Raw

[cshontz]

Thanks guys - all good information. I've been actually reorganizing and experimenting all evening. I think I can optimize my workflow to make RAW more viable. The biggest issue is space. When I purchased my Canon XTi, I was coming from point-and-shoot and expected a 2 gigabyte CF card to be more than adequate. For JPG, this is true, but in RAW... forget about it. Fortunately, they're not that expensive. An 8 gig'r should be adequate.

I also have a 500 gig USB drive that is mostly empty and should also really help. The problem is, its too slow to work off of, so I'm going to have to manually off-load files from my laptop every thousand pics or so. That makes perfect sense anyway.

Mark, what are you using to manage your photos? Lightroom? I gave it a whirl for the first time tonight, and I think I'm sold. Very intuitive, streamlined photo management app makes RAW handling a breeze. There is even a third-party export-to-Flickr plugin that I consider to be pure gold.

 

[articulate]

The end product is almost always a JPEG, but your RAW file is like a high quality negative.

. . . When I shoot for a client, I shoot in RAW/JPEG. We can use the JPEGs for a quick review of the work, and image selection. Then I use the RAW file as the basis of the end product that gets printed and delivered.

Good points, good advice. Noted. I didn't think about that reviewing bonus of shooting in JPG and RAW.

Mark, what are you using to manage your photos? Lightroom? I gave it a whirl for the first time tonight, and I think I'm sold. Very intuitive, streamlined photo management app makes RAW handling a breeze. There is even a third-party export-to-Flickr plugin that I consider to be pure gold.

I haven't tried Lightroom, mainly because I've shot fewer than 60 frames so far. I suspect I'll end up with Lightroom because everyone else likes it.

 

[cshontz]

Wow. I just dropped the boy off at school, turned around in my seat to snap a picture, came home and made a couple of quick adjustments and voila. I'm very happy.

 

[cawddsasf]

Nice colors! What camera are you using?

 

[Ursidae69]

Good picture Chris. :costumed-smiley-007

I checked into Lightroom, it retails for 299. Too bad it doesn't come with Photoshop, I've already invested in that. I might download the free trial to check it out.

 

[cshontz]

Nice colors! What camera are you using?

Good picture Chris.

Thanks, guys!

I'm using a Canon XTi and shot this with 10-22 EF-S.

 

[Robthebrit]

It all depends on what software you are using.

The setting the camera would of applied to the image are stored within a chunk in the raw file (CR2 files only, this data is not in the old canon CRW format and I know nothing about Nikon). The pixels in the raw file are exactly what came from the sensor but if you apply these settings the resulting image will give exactly the same colors as the jpeg the camera would of made.

The CG industry uses this all the time, we convert all files to HDR. We use custom software but I beleive commercial software such as Lightroom can extract and apply these settings.

Rob

 

[Photog]

In the menus of your camera, you can change the way the camera processes the JPEG file. You can add more/less saturation, extra sharpness, B&W, more contrast, etc. All of these adjustments should show up in the RAW file too. But the nice thing about the RAW file, is you can change them later (oops, too much saturation in that photo). With the JPEG you can make some small adjustments; but you are usually just SOL.

I think that is another way of saying what Rob just said.

 

[Robthebrit]

Lightroom and photoshop certainly have problems with raw files.. I wouldn't expect anything less from Adobe...

I just did some tests and shot in jpeg+raw. When these pictures were loaded into lightroom the raw is identical to the jpeg. However, it seems Lightroom is applying only some of the settings that are in the file when initially loading it - for example color balance is always applied. The picture controls in my 5D are set to "faithful" which is all zeros for the adjustments but If I mess with the picture controls, the jpeg changes but the raw doesn't. At the extreme case I can set the controls to monochrome and the jpeg is monochrome, as expected, but the raw is initially color. Sure I can redo the monochrome settings in Lightroom but by default it is not applying the camera saturation settings.

In all the cases I have tried the correct parameters are in the raw file, in fact the canon software handles it properly and initially the raw file appears in monochrome, even window vista handles it properly. Neither Lightroom or Photoshop CS3 handle it and the raw file appears in color.

YMMV depending on your software and the settings you use.

Rob

 

[goodtimes]

. . . expected a 2 gigabyte CF card to be more than adequate. For JPG, this is true, but in RAW... forget about it. Fortunately, they're not that expensive. An 8 gig'r should be adequate.

You might consider multiple smaller cards as opposed to one large card. The story I hear is that you can only over-write these so many times...so if you are not using the full 8 gigs every time you use it...you are not getting full benefit from a life expectancy stand point. In addition, having multiple cards reduces the risk of loss due to damage. 8 gigs of photos spread out over 4 cards...lose a card and you only lose 25% of the images.

At least that is the logic that the fine expo croud used to convince me to get 4 two gig cards instead of one 8 gig card last year.

 

[Ursidae69]

Lightroom and photoshop certainly have problems with raw files.. I wouldn't expect anything less from Adobe...Rob

I'm always looking for a better mouse trap. If you've had less than stellar results with Adobe products, what do you like Rob?

 

[Lost Canadian]

The the one problem I have with Lightroom is, as Rob said, it strips all in camera presets and the opens the file using ProPhoto RGB color space. This is good in some cases but can really increase your chances of making a mess a things if you don't know a thing about color management.

I love the workflow layout and possibilities of Lightroom, it's very powerful, but I still use Nikons Capture NX if I want to get the best out of my photo's, it doesn't strip my in camera adjustments, and I can work in, and convert to any color space I want. I'm not limited like I am in Lightroom. Unfortunately for you Canon guys and gals Capture NX is of no use to you as a RAW converter because it only works with Nikons NEF files.

 

[pathfinderdriver]

I've had really good luck with Lightroom, and it seems from the magazines allot the pros use at least some of Lightrooms functions. I've been using Both Lightroom and Adobe Bridge/ Photoshop.

 

[Photog]

Canon has DPP (Digital Photo Professional). It can be downloaded for free. But it only works with the SLR cameras, not the cameras like the G9.

 

[Ursidae69]

Canon has DPP (Digital Photo Professional). It can be downloaded for free. But it only works with the SLR cameras, not the cameras like the G9.

Hey Photog, I use DPP for my adjustments if needed, usually it's tweaking the exposure a bit. I use Photoshop for batch resize and bordering and sometimes other tweaking. I like it, but I am just an amatuer and am wondering if I should be learning more powerful packages.