Originally Posted by
Michael Gerald-Yamasaki
Artie,
The default brightness setting of 50 for ACR & LR is just some generic setting. Since Adobe can't know what works best for a specific situation (or camera, for that matter) they picked +50.
What brightness does is essentially shift the histogram to the right, in this instance during the conversion of the RAW data to an image. This is not the same as exposing to the right as that would involve altering, well, exposure. The result of the brightness shift (in RAW conversion) is more color resolution at the cost of less luminance (brightness) resolution at the brighter end of the histogram.
For this image, +50 brightness is shifting more of the image to being blown (as you've seen).
What recovery does (this is just my experiential impression) is selectively for the far right of the histogram increase luminance resolution at the cost of less color resolution. This is my impression from what happens when you over recover an image, the color at the edge of the blown regions goes odd and methinks eventually if you could continue to increase the recovery one would see color banding (extreme loss of color resolution).
But enough of that ;) ... What you commonly set brightness at is a matter of taste and its impact will be different depending on how far to the right you have exposed the image.
I prefer to preview my images at 0... All the settings at 0, because for me it is a preview (in LR) before I tackle the RAW conversion in Capture NX and I prefer to evaluate the image from as neutral a starting point as possible... knowing it will look much better when converted and post-processed to my taste.
As always ymmv...
By the way, the in camera histogram, blinkies, etc. is not the same as the ACR histogram (nor is it the same as PS's histogram). Sigh.
Cheers,
-Michael-