Why bother with RAW

kelly1

Borderfox wrote: »

All of this is fine but what if your jpeg is finished when its out of the camera, exposure correct/white balance correct/no clipped highlights

To say that jpeg is never used for serious work is naive to say the least, newspapers are full of unmolested jpegs

OK, I take your point I was thinking about landscapes, portraits, weddings and the like.

melekalikimaka

unless your in need of shots sent off ASAP, there is no reason to shoot jpeg, you loss out on alot of ability to perfect the image, not shooting raw is madness in this day and age.

Hugh_C

RAW is great for studio work - why limit yourself deliberately by shooting in jpeg? I haven't shot in jpeg for years - storage is cheap nowadays ...

gsxr1

gsxr1 wrote: »

Without trying to sound stupid.

Is there a simple exercise I could do with a simple pic . Like this
THIS ONE WAS JUST SHOT IN RAW


THIS ONE WAS JUST SHOT IN JPEG


I have two shots here taken together.

What can I do to them via photo shop to make the difference apparent.
In laymens term:o

the raw shot one has more clarity but im not sure if that was due to the car headlights that where turned on in one shot and not in the other. The camera reset the apeture automatically

If you have a RAW editing program, change the white balance. I use Adobe Camera RAW, and changing the white balance will be as easy as going to the buttons at the top left of the screen, finding the "white balance" tool, and clicking on the snow. You'll instantly see a difference and the photo will look a lot more like the scene when you were looking at it through your own eyes.

Alternatively, and not sure how much success you'll have with this one, but if you bump up the saturation in both of them as much as you can, the RAW file should handle this better than the Jpeg. The JPeg will possibly look a lot blotchier or "posterised" in comparison.

tommycahir

Hope this doesn't hijack the op's thread but which is better for processing RAW files
- Lightroom 3
- Adobe Camera RAW

Paulw

Lightroom uses Adobe Camera Raw to process. But, it does it in the background.

ACR, on it's own, only gives you limited ability to process.

gsxr1

will my new CS5 do it? I can send it via the Cannon software. The pic pops up in photoshop after I send it. Is it still in RAW when it arrives?

I read in a mag that I should just stick to PS instead of lightroom as it is a better skill to have in the long run. But I have both programs.

CabanSail

tommycahir wrote: »

Hope this doesn't hijack the op's thread but which is better for processing RAW files
- Lightroom 3
- Adobe Camera RAW

Saw a side by side comparison recently. Most of the Raw Converters are much the same except for the one in Aperture which had distinct advantages in getting detail in the highlights.

Captain Flaps

I'm always amazed when I talk to/read about people struggling with Photoshop and Camera Raw instead of using Lightroom. It's BY FAR the best digital Photography application on the market and it costs peanuts compared to anything from CS5. But I digress.

I don't think I've shot in jpeg since I got my first DSLR in 2006, one thing that was hammered into us during college was that we could make better decisions about what to do with the data the sensor collects than the camera, and that a Raw file can be revisited later when our skills and the software available to us are more advanced.

I'm also of the opinion that if you have to make more than just the basic tweaks to your image to make it look right, you should be spending more time learning to use your camera. HOWEVER, I would also call bull**** on the SOOC/film purists who turn up their noses at any kind of post processing. I shot a project extensively for 2 years on medium format film to submit for my degree, the negs were great but I still had to spend a considerable amount of time correcting stuff in the Flextite software (exposure/colour balance especially). I found that when the scanner (15 grand Hassleblad X1, not just some crappy flatbed), looked at my negs and made its best guess at creating an image from them they were invariably not as good as when I scanned them and processed them myself. Why should it be any different for a camera sensor? When I was shooting and printing in the darkroom, there was also a lot of time spent correcting the prints, whether they were being dodged or burned or graded. Post processing is and always has been a huge part of photography.

Now obviously I'm not covering sports events or photojournalism where the speed and larger buffer offered by jpeg far outweigh the quality gains, those are completely valid reasons to shoot jpeg and if you know what you're doing it definitely the way to go. Since my work is mostly wedding/pr based (as well as my own personal work) I don't see any advantages at all to shooting jPeg.

tl,dr; there are advantages to both but generally a good working knowledge of RAW processing will only help you. If nothing else, you'll be able to see what's possible with software and what's not which will inevitably lead to you taking more care when you're out with your camera.

melekalikimaka

looking at the reviews for fps in jpeg vs raw, really, do people notice a .02 of a second?

Captain Flaps

melekalikimaka wrote: »

looking at the reviews for fps in jpeg vs raw, really, do people notice a .02 of a second?

It's not the speed, it's the number of images you can shoot in quick succession without the camera having to pause to write to the card. On most cameras the number of jpegs is a lot more, as much as double. Even the fastest CF cards won't stop this.

Blazer

Captain Flaps wrote: »

It's not the speed, it's the number of images you can shoot in quick succession without the camera having to pause to write to the card. On most cameras the number of jpegs is a lot more, as much as double. Even the fastest CF cards won't stop this.

agreed...notice my buffer is about 6fps when shooting raw but jumps to 99 when jpeg only...huge difference in sports shots..especially in getting the facial expressions





Started shooting RAW recently in addition to jpeg..
boss recommended me to get Scott Kelby's CS5 photoshop book and it looks very interesting...in fact I used to shoot RAW+jpeg but now set my camera to RAW only in order to force me to learn CS5 etc, how to edit RAW, WB balance etc and all that

melekalikimaka

Sc@recrow wrote: »

agreed...notice my buffer is about 6fps when shooting raw but jumps to 99 when jpeg only...huge difference in sports shots..especially in getting the facial expressions





Started shooting RAW recently in addition to jpeg..
boss recommended me to get Scott Kelby's CS5 photoshop book and it looks very interesting...in fact I used to shoot RAW+jpeg but now set my camera to RAW only in order to force me to learn CS5 etc, how to edit RAW, WB balance etc and all that

do people really do bursts of 6+ ?

whats the average sport togs would burst?

kensutz

10fps

gsxr1

my entry level dslr will only shot 1.5 frames per second on raw. while it will do 3 fps in jpeg.

I shoot sports so its not really that much use to me for that

melekalikimaka

kensutz wrote: »

10fps

wowza, i understand now

Blazer

gsxr1 wrote: »

my entry level dslr will only shot 1.5 frames per second on raw. while it will do 3 fps in jpeg.

I shoot sports so its not really that much use to me for that

that seems very low for jpeg..what camera do you have?
Mine's a 40d..rated for raw at 6.5fps, no idea for jpeg but unless I leave the button pushed about 10 pics in only then does it begin to drop from 99..

mehfesto

I always shoot raw since been converted by a friend.

I shoot to underexpose at gigs (shoot at a higher shutter speed to freeze the action) and then I can use the exposure adjustment benefits of raw to bring the picture to a satisfactory exposure.

Other than space requirements and writing speed, there are no reasons to not shoot raw. It's deadly.

mrboswell

Sc@recrow wrote: »

that seems very low for jpeg..what camera do you have?
Mine's a 40d..rated for raw at 6.5fps, no idea for jpeg but unless I leave the button pushed about 10 pics in only then does it begin to drop from 99..

It's still 6.5 fps for jpeg but you just get more jpeg shots in the buffer compared with raw

Roses And Shutters

Just throwing this out there, but if you feel the need to shoot in jpeg for speed. Do a batch save in an uncompressed file format, like tiff, after you've imported the images from the camera and work from the uncompressed files. So that later on, if you revisit the images, you won't loss data when you re-save them.

Captain Flaps

I think there's a bit of confusion with terminology here, people are getting mixed up.

FPS = frames per second = the number of images your camera can shoot in a second at high shutter speeds (this should be reasonably consistent for both Raw and jpeg, though jpeg will be slightly faster)

Buffer = the number of images you can shoot continuously without releasing the trigger before the camera has to stop and finish writing to the card. This number will always be lower for raw as larger files take longer to write.

So let's say your camera does 6.5FPS when shooting raw, and you have a buffer of 65 raw images (unlikely but for the sake of clarity let's go with that), you'd be able to shoot continuously for 10 seconds before your camera stopped taking photos and flashed the 'busy' light.

If the same camera has a buffer of 650 images for jpeg (again unrealistically high), you could shoot for 100 seconds (if only!) before the camera needed a break.

tl,dr; FPS and buffer are different things, not interchangeable terms.

Captain Flaps

Roses And Shutters wrote: »

Just throwing this out there, but if you feel the need to shoot in jpeg for speed. Do a batch save in an uncompressed file format, like tiff, after you've imported the images from the camera and work from the uncompressed files. So that later on, if you revisit the images, you won't loss data when you re-save them.

Yes you will. The images come out of the camera as compressed jpegs, if you save them as Tiffs they won't recompress but if you try to save them as jpegs again they're immediately recompressed. Also converting all your images to tiff is a great way to triple the filesize.

Roses And Shutters

I wasn't clear. That's what I meant, when I said save as a tiff I also meant when you re-save continue saving as a tiff. As to the file size, storage is cheap. If you need a smaller file to send make a smaller one, but always keep the larger one.

magicbastarder

melekalikimaka wrote: »

wowza, i understand now

you'd think they'd just buy a HD camera and do screengrabs...

Captain Flaps

1080p HD camcorder = 1920×1080 pixels
Canon 1Ds3 (21MP) = 5616 x 3744 pixels

Also standard video cameras don't capture frames fast enough for good sports stills, you're talking 24 frames per second even vs potentially a 1/4000th of a second capture.

magicbastarder

to be honest, i was just being facetious.

melekalikimaka

Captain Flaps wrote: »

1080p HD camcorder = 1920×1080 pixels
Canon 1Ds3 (21MP) = 5616 x 3744 pixels

Also standard video cameras don't capture frames fast enough for good sports stills, you're talking 24 frames per second even vs potentially a 1/4000th of a second capture.

24 secs as a minimum, i used a sony hdv video cam that can shoot a 1000 a sec

Paulw

Captain Flaps wrote: »

1080p HD camcorder = 1920×1080 pixels
Canon 1Ds3 (21MP) = 5616 x 3744 pixels

You wouldn't be shooting sport with a 1Ds. More like a 1D MkIII (10mp) or a 1D MkIV (16mp).

charybdis

Captain Flaps wrote: »

1080p HD camcorder = 1920×1080 pixels
Canon 1Ds3 (21MP) = 5616 x 3744 pixels

I don't think sports photographers are users of the 1Ds, so it'd be fairer to compare any other camera to something like the 1D4 (4896 × 3264 pixels). Furthermore, the 1080p camcorder you're referring to is probably a 3 CCD model meaning it can achieve far higher resolution than its pixel dimensions relative to the DSLR's would suggest, up to 3 - 4 times. Also, most sports photographs are printed in newspapers, which doesn't exactly require high resolution images.

Captain Flaps wrote: »

Also standard video cameras don't capture frames fast enough for good sports stills, you're talking 24 frames per second even vs potentially a 1/4000th of a second capture.

It sounds like you don't understand that framerates and shutter speeds are different things, although I don't think I understand what you're trying to say. Could you elaborate?

gsxr1

Sc@recrow wrote: »

that seems very low for jpeg..what camera do you have?
Mine's a 40d..rated for raw at 6.5fps, no idea for jpeg but unless I leave the button pushed about 10 pics in only then does it begin to drop from 99..

canon 1000d.
Continuous shooting speed
JPEG: Max. approx. 3 shots/sec.
RAW: Max. approx. 1.5 shots/sec.

Maximum burst JPEG (Large/Fine): Approx. 514,
RAW: Approx. 5,
RAW+JPEG (Large/Fine): Approx. 4
* Based on Canon’s testing standards with a 2GB SD memory card, ISO 100, and Standard Picture Style
* Varies depending on the subject, memory card brand, image-recording quality, etc.


Wow. now I feel inadequate

Sure im only taking baby steps at the moment.

Just discovered PS Bridge. Seems very simple for RAW photo adjustment.

The Snipe

magicbastarder wrote: »

is a PSD a RAW file?

Not specifically but for comparison of a photographer to a digital artist which I was making yes.

ditpaintball

As said before, there is no better way, shoot in the mode that you need. I use both, depending on what I am doing.

When shooting for dough - I shoot jpeg
When shooting for show - I shoot raw

Shooting for dough is the sports stuff with a Canon 1D MKiii. JEPGs with custom picture style are perfect. Images are sharp and exposed well. When taking on averages 1,000 images a day, you don't have time for raw.

When I shoot for show, I use my Nikon D40 in Raw. It's only a 6mp sensor but I use it for its stupidly high flash sync speed for outdoor portraits and general strobist / portfolio work. I shoot in raw where I can get creative on images.

Explore your camera and see what JPEG proccessing options you have in the camera. If you can tweek your camera to give better saturation sharpness etc in the camera, so that your JEPGS are good to go, then try it. When I shoot RAW, the images is 80% ready out of the camera, the stuff I can do with the raw file in photoshop is only the final 20%. Stick with JPEG if you are happy with the 80%

jpb1974

And all those years I thought it was "trebles for show, doubles for dough"

DotOrg

Deleted User wrote: »

Using JPeg, my camera processes the images quicker, meaning in burst shooting mode, I can get more shots out in succession before the camera buffer stops me; and jpeg means I can get more images on my card.

If I want a billboard made up, and I have two billboards, one with a JPeg photo and one with a RAW photo, will the RAW one look better...

two points on your two points above.
1 - shooting in burst mode until your buffer fills up isn't a great way of improving your photography. try and look through the viewfinder and try and learn when 'the moment' is about to happen, rather than firing away like a machine gun just hoping you'll catch something. Unless you're shooting really fast sports that is.

2 - you will notice a difference if you are close to the billboard and if you did a reasonable amount of processing on both images. if you didn't you probably won't. Any non photographers probably wouldn't see the difference unless you point it out to them