Sorry, Fred - the geek side of me (my wife would say "what other side is there?") can't buy this. QU doesn't change the NEF file, so if the sharpening isn't in the qrs file, where is it?
Mel
She loves you Mel.
I can tell.
Let me answer your question by asking you one.
If I open a raw image in Photo Shop ACR, (Raw processor), and change the exposure, the contrast the saturation and say SAVE, what do you get?
I will save you the trouble!
You get an .XMP file that carries the changes. That is like a QRS file
The NEF is not changed.... but whenever you open that file again in PS, the XMP parameters are applied!
There are a whole set of default settings that apply sharpening, contrast exposure, etc. These are part of the setup of ACR. They can be changed too.
So to Qimage:
I will ask you to please call your lovely wife in to read this now...
Thank you!
Let us assume you have some sharpening applied in the RAW OPTIONS. You also have some Noise Reduction applied there too.
In that same dialogue box there are other things like color space to be selected too.
(Mrs. Mel, Just think of having a colorful birthday card and wanting to see the correct colors. You have a lamp with a red bulb only, another with an orange bulb and a third with a purple bulb.
You have one more choice. You can step outside and look at the card in daylight. That would be the likely choice for a color space as it is called!
Ok, this stuff isn't that hard, right?
You set the colorspace choice, the amount of sharpening, and the amount of noise reduction in the RAW Options box, and you forget it.
It will be applied to ALL your pictures evenly.
Same color space, same noise reduction, and same sharpness.
OK she's got that, so back to you.
These parameters are defaults. They are saved as defaults like the Skin you chose or the thumbnail size.
When you open a NEF, Qimage looks to see the EXIF information, sees what camera, and applies the defaults...
It doesn't need to save it anywhere else. It is only used in Qimage, applied to your raw nefs.
Now you decide to use the REFINE tools. You can adjust the exposure, the fill and the White balance. Whatever you changed in the refine screen is saved as a QRS file. It can be changed aor deleted in a mouse click. It is not a default because it applied to the image you are looking at only!
You save that change and the filename is blue. That reminds you that you made a change.
Now we go into the editor for further touch up. OK Mrs. Mel... here's where you can help the poor lad.
You are going out to dinner at the Ritz where Mel usually takes you.
Your hair is perfect, and your makeup is fine too, but not quite finished. You always leave that last touch for the end because nothing will brush against it anymore.
So a brush of blush! A swipe with the mascara brush, a dab of lip gloss....
That's what we do to a picture in the Editor. We touch it up. We add a dab of color if needed, a dash of sharpening, if needed and we save it that way.
What you need to explain to Mel is the difference between how naturally beautiful you looked before the touch up, and how gorgeous and stunning after the touchup in the final editor.
I hope she can explain it to you.
Fred