Originally posted by tlwyse I'm using a K20D as well but I've been in the habit of using DNGs from the camera and not PEF (I've never warmed up to the Pentax supplied raw conversion software). I also use a MacBookPro running OS 10.6.4.
My beef with using raw/PEF/DNG with Photomatix is that it does an "as-is" conversion from the raw data with none of the white balance or exposure corrections that have been saved to the DNG from either ACR or Lightroom. Using the "As-shot" white balance bothers me especially as that is the first thing I do once I grab the DNGs from the camera (I'm one of those anal types that includes both a Robin Myers gray card and a Macbeth color checker in the scene before I start shooting).
As far as the de-mosaicing of the raw in Photomatix, I'll confess that I haven't looked at it all that closely but maybe I should. I did some tests some time last year between the Pentax raw conversion software, Aperture and Lightroom2 and actually that the ACR/Lightroom conversion in terms of artifacts was inferior to the others (you have to enlarge 200-300% to see the diff)....but at the end of the day, the better workflow of LR trumped the others in my opinion. I could see going to Aperture but their limitation of using only AdobeRGB as their internal working space I found unacceptable.
Perhaps I should go back and try some raws/DNGs in Photomatix again and compare the results.
Terry
That makes sense if you are doing color corrections in ACR before running the images through Photomatix. BTW, the new raw conversion in Lightroom 3/ACR 6 is much improved.
I don't color correct before HDR processing but throw the images back into ACR afterwards. I've generally found that Photomatix shifts the colors in tone mapping. I'll have to run some tests to see if I can tell the difference.
I've tried working with ProRGB but after adjusting for my printer's out of gamut color range, I just can't get better prints than I can with AdobeRGB. I suppose that I should just spend the money on toner and practice more.