Shooting raw

[FUDGEY]

As a novice I am in the fortunate position of having the local ranger who is an expert in photography teaching me things from time to time. As I said earlier on another thread I'm shooting jpeg fine at the mo but the ranger has said he is going to teach me how to shoot raw as this is the best way. Can anyone explain what this means and is it difficult to learn as I'm a little worried about how I'll get on. With all these questions we might have to start a Fudgeography forum lol I do aopologise but I'm just so keen to learn.

[Ollie]

It isn't particularly difficult to learn and rather than me explain as I aren't so good at explaining you may find this older thread useful. RAW v JPEG

[FUDGEY]

Cheers Ollie I'll have a look at it now bud.

[Jim Ford]

I shot raw exclusively for several years, but lately have gone back to JPEG. The main reason for this is that I got fed up with the time my slowish computer takes for development. The only time I'm now hedging my bets by taking raw+jpeg is with potentially problem shots. I must say that it's refreshing to be able to just put the jpeg images up and quickly view them.

The camera jpeg engine does make a difference, though. I use an Olympus DSLR and the jpeg conversion is often stated as being one of the best there is.

I did see recently an experienced and respected photographer state that if you needed to do 'heroic work' in raw, it's probably a rubbish image anyway!

Jim

[Geoff F]

Go ahead, Fudgey, give RAW a go. It's just as easy to shoot as Jpg and gives you a second chance to adjust some settings. Also the larger file size without any loss of data, as happens with Jpg, means you have more pixels and better data to play with when doing considerable crops and resizes.

The down side is large files so you need a big photo card or a second card, and downloading can take more time; a lot of time if you have an older low power computer, possibly 3 or 4 minutes per photo. But it works fine on any more modern computer.

I use RAW all the time for wildlife work. Most cameras allow you to vary your settings as required. I use RAW + small Jpg so it doesn't take up too much space but the Jpg is easily viewed by my editing software prior to full conversion, so I can see exactly which images are which.

Remember, taking photos is exactly the same with RAW, it is only when processing your photos that there is a small extra step. Some programmes allow you to reset your image data and help to recover blown highlights etc.

During the basic RAW conversion I always convert my RAW files to 16bit Tiff images, which are large uncompressed files so it does take a bit more computer hard drive space but you don't loose any information, as can happen with the compressed files like Jpg etc.

Converting your images will seem strange at first but you will soon get used to it.

[DanJeffery]

You can download (I think from the Microsoft website, or maybe from the camera manufacturers website) a codec that will enable RAW shots to be displayed in Windows as thumbnails of the shot, like the JPEGs.

[Ed Tyler]

Fudgey,

Shooting raw is no different to shooting jpg (sorry to repeat that) the big difference comes after the image has been captured.

You need to learn post processing techniques which can take a while to get your head round but well worth it in the end.

I think raw images look much flatter than jpg's until they have been processed, then you can produce some much better looking images.

It shouldn't take long to turn images around, a few minutes per image.

Although some settings can be changed afterwards please don't let this mis-lead you, get the image right when you release the shutter, don't rely on the computer to do it afterwards.

[Jim Ford]

Originally Posted by Ed Tyler

I think raw images look much flatter than jpg's until they have been processed, then you can produce some much better looking images.

Raw 'images' don't look like anything - they are just files of greyscale data. They don't even carry any colour information. When you look at a raw file in an image processing program, it's already not the original raw data because it has been processed to a degree by the software to enable viewing.

I think what you mean above is that they may look flatter because they haven't been enhanced by the user settings of the camera JPEG engine - sharpness, vivid colours, noise reduction etc.. If the user settings are all set to zero or off, then the JPEG image will look little different to the raw.

Jim

[ron1863]

As pervious posters have stated, shooting in RAW mode is just as easy as shooting in jpeg mode, it's the processing that takes more time, I have a modern laptop and have no problems, though downloading from the card is a lot slower in RAW. You do have a lot more control over the image though.

[Ollie]

Originally Posted by Ed Tyler

Fudgey

I think raw images look much flatter than jpg's until they have been processed, then you can produce some much better looking images.

Although raw images do look flatter than a jpg I don't necessarily agree that a raw image will produce a better looking image than a jpg. Get it right in camera and a jpg image is equally as capable of producing a great image as a raw image.