Fujifilm X-T5 raw photos show strange colors

Aspect Bug Reports
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1

Observed behavior

In Aspect 1.0.0-preview.35 (and possibly earlier versions, I can’t remember), it looks like all files from my X-T5 are displayed with strange colors:

  • blues are shifted towards teal;
  • yellow/oranges are shifted towards magenta maybe?

It almost looks like the image has been cross-processed. It doesn’t look like a straightforward white balance issue, because I can’t reproduce this look by tweaking the color temperature and tint in other software.

I made screenshots for a couple examples in Aspect and in RAW Power, as well as in FastRawViewer and Photomator for one of those examples. I uploaded an archive of screenshots from Aspect and other software, and a couple RAW files, here:

Expected behavior

Color rendering closer to what I’m seeing in other software. I don’t expect an exact match, because interpreting proprietary RAW files is an undocumented exercise left to each software implementation. But given that every other photo software I’m using ends up in the same ballpark and looks somewhat realistic, but Aspect doesn’t, I’m assuming Aspect is getting it wrong. ^^

The other software I tested all have different RAW engines, as far as I can tell:

  • FastRawViewer: LibRaw (it’s made by the authors of LibRaw)
  • Photomator: uses Apple’s RAW library
  • DxO PhotoLab: uses their own RAW engine
  • RAW Power: uses Apple’s RAW library, and their own Extended RAW support for some formats, including Fujifilm RAF files (though I suspect this extended RAW support might be using LibRaw?)

Steps required to reproduce

  1. Import some Fujifilm X-T5 RAF files in Aspect

Operating system/Hardware used

  • macOS 14.3
  • Macbook Air with M1 chip
2

It seems like this is an issue when developing the image without the demosaicing part, so instead of computing a high-resolution image from the X-Trans sensor pattern, squares of four or nine sensor pixels are averaged together to form a single low-resolution RGB pixel. This is used whenever no full resolution is required, as it is much faster, especially for Fuji RAWs.

I’ve added an internal ticket for this (#1378) and will look into it.

3

While this has made loading at 50% or less size a bit slower, I’ve been able to implement a workaround that results in correct colors. Also, while at it, I’ve changed the demosaicing algorithm for X-Trans RAWs to trade a little bit of quality for a big speed gain to make working with those more practical.

The next release is expected to have this fixed.

Thanks for providing the sample images, that has made this a lot easier to find!

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