IRaw Mono - High-resolution B&W digital infrared imagery

June 2008 - updates being prepared.

December 2006

IRaw Mono is a RAW converter specifically for use with photographs taken using "dark" infrared filters. It's intended for use with digital cameras modified for IR with 87C/830nm filters. In fact it ONLY works with these photographs, and only produces greyscale images.
This is a niche product: if you don't have the right sort of camera, this is not going to work for you. But if you do, we think you'll be blown away by the results.

Wattle Park reeds Canon Pro1/87C

It will not work correctly on photographs taken by "normal" cameras, nor will it work with photographs taken by cameras with R72 or 715nm filters (these cameras can produce false-colour IR photographs). Appropriate infrared filters include: Wratten 87C, Schott and Heliopan RG830, RG850, RG1000, B+W 093, Hoya RM-90. The colour filter array (CFA, or Bayer array in many cameras) behaves consistently with the IR wavelengths passed through these filters, and this lets IRaw Mono do its work.

The difference between IRaw Mono and other RAW converters is that it doesn't assume that each pixel on the sensor has both colour and luminance information. Instead it assumes that each pixel only has luminance information (which is true with these IR filters). The result is images with relatively low noise/grain, and high resolution. Usually finer detail than produced by other software, and higher resolution than provided by in-camera JPEGs.

It's not quite as good as having a "pure" monochrome sensor (as found in the old Kodak DCS-760M) because the dynamic range is still limited by the effects of the sensor's colour filter array, but it's pretty close. There are no current cameras with pure monochrome sensors.

When released, IRaw Mono will be available for OS X (both PowerPC and Intel Macs) and for Windows. If there is interest in Unix-like platforms (e.g. Linux, FreeBSD, etc) we can accomodate that, although it's not currently in the testing schedule (in other words, if you want it please let us know).

IRaw Mono is intended to be used in conjunction with tools such as LightZone, Adobe Photoshop, and Lightroom, but as it generates 16-bit greyscale TIFF files it should be compatible with most software. Its user interface is currently undergoing significant changes, but should have settled somewhat by the beta release.

Supported cameras

There are many, listed here.

Sample output

This page will be updated as we approach the beta release, but in the meantime here's some sample IRaw Mono output.