Correcting DSLR color channel clipping?

I have shot some photos with Canon 10D that have one color channel
overexposed (the histogram was OK in the camera, but when I load the
RAW-files in Capture One I see that e.g. red color channel is
overexposed and as the result some areas in the photo are yellow). Is
there any way I could try to adjust the photo to make it usable? I
understand that if any channel is clipped then the image is spoiled
(overexposed image information is lost), but I suppose there should be
something I could try to do to reconstruct a reasonable unclipped
image.

Some ideas that come to mind are:

- using linear RAW-conversion (or combined linear + normal
conversion) to get more dynamic range (I have a vague idea that
someone somewhere has mentioned this, but more information and tips
how to do it are needed).

- I could try to copy data from blue or green channel to overexposed
red channel and then do color correcting if needed (would this help?)

- I could measure white balance in difficult shooting conditions and
use the corrected white balance for shooting (e.g. very dimly lit
interior where main light source is the fireplace is a shot that is
bound to have red channel clipped as most of the tones in blue and
green channel histograms are on the left end, but tones on the red
channel are on the right). Corrected WB might result in losing some of
the mood, but that could be corrected later in RAW-conversion. --> I
doubt this would work, as WB can be adjusted in RAW-conversion phase
and therefore shooting-WB does not actually play a very large role.

- In difficult shooting conditions I could always take two exposures
from tripod (one underexposed to record detail on the channel that
would probably otherwise be clipped, and one normal or overexposed
picture to record detail from the other channels) and then combine the
images in Photoshop. This requires quessing, more work and taking
multiple images, but is probably the most likely way to get good
results?

Would these work or are there any other possible solutions?

-Antti

 

Word has it that on 30 Sep 2003 02:18:21 -0700, in this august forum,
(Antti Heiskanen) said:

If you shot in RAW mode, try dropping the exposure compensation a stop
or two in your favourite RAW-manipulation program. Unless your image is
really horribly overexposed in the red channel, that should bring it
under clipping level.
Also, before converting & tweaking the image itself, do check to make
sure that your WB is set for something approximating the actual lighting
in the original scene, as I've noticed that all the usual programs will
cheerfully blow out the red channel if the WB is a long way from
reality.