If you're new to photography, you've likely heard other photographers talking about shooting in raw and how it's a crucial step in one's workflow. This helpful video will give you a quick rundown of what raw is and why you should be shooting in it to maximize your image quality.
Coming to you from David Flores at B&H, this video examines what raw files are and why they're a great thing for photographers to take advantage of. One thing to note: Flores mentions that raw files are much bigger than JPEGs, and while that's true (they're normally about triple the size), I generally believe that we're at a point where storage is cheap enough to justify overlooking the larger file sizes. The amount of post-processing flexibility one gains far outweighs the additional storage needed, and once you see the control you have over the final image, I doubt you'll ever go back to shooting JPEGs, except in cases when you specifically need to turn around files very quickly. And if you'd like a comprehensive beginner's course, check out "Photography 101: How to Use Your Digital Camera and Edit Photos in Photoshop," which you can get for half off during our holiday sale.
Lead image by David Bartus, used under Creative Commons.
In before NORTHRUP v. FRO... :D
Fro vs Ken Rockwell
LMAO.
Useful info for beginners from a reliable source. The wonderful journey into modern-day digital photography.
In the end of the day, the photographer must know when to shoot raw and when to shoot jpeg and how to manage those two type of files.
I feel like that would result in some rather large JPEG files since the ability to recover detail is directly tied to the compression algorithm, which is the primary benefit of JPEG in the first place. It seems like what you're looking for is essentially compressed RAW with a JPEG file extension. It would be interesting to see to what degree something like this could be implemented.
The other thing to take into account here is given the fact that most people shooting in JPEG are looking to use their images SOOC, disabling noise reduction and sharpening would probably cause the average consumer would perceive the camera to be outputting lower quality images than its more heavily processed (and visually pleasing for the average person) competitors.
I don't think it's collusion so much as the natural result of the competition to make their cameras stand out to consumers. It's like how every TV you see in an electronics store has ridiculously hyped colors to make it stand out more than the one next to it or how music has gotten louder and more compressed over the years as a natural result of competing for attention on the radio.
When you outsource your thinking to a computer, you have also tacitly excepted the computer's decision of what is best. I won't outsource my right to decide to a computer.
I'm a control freak, once a year there is 16 hour PR event shoot I do, maybe 500 gigs of raw images. They want them quickly. One year I decided to shoot in JPG. Client was happy with them, I wasn't. The following year I went back to RAW.
In the 90s I was a drum scanner operator, I thought I was pretty good at processing photos. After getting my first digital camera I color corrected the RAWs, saved the tiffs, then threw the RAWS away. What a mistake. I often revisit my old RAWs to see if I can get any more out of them. I'll open of those old tiffs not realizing they aren't RAWs and I'm so disappointed for throwing them away just so I wouldn't be wasting hard drive space.
I am used to my workflow, and am happy with the results even if it is more work.
I wonder if a JPEG you get out of a D850 or a7Riii would be better than a RAW file taken from a 20 MP Canon Rebel.
define "better".............
I was thinking in terms of dynamic range and how it might look printed at a very large size. I figured at some point the D850/a7Riii JPEG would have to beat a RAW file (e.g., a 6 MP RAW file from a Canon 20D), but was wondering where that break-even point might be.
In my opinion - no.
Everyone knows .BMP is the best duh!
LOL!
A member of the local camera club gave a presentation of how he prepares for print competitions. One of the things he has set on his camera is to use the Adobe RGB color space. The sRGB is a subset of Adobe RGB, so information is being lost. Why intentionally throw information away?
I'm 100% behind shooting RAW. But if you take the time to get to know your gear and set the parameters right and get your exposure and white balance right, then there is no reason not to get great SOOC JPG images. That's how we did it back in the days of transparency film, which had far less margin for error than digital ever did.
If you can get to a level where you are producing great JPG's straight out of camera and then you switch to shooting RAW you'll have a level of flexibility that you would never have if you simply use RAW as a get-out clause for poor camera craft. And you will inevitably have a faster workflow as well as you spend less time correcting 'mistakes'.