessary file archival, and once my jpgs or tiffs are used for the purpose they were created for, I usually remove them. My only concern is the survival of the NEF file.
My main browser for NEF files would invariably default to VNX2, sometimes FastStone's viewer, and sometimes Windows Explorer(with the NEF codec installed). But more often than not, VNX2.
So I'd browse through my files and possibly want/need a new copy of an old file edited with CNX2.
All I may have wanted was a new jpg file or something simple, but converting that file wasn't possible because it was edited by CNX2.
I was always curious as to why Nikon would limit their software like that!
So while it wasn't painful to open in CNX2 and covert from there .. it'd have been much simpler just to allow VNX2 to do the conversion! . ie. it was already open, so no need to open more software for a simple conversion.

Strangely, this is how(and why) I stumbled onto to IJFR(instant jpg from raw). It allows you to right click a raw file and extract a jpg out of it .. even an NEF file edited in CNX2!
The only issue was that this rightclick option wasn't enabled in VNX2 .. hence the eventual use of Windows Explorer directly .. and hence the eventual use of Photo Gallery for tagging NEF files.

Oh!.... and did you know that Windows Explorer can also tag files too(in the same ways Nikon do)!!
So if you have the Nikon NEF codec installed and use Windows Explorer to view your NEF files, you can go into properties of a file, and move through the various fields of the properties dialogue box and edit some/many .. tags included. Then you can search images metadata directly from within Windows Explorer. I do that a lot now as I've now started on a path to tag all my images.

** Probably all useless info for you Andrea, as I think I remember you're a Mac person .. but it's just some info there for other Windows users.

[Rick Popham]

I wish Nikon would just make the CNX2 source code into some kind of open source project and let us out here in HackerLand (white hat of course) have a go at preserving it for future Nikon cameras.

I wonder if that would be possible, considering that CNX was developed with NIK, contains a lot of NIK IP and NIK is now part of Google.  I'd like to try Affinity, but it too is Mac only.

[Andrea B.]

ViewNX2 can't convert a raw file, if it's been edited by CNX-2.

ah yes, I had forgotten that. Agree it was stupid of Nikon.

[Nancy Elwood]

I wonder if that would be possible, considering that CNX was developed with NIK, contains a lot of NIK IP and NIK is now part of Google.  I'd like to try Affinity, but it too is Mac only.

I used NX-2 quite a bit, but now with my D810 went to NX-D.  Yes, it is not great for batch processing, but I prefer its RAW conversion much better than any other software. It reads all of my custom IN camera settings. I do not spend much time in it, levels and curves, exposure with highlights saving mostly.  Then I "save as" a 16-bit Tiff and take it into Photoshop where I have my Nik/Google collection plug ins.  Nikon had to drop the Control Points technology because of Nik being bought out by Google.  So I just use that technology through Photoshop.

Here is the link to the Google/Nik Collection   https://www.google.com/nikcollection/

[Øivind Tøien]

New version of CNX-D and ViewNX-i are just out. They do cooperate better now and ViewNX-i has gotten editing capabilities similar to ViewNX2 sharing sidecar files. Watch out though as installing ViewNX-i deinstalled ViewNX2 last time I tried,  and it will only write edits to sidecar files, so it would not work together with CNX2 the way ViewNX2 works. I have been able to reinstall ViewNX2 in that VM now, and ViewNX-i will still start, but I do not know if there could be any undiscovered ill effects.

When is Nikon going to fix that cutoff star rating filter box with Win7 when font scaling on high resolution screens is more than 100%?    I already reported it during the beta period...

I had some problems with display of some older files, one or two showed a black thumbnail after edit. For a few others, little response was seen to edits, but when I reopened them after shutting down the VM in between, they displayed with wild colors. Don't know about speed, as I was working in a VM; it was not particularly fast there.

[ThomasAdams]

I tried both of them (CNX-D and ViewNX-I) and really could not like either one for a multitude of reasons. Some have been expressed here very well by multiple members. I wanted to like it but it is almost a step back from the first Capture or Capture NX albeit with a few more supported cameras and other nuances etc. etc...  The UI is really a mess, I have not seen shortcuts like that and it is just a bizarre layout (e.g. (O)pen (S)ave). The menu items seem to just mush together I am sure I could become more familiar with the icons overtime thus speeding up the workflow. And while there may be a few gems there are simply too many hurdles for myself to overcome and venture into further use. .. Then there is that voice in my head - when Nikon loses this contract or the company gets bought out like the last one... I fear I will be in the same boat. Looking for yet another raw processor/Image editor.

It does seem that this cycle of Nikon and their software keeps spinning and while they have mixed it up (made by nikon and 3rd parties) they seem to miss the mark more often than not. For my uses NX/NX2 really worked well for me and while I still use it, I am reminded constantly that may days are numbered which leads often leads me to go on download sprees to test trials of other products. The list continues to grow... I really hope that the current iteration of Nikon software matures (soon), but the real question is what will it mature into and will it be something I can use?

And another question. Do you think Nikon was better off developing their own software or do you think they are better off leaving it to others? I know at one time many people held the opinion that Nikon needed to give up the software end of it, I may have as well at times. Has your opinion on this (if you had one) changed?

Best regards,
Tom