Nikon nx studio

[Aubrey]

Anyone using the new Nikon  software NX studio?
I found capture nx d very clunky and did not like the way side car files were organized in a separate directory.

Aubrey

[Mario]

I have not used this yet.
But, from experience, before you do anything permanent, double-check what this software does with the metadata in your files.
Nikon has a long track record of, eh, sub-standard metadata handling...and not even ExifTool can repair everything.

[Aubrey]

I've played with it this morning.
They've brought back control points (I thought that this was proprietary to DxO and Nik ?)
Layout is good for quick changes... looks like Capture-NX2 on steroids! however:

Completely changed white balance in one file to see the effect.
Changes can be saved back into NEF file or to sidecar (which is placed in another directory, like Capture NX-D)

I decided to save back into the nef. (One can also save tiff and jpg)
Result:
It appears that the embedded jpg is not changed, so the thumbnail in W10 and also in IMatch (after forced update) does not change.
If I reload modified NEF into Nikon Studio then I see my changes are present.

It's a first edition of new software, I think I'll continue with DxO's Photolab4 for the time being.

[Mario]

It appears that the embedded jpg is not changed,

You mean the embedded preview in the NEF? Nikon Capture did that, but I'm not aware of any other RAW processor since.
This is something Nikon should do again - updating the embedded preview in the NEF to match the settings you have applied in Nikon software. This was a great workflow in the past days of Capture.

Capture NX was just a relabeled SilkyPix. Is this NX Studio software based on the same OEM?

Since Nikon NX is free it shall I assume it will get some audience. Lot's of press work and online marketing currently.
Most people prefer free and are willing to accept limitations if they get something for free.
Considering that Affinity Photo costs only 50$ for a perpetual license, even free software must offer a lot of functionality these days.
Metadata management was never a strong point of Nikon software in the past, unfortunately.
I will need to download and install this at some point to see what it does.

There is a review and comments over at dpreview: https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/nikon-nx-studio-review

[loweskid]

I tried the old version of NX years ago but soon gave up on it.  Two problems - posterising (banding) in dark gradient areas and the fact that it applied in-camera settings to the raw file.  I expect this is how they can display the focus point.

The problem for me though is that I had set in-camera sharpening to a high(ish) level, which NX applied, and there didn't seem to be a way to turn it off.  The stock agency Alamy will not accept images that have been sharpened so I had to rework them all again in Photoshop.  To my mind a raw file should be just that - raw.

I wonder if this is still the case - maybe I'll give it a try sometime.

[Aubrey]

It appears that the embedded jpg is not changed,

You mean the embedded preview in the NEF? Nikon Capture did that, but I'm not aware of any other RAW processor since.
This is something Nikon should do again - updating the embedded preview in the NEF to match the settings you have applied in Nikon software. This was a great workflow in the past days of Capture.

I meant that the embedded preview was not updated with the changes made in NX Studio
Given it's version 1.0.0 there will be a few (?) bugs to be ironed out.
I'll leave the software installed and come back to it in a few weeks...

Is this NX Studio software based on the same OEM?

I'm not sure, the GUI appears somewhat different to my memory of Capture NX2