i shoot with a D2X and now also a D200. i shoot adobe RGB color mode II. so i set up PM for that color space, but the colors are a bit washed out, compared to when i open the file in ACR/photoshop.
Photo Mechanic just displays the JPEG preview embedded within the NEF file.
also, any adjustment that i make to the file in ACR, and it is written to the sidecar XMP, doesn't show in PM. that involve exposure for when i shoot UE to preserve highlights, and the white balance/color calibration that i have with ACR.
Because ACR does not update the embedded JPEG preview within the NEF file, you do not see the adjustments you make in ACR appear inside Photo Mechanic.
my problem is that when i use PM to workdirectly with the client to select images, i am showing files which are not as good as the actual image is.
any way of solving this?
You could save your conversions out as JPEGs, PSDs or TIFFs and view those. If you save your conversions as JPEGs into the same folder as the NEFs, then Photo Mechanic will automatically combine the NEF and the JPEG with the same names as a single thumbnail, and when previewed will use the JPEG which will look like it did when you were in Photoshop.
should i trasform my files in DNG?
That would also be a solution since ACR can put a current preview inside the DNG files and PM will display that.
i am going for a 2 weeks long gig with a client, and we will be constantly looking at images with PM. i would like to show them the photos as they are displayed in ACR.
Photo Mechanic will likely never be able to take a RAW file and an XMP sidecar file with your adjustments in it and render it the way Photoshop does. It's really just not possible. If Adobe released a SDK that given a RAW file and an XMP file would render it (similar to what Nikon and Canon do with their SDKs) then we could use it, but I don't think Adobe would ever do such a thing since it would not be in their best interests to do so.
I would either save as JPEG from Photoshop so you take advantage of the RAW+JPEG feature and preview from those, or try the DNG route. But one thing I should say about DNG is: don't throw away your NEFs once you convert to DNG, doing so means you will no longer be able to convert your files with Nikon's software should you wish to do so in the future. Nikon's software does not work with DNG files.
HTH,
-Kirk
