Nikon NX studio

[Ann]

Well, I played with NX Studio for a while and then . . . I scurried back to ACR!

The NX UI is not efficient.
Too many vital controls are hidden in the Prefs and require a restart every time before any changes to the Prefs become available to the User.

The Adjustments Panel is interminably long and needs excessive Scrolling.

There are no KBSCs.

NX seems to have been designed for those who shoots JPGs instead of RAW.
There doesn't appear to be a way to import my own xRite-engendered Camera Profiles.

NX Studio makes heavy use of the camera's internally recorded Settings and Picture Controls (which are something that I never use). It also wants to honour Active D-Lighting (something that is applicable to JPGs); and seems to base operations on other settings included in the camera's EXIF (all of which I inevitably ignore!).

NX also lacks many of the advanced tools (including Color Grading and a Smart Object workflow into Ps) which ACR now provides.
Neither did I get the impression that NX is any faster than ACR.

Bottom Line:

My previous impression of Nikon's Software has now been re-confirmed.

My copy of NX Studio has now taken a trip to Never-never Land via the Uninstaller.

[Ilkka Nissilä]

NX seems to have been designed for those who shoots JPGs instead of RAW.

I doubt it. I've never been a JPG shooter; I felt it was too much of a compromise.

I use Nikon software for browsing, image selections and some editing because the software defaults to using raw conversion settings set in the camera. This saves time as when I view the images, the processing applied is as I have intended. I still refine the image adjustments when needed, but I have a better starting point because while shooting the adjustments made are respected by the browser and raw converter.

Furthermore, Nikon software shows the focus points and settings used in the camera. This helps me see what worked and what didn't and allows me to investigate why.

The Nikon software also obeys the white balance settings made in camera whereas ACR/LR makes its own interpretation of the white balance which is often quite different from Nikon's.

I also like sometimes to use D-Lighting and I can activate this in post-processing using Nikon software. There are also useful tools such as axial color aberration correction and PF flare correction.

Finally, I feel the conversions made by Nikon software look more natural and three dimensional and I feel this is lost when using other raw converters.

There doesn't appear to be a way to import my own xRite-engendered Camera Profiles.

Nikon software is useful for accessing Nikon profiles, picture controls and algorithms and applying them to raw files; other software exists for working with X-rite profiles and algorithms.

NX Studio makes heavy use of the camera's internally recorded Settings and Picture Controls (which are something that I never use).

Right, it produces almost exactly the same results as the camera at the selected processing settings (but with higher quality as JPG compression is not applied unless requested).

It also wants to honour Active D-Lighting (something that is applicable to JPGs); and seems to base operations on other settings included in the camera's EXIF (all of which I inevitably ignore!).

D-Lighting is a good algorithm and being able to adjust its settings when needed is one of the reasons to use this software.

NX also lacks many of the advanced tools (including Color Grading and a Smart Object workflow into Ps) which ACR now provides.

It doesn't prevent you from using ACR. Just set Open with to open Photoshop and voila, you have access to ACR conversions.

Neither did I get the impression that NX is any faster than ACR.

I am sure that it does convert files faster than I can adjust the ACR settings to match in camera settings for each image (if I have made such adjustments). I find it extremely annoying that even after 22 years of NEF file availability Adobe still haven't bothered to read in the in-camera settings and obey them. It's a  productivity disadvantage, in my opinion. I time and time again ask them to address this issue but their effort, when it finally came, is half-hearted. ACR now can read the camera profile used but it doesn't do it correctly if I use multiple photo shooting banks in the camera. It always seems to take the picture control used in Shooting Bank A rather than the shooting bank which was active at the time of shooting.

My copy of NX Studio has now taken a trip to Never-never Land via the Uninstaller.

Good for you.

I will use NX Studio for most of my projects for browsing, image selections/deletions, and as a platform to make Nikon raw conversions, launch Photoshop on the produced TIFF images, launch ACR/Photoshop or DXO Photolab as alternative raw converters and editors that I use in specific cases, depending on what kind of processing I want to do to the image. I will still use LR for editing studio photographs which is where I use X-rite profiles (e.g. to homogenize the colors from LED and flash lights, though my subjects often prefer Nikon profiles, I like the X-rite for fully controlled lighting situations), and for when I need to print multiple photographs on one piece of paper, which LR allows in a very convenient way. I generally do the later steps of photo editing in PS or LR. What varies is mostly just the raw converter which I select depending on image.

Luckily there are different software available to suit individual photographers' needs.

[Matthew Currie]

"NX Studio makes heavy use of the camera's internally recorded Settings and Picture Controls (which are something that I never use). It also wants to honour Active D-Lighting (something that is applicable to JPGs); and seems to base operations on other settings included in the camera's EXIF (all of which I inevitably ignore!)."

I think that complaint of Ann's applies to all the Nikon software that precedes this.  It's a blessing and a curse, I guess.  For example, if you start out with D-lighting on, you can't turn it off in View NX-2.  But you can turn it on if it wasn't there before.  Similarly, other settings made in the camera are carried into the program, and though you can alter some,  you can't always diminish them or remove them completely.  On the other hand, if you're more or less satisfied with what you started with and what you saw on the camera's screen,  you don't have to do anything to get there.  I prefer to do as little post processing as I can get away with, and don't mind that, but I can see how someone not used to it would find it quite annoying.

[David H. Hartman]

NX Studio makes heavy use of the camera's internally recorded Settings and Picture Controls (which are something that I never use). It also wants to honour Active D-Lighting (something that is applicable to JPGs); and seems to base operations on other settings included in the camera's EXIF (all of which I inevitably ignore!).

Active D-Lighting is definitely not limited to JPG(s). This is a the point of view of people who use Adobe Camera Raw and other non-Nikon software that cannot make use of Active D-Lighting when developing NEF(s). I do not shoot JPG and I do use Active D-Lighting when I find it useful. I have it set to low in my D850 as Capture NX-2 didn't allow Active D-Lighting with my D300s unless it was on in camera. When developing an NEF I turn Active D-Lighting off or up to normal as needed.

Note that Canon and other camera makers use the same technology as Active D-Lighting under different names. I believe they all license it from the same company.

Dave

I apologize I just edited this an hour or two after posting it. If the following post quotes me and doesn't match it is because of my edits. I felt a need to clarify what I wrote and naturally there were typos and cut & past errors which are my hallmark.

[Ann]

To clarify, I never use ACR's (or anyone else's) Camera Profiles because I have made a complete set of Profiles for each of my cameras and also (for each camera individually) for every regular and odd-ball light-source that i have been able to find.

I use xRite's ColorChecker, followed by DNG Converter, to build these personalised Camera Profiles and I have imported them all into ACR.

Now I simply Batch-select all of the images from a shoot and apply the appropriate Camera Profile for the camera which was used, and the light-source under which the images were shot, and that provides my starting point.
Thus I mostly start the image processing with my Colour Balance and White Point in need of minimal tweaking.

Then I multi-select images which may need similar brightness, contrast or changes to some of the other controls and Sync the settings for the whole group.

This is probably not the way that most people like to work but it is actually very fast and I can easily process over a thousand RAW images this way in a day into a reasonably complete and usable state.
(Return from a trip with over 12,000 new Nefs, and you can understand why this workflow is helpful!)

When shooting, I simply use Neutral and leave all Picture Controls (especially Sharpening!) set to the Minimal or Off position.

ACR suits my own (perhaps rather idiosyncratic?) ways of shooting and processing because I always Process with the intention of storing my files still as RAW Nefs. I Keyword them and save them as Nefs with xmp Sidecars

When I need to use one of them, I re-open the NEF in ACR, make any additional tweaks that seem necessary and then "Open Object" (as a Smart Object and ProPhoto RGb 16-bit) directly into Photoshop.
 
I make final adjustments and refinements in Ps; apply (as the last step and always in a separate Layer) the exact kind of Sharpening needed for my Output purposes. That is because Press, Printer and Web require entirely different kinds and degrees of Output Sharpening

I then Save the file (in the appropriate format and Color Space) and can now Export it into a Page Layout program for the Press; or for Printing on my inkjet; or for inclusion in a Web Site and for Posting on the Internet.

I realise that mine is much more of a Production-oriented workflow than many Photographers will wish, or need to adopt; but, for the past 40 years, I have been in the rather unusual position of being the Photographer, the Art Director and the Production Manager for everything that we have produced.

Perhaps this also explains why I find that ACR provides me with the more complex editing tools and capabilities that I need; and why it also offers me a far more complete and versatile Workflow than NX Studio seems able to provide so far.

[David H. Hartman]

I mostly ignore Nikon's *.nksc (side car files) but rather save *.nxd (Save all adjustments) files in Capture NX-D. NX studio doesn't read these. NX Studio introduces *.nka files that replace the *.nxd files. The only bridge I know of between *.nxd files and *.nka files is the *.nksc side car files.

It's possible to have both Capture NX-D and NX Studio running at the same time. So far they haven't crashed each other. 

---

At first Nikon ignored that users had a great deal of time invested in Capture NX-2 saved NEF files with many adjustments. Early version of Capture NX-D blissfully ignored these people's work. Now NX Studio blissfully ignores the hours invested in *.nxd adjustment files.

Here is how I move the edits saved in *.nxd files to *.nka files. Open Capture NX-D and open an NEF. Load the adjustments in a paired *.nxd file. Move to another NEF file so Capture NX-D saves an *.nksc file. Open the NEF just opened in Capture NX-D in NX Studio and "Save all adjustments" in the new *.nka file format. Yes, I know NX Studio is free. NO IT'S NOT. Those who buy Nikon cameras that produce NEF files are paying for NX Studio when they pay for their new black beauties. Nikon needs to fix NX Studio so it can read an *.nxd file and then save an *.nka version. NX Studio need not and probably should not save adjustments in the old *.nxd file.

I normally save only one paired *.nxd file, e.g. D850_DSC0000.nxd for each D850_DSC0000.NEF. Sometimes I save several *.nxd files per NEF. I'm sure there are good reasons for the new *.nka file but this change without real accommodation will waste many hour of my time. Every D800 NEF I've developed in CNX-D will have at least one *.nxd file associated with it.

A fine rant if I say so myself.

Dave

[John Geerts]

The Nikon File transfer module (import) is now a lot faster. !!    It's still a pity it can't read other RAW files, like the RAF from Fuji.

Thanks for the Open-With link, Ilkka.  It is fast to go directly to ACR.  I also use Faststone for image-review, but need to see if Nikon NX Studio is just as fast.

[Øivind Tøien]

I mostly ignore Nikon's *.nksc (side car files) but rather save *.nxd (Save all adjustments) files in Capture NX-D. NX studio doesn't read these. NX Studio introduces *.nka files that replace the *.nxd files. The only bridge I know of between *.nxd files and *.nka files is the *.nksc side car files.

It's possible to have both Capture NX-D and NX Studio running at the same time. So far they haven't crashed each other. 

---

At first Nikon ignored that users had a great deal of time invested in Capture NX-2 saved NEF files with many adjustments. Early version of Capture NX-D blissfully ignored these people's work. Now NX Studio blissfully ignores the hours invested in *.nxd adjustment files.

Here is how I move the edits saved in *.nxd files to *.nka files. Open Capture NX-D and open an NEF. Load the adjustments in a paired *.nxd file. Move to another NEF file so Capture NX-D saves an *.nksc file. Open the NEF just opened in Capture NX-D in NX Studio and "Save all adjustments" in the new *.nka file format. Yes, I know NX Studio is free. NO IT'S NOT. Those who buy Nikon cameras that produce NEF files are paying for NX Studio when they pay for their new black beauties. Nikon needs to fix NX Studio so it can read an *.nxd file and then save an *.nka version. NX Studio need not and probably should not save adjustments in the old *.nxd file.

I normally save only one paired *.nxd file, e.g. D850_DSC0000.nxd for each D850_DSC0000.NEF. Sometimes I save several *.nxd files per NEF. I'm sure there are good reasons for the new *.nka file but this change without real accommodation will waste many hour of my time. Every D800 NEF I've developed in CNX-D will have at least one *.nxd file associated with it.

A fine rant if I say so myself.

Dave

While I absolutely agree that Studio should be able to read the CNX-D .nxd files and I am encouraging you to file a report with Nikon on it, I do not understand why you want to avoid relying on CNX-D and NC Studio automatically saving the .nksc files. It is effort free, appears compatible between CNX-i, CNX-D and NX studio. I am even able to get the edits automatically back to CNX-D after editing in Studio. There might be something I do not quite understand about your workflow, but without any further knowledge I would highly recommend you to in the future to rely on the .nksc files to store the edits and stop deleting those NKSC_PARAM folders if that is what you are doing.

[David H. Hartman]

I do not understand why you want to avoid relying on CNX-D and NC Studio automatically saving the .nksc files.

The problem with relying on the *.nksc files is if I experiment with adjustments and Capture NX-D has saved the *.nksc file then how do I get back to my best efforts (before experiments) on adjusting a image? If I've saved an *.nxd file I can load it and i'm back to a known set of adjustments.

I don't delete *.nksc files and I move NEF(s) from one folder to another with ViewNX-i or Capture NX-D as this keeps the *.nksc files associated with the NEF files.

To me the *.nksc files are Nikon's temporary files and other than moving NEF(s) with ViewNX-i or Capture NX-D I ignore them. Their size is only about 10KB so they don't use much space on an HD or SSD.

Dave

[David H. Hartman]

While I absolutely agree that Studio should be able to read the CNX-D .nxd files and I am encouraging you to file a report with Nikon on it...

How do I send Nikon a report or offer suggestions? Can someone drop a link?

I've sent an email to Nikon but it was probably send to the wrong place.

I am quite displeased with NX Studio's crop feature. It's unfinished and I think Alaph test quality, not even ready for Beta tesing. It's a major step backwards. I note that an image can be cropped in Capture NX-D and NX Studio honor the CNX-D crop but if the crop tool is clicked the CNX-D crop is history.

Also there are many times where Undo and Redo are grayed out. This should not have escaped in a v1.0.0 release. Again this is to me an Alpha test release. At least with Capture NX-D the first released were 0.9.x releases. They were rather rough but at least the user was forewarned.

Dave

---

My impression is Edit> Undo/Redo is so frequently grayed out I wonder why it is found in the Edit menu. 

[Øivind Tøien]

OK, I understand better now. May be one thing we should wish for though feedback is a versioning system, like in CNX2.

When CNX-D was released Nikon had a special bug/feedback reporting page, however we do not see that for NX Studio (yet). So feedback will probably have to go though the regular support channel: https://www.nikonimgsupport.com/ni/NI_ask_support?ctry=US&lang=en_US (or google 'Nikon customer support').

Keep in mind that a number of things were missing in CNX-D in the beginning, and Nikon did listen to a number of specific wishes, like  the control points and ability to import files edited with CNX2. The inclusion of IPTC editing tab in studio and choice of saving edits to nefs seems to echo a suggestion I (and probably many others) made to improve CNX-D. It seems like while Studio looks somewhat polished in some respects, others did not make it in time like the undo. Perhaps they hoped to get it out CP+ and got rushed. With proper feedback we are probably going to get there, but it might take some time. Until then CNX-D will work well enough for me.

[David H. Hartman]

Perhaps they hoped to get it out CP+ and got rushed. With proper feedback we are probably going to get there, but it might take some time. Until then CNX-D will work well enough for me.

My guess is NX Studio was rushed out due to the Apple M1 CPU Mac(s).

I wish I could buy one. My old MacBook Pro is living on borrowed time. There may be a problem with the SSD in it but my fear is video ram is going bad. A friend's MacBook Pro, about 1 year newer than mine, needed a new logic board for $700.00 (USD). A Crystal Ball would have helped her. That $700.00 could have gone toward a new MacBook with the M1 CPU.

Thank you for the link!

Dave

[Airy]

I finally managed to install it on my other Win10 laptop. Strange it does not want to install on the M$ Surface pro.

For a CNX-D user, the new software feels familiar, and I have yet to find out the biggest changes.

One thing does not change, alas : there is no way to correct distortion manually - did I miss something ? as I am using lots of non-Nikkors, that's a small problem.

[Airy]

[Bored] The second time I try and launch NX, it freezes:hourgalss spinning, and some low CPU activity going on for hours. Had to kill it via the task manager. Third and subsequent time : same phenomenon. Pretty crappy release, it seems.

[Birna Rørslett]

Even on one of my smaller laptops, NX Studio runs well. Snappy response in general.  No hiccups so far. This is on a 16GB box with 1 TB SSD.