Pending upgrade to CS4 I'm stuck with Silkypix for my LX3 raw files. As I really don't want to learn to use another raw converter on top of ACR and DPP, I planned to download Adobe's DNG converter. 2 questions - does the DNG converter itself open the Panasonic raw files - I don't really understand the workflow to get these into ACR, and secondly, as I'm using CS2, I'm stuck with ACR 3.xx something. Can i download the latest DNG converter (5.xx) or should I dowload an earlier version to stay in sync with my version of ACR

The answer to your first question is yes, the latest version of DNG converter will open and and convert LX3. files. However, there's an enormous "BUT" attached to that. Because the current version of the DNG spec doesn't understand the LX3's lens corrections, whet you get is a demosaiced, linearized, lens aberration corrected, color converted file, effectively a TIFF in a DNG wrapper. When you open that DNG in whatever other program, what the program will read is the demosaiced, linearized color converted data, not the LX3's raw data.

Re using the latest DNG converter with ACR 3.xx, as far as I am aware, DNG converter is entirely stand alone; there should be no problem.

Sandy

So effectively what you are saying is that you need to use Silkypix which has the lens corrections programmed in or have to do a lot of work in either ACR or Photoshop.

If you plan to use the DNG Converter, I recommend using the latest available version of the DNG Converter. It will work with older raw files.

I too don't want to load, learn, or work with any more software than I already have.

I've created sub-directories for JPGS, RW2s, and DNGs. I download the RW2s into their directory, run the DNG converter to point to that directory for its input file source, and point it to the DNG directory for its output. ACR then accesses those DNGs without a hiccup. Pretty simple. The DNGs are large because of the lack of full support for the LX3s code, but its no real hassle. Yes, the workflow would be simpler is ACR could access the RW2s directly, but I've only got one more step in the workflow. I can live with that.

Not quite - DNG convertor will do the lens corrections, but it will bake them and its demosaicing algorithm in the DNG. Ordinarily, a DNF stores the "negative", and you can go back to that as often as you like - in this case its storing something thats a lot more processed

Sandy