Robert’s Photography Blog

Bibble Labs Inc. just announced the availability of Bibble Pro and Bibble Lite upgrades to v4.8. The upgrades are free for existing Bibble 4 license holders and represent the third upgrade of the ’4-series’ raw conversion software in 2006. Several new cameras have been added including the Fujifilm S3 Pro and Panasonic LX1.

The Lens Correction tool that enables correction of barrel and pin-cushion distortion as well as chromatic aberration and vignetting has been redesigned to be faster and use less memory. Previously, the tool used PTLens technology which itself employed well-known algorithms developed by Helmut Dersch.

PTlens is now using a private binary database format and is no longer free. According to Bibble, “Beginning with version 4.8, lens distortion correction has been reworked and moved inside the main Bibble application. All of the lens profiles available with the previous (4.7) version of the BPTlens plugin are also included and supported. Moving forward we will be providing our own new calibrations as lenses and cameras are introduced.” What does this mean to a user? It means, you won’t find any cameras or lenses in the dropdown lists that were introduced after PTLens went commercial in early 2006. Yup, this includes the Canon EOS 30D. Interestingly, the new Canon EF 24-105mm f/4 lens is on the list. It must have just made it in just before the cutoff date.

Robert’s tip: Use the Canon EOS 20D setting for the Canon EOS 30D. The sensor and mirror design are the same. It won’t affect any of the other settings and is independent of the EXIF data. You really need to apply this correction to any photos taken with a lens set to less than 24mm when using a 20D or 30D.

Additionally, a new plug-in has been added to Bibble 4.8 that allows customized black and white conversion, including an innovative Spot Color feature. According to Eric Hyman, President and CEO of Bibble Labs: “A new plug-in is also distributed with the application to allow robust Black and White conversion, including an innovative Spot Color feature. “With this plug-in, users can create Black and White images quickly, controlling which color channels affect the B&W value, with much more granularity than simple desaturation. This plug-in also works in conjunction with our powerful color manipulation tools, providing complete control over the B&W conversion process,” says Eric. “Further, our novel Spot Color feature within the plug-in allows for creative effects not available in any other RAW Workflow tool.”

Robert still maintains a very high rating on Bibble Raw Conversion Software. Although, I have knocked them back half a star until this lens distortion correction feature is fully implemented.

I recommend getting the Pro version rather than the Lite version. The difference in price isn’t that much considering that you get multithreading, advanced copy and paste, work queues, and IPTC caption support.

Robert’s rating:

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Addendum July 28, 2006: Bibble Labs has just released v4.81. The Canon EOS 30D is now included in the dropdown box for Lens Correction. This version also introduces the ability to import settings created in Pixmantec’s Raw Shooter Premium and Raw Shooter Essentials.