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Category: Digital Files and Formats

Photography Question 

Nick Milton
 

Raw Versus Jpeg Fine


I use a Canon Rebel 300D, I shoot in the large Jpeg fine mode (highest setting except raw). My question is, is there really any difference? If I shoot a wedding, and then want to edit some pics before customer sees them, it's easy in Jpeg, Raw is so hard and time consuming - I have to convert to tiff to edit. And I can't see any difference in image. I take time to frame the shot carefully before shooting, this way I dont have much editing to do, just resizing. Am I off the mark here? Or am I right?

I understand that by over editing the Jpeg it will lose quality, but after converting a Raw to Tiff doesn't that, too?

All confused now (lol).


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March 06, 2004

 

Damian P. Gadal
  I believe that shooting in RAW or Tiff you will get more detail. Jpg uses different levels of compression, thus causing some loss of detail. RAW and Tiff will be much larger files and will require more storage, but you can always convert these images to Jpg after you're done editing and you will still have your orginal RAW or Tiff file to work with (providing that you work from a copy of the original image)...
hth


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March 06, 2004

 

John Wright
  I would add a couple of things here.
First, I believe the difference between shooting RAW and Large/Fine is actually minimal as far as the quality goes. What RAW does do is open some opportunities to modify the image as the camera saw it - Prior to applying it's "in camera" configuration.
On the 300D - shooting RAW, you are given the chance to change some settings and effect the image by selecting a different Exposure compensation, white balance, contrast, color saturation, color tone, sharpness, and color space. All of these are set with the camera, but if you shoot Large/Fine the image is modified in camera with the settings as they are set prior to shooting the image. Shooting RAW, you can change all of these settings after the image is in the camera and transferred to your computer.

I agree that it's more work to process the RAW image afterwards. If you shoot correctly from the start and configure your camera with the proper settings before shooting the image - your workflow will be shorter and you'll end up with fantastic images shooting in the Large/Fine mode.

I hope that helps...


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March 06, 2004

 

Nick Milton
  Thanks guys. What is the most popular way of shooting images, for example, if you're taking a wedding, and the customer wants a slide show that evening, before you've created a contact sheet, etc. etc., would you do Raw or top Jpeg setting?


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March 06, 2004

 
- Gregory LaGrange

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  You're not going to need raw for typical wedding photos and typical wedding photo sizes. For highly manipulated photos that a graphics artist might do, or for anything that would be possibly made into posters such as fashion, or shooting an ad for a product, an agency would want digital without compression.
If you were to make a large file jpeg into a 20x30, you would see a difference between something that started out raw because without any compression that raw offers, software can extrapolate more info.
But shooting large/fine jpegs, the image size is 11x17 when you open it in photoshop. So if you're just going to make regular size prints of somebody's wedding, and especially if it's uncropped and unchanged, all you'd need is large/fine jpegs. Just set the resolution high enough, and you'd have a good print.
And with good lenses and good paper, I bet you could even do med/fine or large/normal jpegs if they are saved in the highest sized files. Just shoot a picture in a couple of jpeg settings and see how the prints look in the size you normally make. Because that's all that really matters, how does the print look.


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March 06, 2004

 

Wing Wong
  At the most basic level, what you get with shooting RAW is the ability to compensate for some exposure issues. It isn't that RAW captures more detail than JPEG, but rather, more detail is preserved.

If you shoot raw, one of the things you will find is that you will be spared JPEG artifacting which while minimal in fine/super-fine modes, is still present. This becomes more apparent when you are sharpening/filtering the image. With RAW conversion to Tiff, this is not as much of a problem.

For most prints, you will not even notice the difference. If you crop heavily or if you plan on blowing up the image to a large size, then shooting raw might be a better option. As usual, you will need to determine for yourself which option is better for your workflow.


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March 07, 2004

 

Wing Wong
  Regarding the "instant" slideshow:

Depends on the computer you have. If you have a MacOSX system, you could do it with JPEGS in iPhoto right off the bat. Just make sure pictures are rotated okay.

With windows and third party slideshow programs, it's really up to you. A quick and dirty way would be using PowerPoint if you don't have a slideshow program otherwise.

In this regard, JPEG would be best as raw would require conversion before you have a file which most programs can read.


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March 08, 2004

 

Jeffrey Judd
  I have the Canon 10D and shoot in RAW/Large jpeg format. Using the Canon Digital Camera File Viewer Utility program, I can extract and save the jpeg file for manipulation by selecting "file", "save file" and "extract save JPEG" and still have the RAW file for future use.


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March 09, 2004

 

Artur
  Hi All, the most important aspect of RAW beside giving you ability to control most image processing on your computer, is 16 bit per channel color depth witch is not achievable any other way.


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March 10, 2004

 

Phil Forister
  I have a Canon EOS 10D and all I shoot in is RAW. I shot jpeg for months, and them immersed myself in RAW - I will never go back. With the right Raw conversion program - converting to TIFF/JPG is easy. Use the Photoshop 7.0 RAW/JPEG 2000 plug-in, or something like Capture One. I do not convert to Tiff, too big. I convert to JPG.

Raw takes the data right from the sensor and saves it before; jpeg pompression, sharpening, white balance, contrast, saturation, etc.

The best thing about shooting in Raw is White Balance can be set during conversion. A Jpg with an inappropiate or off white balance is tough to correct. In Raw, white balance has not been preformed yet.

The second most important thing Raw gives you is latitude to correct moderate exposure problems. You can compensate, as you would with the camera, as much as 2 stops in either direction. Although I only recommend a 1/2 stop to a full stop.

Give it a week, the advantages well outweigh the added post-processing. Download Capture One and give it a good try. If you want the best out of your photography - get it right at the shoot, and shoot in Raw to give you better control of the outcome of the photo.


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March 15, 2004

 

Robert Torrence
 
 

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I think we all forgot about the difference in the bit depth in jpeg the bit depth is 8 bits per color (24 bits) and in Raw it changes to 12 bits per color (36 bits) 12 red, 12 green, and 12 blue. I shoot pro cameras and backs and in raw mode some do 48 bit the deeper the color the more colors that can be made in the final output. Check the manual of the camera you are using to see the difference in the bit depth. I do a lot of onsite printing and if you are not printing larger than 8x10 do not worry shoot jpeg. Another tip is if you shoot weddings burn a CD of the jpegs right away that way you will have all of the information you had when you shot it and work from the CD You will be OK!


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March 16, 2004

 
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