So apparently shooting in RAW is the thing to do I believe?
So I took some shots in RAW last night, downloaded them and had a look. I can't see much differnce, TBH. To be fair it was only a few shots of the bikes in the garage though, so I'm very willing to be convinced. 🙂

So, convince me! (In plain language a village idiot could understand please!)
Why should I shoot in RAW, what are the adventages?
How do I use it properly? (There didn't seem to be much editing possible in the Canon software)
Have you got any before and after examples I could have a butchers at please?

Thanks eversomuch!
🙂

afaik RAW is better for post shoot processing as you can fiddle about a lot more with the image than an ordinary jpeg file

Hi Peter. RAW is mainly useful if you need to edit the image. Essentially, a RAW image contains lots of hidden information that you'd lose if you went with a compressed format. For example, if you want to change the exposure in Photoshop (or whatever), a RAW image would end up looking as if you'd actually taken it with that exposure in the first place. If you change the exposure levels on an already compressed (jpg) image, you'll start introducing noise into the image. RAW all the way I reckon, I've not shot a jpg in years.

I'm far from expert but in the photos we use at work we can't tell the RAWs from the non-RAWs on normal resolution standard office monitors.

When you go to high res big screen viewing there is some increase in saturation/definition, I'm sure you wouldn't notice the difference on web hosted pictures though……..

they are bigger file sizes too (because of all the extra information they contain)

Right, so changes to exposure should look more natural. Seems reasonable, and that's something I like to do.

I do need some decent image processing software I think. The best I've got right now is Piknik on Flickr, which I've found really sharpens my pics up beautifully

Will Photoshop Elements do this for me in RAW?

Seems to me it's only gonna be of any use if you play about a lot with photos, use high quality equipment, print out big prints etc.

I bought a camera with RAW facility and I never use it (D'Oh! wish I'd stuck with my wee Canon 🙁 )

You can pull a huge amount more out of a RAW image in processing, but to look at an unprocessed RAW next to an in-camera processed and compressd JPEG, especially at normal size, you won't see much difference (the JPEG may even look slightly better).
Point to note – most cameras shoot in their own version of a digital negative, (nikon = NEF for example) which then translates into a RAW file once you get it into Photoshop.
I can't recommend playing with RAW processing enough – blown-out skies are recoverable, darkened foregrounds can be pulled out, and you can get some real life back into images.

RAW contains 12-14 bit depth per colour (i.e. 4K or 16K shades per colour). jpeg contains 8 (256 shades per colour). This means that if you want to do any sort of editing, or try to correct for exposure mistakes, if you shoot RAW you have an aweful lot more info to work from and come up with decent results. For example you can effectively compensate for under or over-exposure with the twitch of a slider, or generate MUCH better HDR images. Recovering more detail in areas that look like they're blown-out in jpegs is a piece of cake. the jpeg encoder on the camera is often VERY good at choosing the right values, but sometimes, especially in scenes with big ranges from dark to light, it only compromises and may not compromise in the way you choose it to.

Also you have finer control over the sharpness of your image and your colour saturation etc.

they are bigger file sizes too (because of all the extra information they contain)

That really is not the slightest problem. I took nearly 800 shots on Sunday and still had room for 1200 more on the card…… 🙂

Yes I'm pretty sure Elements can handle RAW files. Lightroom can as well.

Oh – and Peter, yes – Elements will deal with your RAW stuff no probs. I got a bit confused initially trying to work out how to convert back to a JPEG so that i had a processed image in an easily useable and reasonably sized format.
Be warned – RAW images get massive once you edit them! you can get 20meg upward file sizes easily.

Sometimes i find that the jpeg shots are more contrasty, a little sharper and more saturated compared to a like for like raw. But this is a BAD thing, as the camera has made those decisions for you. With the raw file, you can do all these changes in post processing and achieve the look/feel you want.

Coffeking – You're convincing me. 🙂

I was very sceptical about RAW until I got my D300, which has odd colour balance – everything comes out too yellow by default (see deejays pics for examples). I sent it back to Nikon for correction, but it was no different when they returned it, so I switched to raw so I could tweak the balance afterwards. Eventually I set on +b2 (2 steps bluer) with auto WB as the best compromise, but lingering paranoia prevents me from going back to JPG. I should say I'm partially colour blind so I find getting the balance right extremely difficult

Lightroom can as well.

What's Lightroom?

Sorry, I'm new to the software side of things!

Also depends on what you want the images for.
When I'm photographing at an event, I can shoot upto 4000 pictures, so there's just no way I can use RAW & keep the workflow sensible, whereas a wedding I'll always shoot RAW, it gives you the extra piece of mind that the file contains so much more information that can be adjusted how you want it & not how the camera sees best to compress it.
Use it a lot for contrasty landscapes as well, as it's far easier to pull detail out of deep shadow or what appear to be blown highlights & still keep everytinhg looking natural.

Post processing, post processing, post processing.

As soon as you start messing about with a jpeg in photoshop, everything you do adds noise.

Making your tweaks in a RAW editor will generate much less noise.

Mind you, shooting in RAW did sort of ruin photography for me as a creative hobby. It removed a large chunk of technical aspect somewhat leaving mainly the composition up to you and basic settings. Once you start making great photos out of technically fluffed shots – it gets boring quickly.

However, all of my photography is editorial now and it's a god send knowing I can get the shot 'about right' and sort it later. Makes things less stressful and you can enjoy the shoot!

Shoot in Raw and for 'snaps', just do a batch convert to jpgs

The benefit of RAW is that it is the uncompressed image that the sensor in the camera captured. jpg's are compressed and have had some automatic processing done on them. This automatic processing is decided by the camera, not you. With the RAW file, you can manipulate all sorts of things with out loss of any data (always keep the original RAW unchanged so you can go back to it). Don't forget, eveytime you save a jpg, it gets compressed. The compression, by it's very nature, discards some data everytime you save it. You can really bring over / under exposed / wrong white balance images to life with RAW and not suffer from artefact, etc, whilst if you really push a jpg, you will start to see the dreaded blocks of colour.

You don't need to shoot everything in RAW, but bear in mind it's everything the camera captured and who knows what we will be able to do with them in the future. If you value being able to keep the best possible images that you can go back to time & time again to make any changes you want, then shoot raw

Goldenwonder – MTB shots mainly, that's 80% of what I do, and it's generally in woodland round here, so exposure can be tricky

Elements is ideal for most image tweaking scenarios and the Adobe Camera RAW converter it comes with is OK but, if you use a Canon camera, their bundled DPP software offers by far the best RAW conversion and some good basic RAW editing tools. I tend to use DPP to adjust exposure where necessary and tweak white balance, curves, contrast and saturation. Then export as a jpeg if I'm satisfied with the image or export as a lossless TIFF for further work in Elements if required.

If you want to see the detail difference between .jpg and RAW, set your camera to shoot both, turn off all sharpening presets then view the resulting files side by side at 100% in DPP. Much more detail in the RAW files.

However, as stated above, if you are only viewing at 'normal' or web sizes, save yourself time and hassle and shoot in jpg. I tend to produce a lot of stuff for image libraries so need to capture and retain as much detail as possible – I usually have to upscale images and submit them unsharpened – doing this straight from camera converted jpegs produces borderline results at best.

Crikey – without sounding big headed there is a bit of miss information here.

A RAW file does not contain extra information. It is simply the image straight from the camera's sensor with no in camera processing at all.

Each pixel of your sensor is only sensitive to one colour. This may be measured and recorded using 8,10,12 or even 14 bits per pixel. So you have an image that is composed of red, green or blue pixels. When you use jpegs your camera performs some calculations that basically averages out the colours by looking at the pixels around them. This is called interpolation or demosaicing. You end up with each pixel in full colour.
When your camera "fixes" its image including saturation, sharpness and the interpolated image it is essentially set. ANy changes you make on a computer change modify that image and you have less control over this.

With RAW this means is you can apply the changes later, on a computer. This gives you more control over the image, less loss of information and you can undo changes that don't work later.

The comment about 8bits per colour for jpeg is a mute point for most people as computer screens can not display more than 24bit and that is 8bits for red 8 bits for green and 8 bits for blue which totals at more than 16 million combinations of colour which for most people is just fine.

It is worth bearing in mind that for most people the extra fuss for RAW is too much but if you want control over your final image without loosing any detail or performing irreversible changes RAW is a good bet.

and not suffer from artefact

WTF is that? Village idiot language please! 😀

A RAW file does not contain extra information.

It does in so far as the jpegs created in-camera lose information. Full detail captured in RAW file, reduced detail output in jpeg.

Ok big disclaimer here – I'm not claiming this is a great shot and it is only some mucking about in the woods with friends type stuff.

But you can image what this shot probably came out of the camera like. It's snowy, I'm shooting into the sun through the trees. The speedlite helped but shooting in Raw allowed me to drag it back into some kind of even exposure.

as goldenwonder says, shooting loads of images makes RAW less fun, as you need to hand-pick the settings for each image it takes a LONG time! But my cam saves RAW and jpeg, so I tend to just leave it saving both (unless I need long stints of high frame rate) and bin the raws if I'm happy with the jpegs.

Shooting in RAW transformed photography for me, as a newish photographer, because my main interest was in HDR (not the ghastly over-saturated look) and some of the more interesting effects you can get, and RAW allowed me to dabble in that faster and easier I think. It also helped with the camera I had, which had a tendency to produce a lot of noise in low-light, and I found I could filter it better in PP than the camera could.

It does add hours to post processing, but it's worth it for some of the images I get. For others I just bin the RAW and keep the jpeg.

However, as stated above, if you are only viewing at 'normal' or web sizes, save yourself time and hassle and shoot in jpg.

I've actually started selling them. I just want to do the very best image I can with the kit I have available to me. So far people are happy with the shots, but I'm not sitting back and resting on my laurels. Must improve! 🙂

This is a typical shot for me. Heavy woodland. I'm actually very happy with this one, but it has to be said to get some detail in the background, I had to sacrifice some of the detail in her face with the software I have. I can see where it could be improved as a result and that's what I'm hoping RAW, or at least better editing software can do for me.

Does that make sense? 🙂

EDIT
God knows how I managed to double watermark that one!

A RAW file does not contain extra information

More information than the JPEG, yes it does. Hence why you point out later (as I did) that it allows further editing without as much loss before conversion to jpeg. The conversion to jpeg is a lossy process, binning information for the sake of space. That's why you shoot raw to retain that info in case it is needed in editing.

The comment about 8bits per colour for jpeg is a mute point for most people as computer screens can not display more than 24bit and that is 8bits for red 8 bits for green and 8 bits for blue which totals at more than 16 million combinations of colour which for most people is just fine.

It's not really a moot point at all, the fact that it stores in 12 or 14 bit means that you have greater control over where those bits are spread when laterly converted to a lower bit depth. Many LCD screens fail to even reproduce an 8 bit image properly, but if you scrap that info early on in the process you're constantly losing information meanign the end result can only be further from the truth by definition.

One word of advice about the Adobe RAW converter if your camera is fairly new
The latest versions of the converter are linked to the latest versions of Elements

So for instance you wouldn't be able to download from a Canon 7D to Elements 6, crafty way to keep you buying the latest Elements edition

TT – Canon 400D, couple of years old……

Any recommendations for software that deals with Nikon RAW files? I'm currently using an old free copy of Pixmantec Rawshooter.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compression_artifact

jpeg is a lossy format – i.e. it discards lots of information before being saved. RAW gives you much better flexibility with processing, and you can always go back later and adjust things like colour balance without making a pigs ear of the image. Editing a jpeg may compound its shortcomings. I always use RAW now – there is no contest in terms of the flexibility it provides, and the quality of image you can produce.

You probably have a setting which saves a jpeg + RAW (i.e. takes up lots of space!) in your camera – then you have a quick jpeg, and a RAW for doing editing on. So if you cant choose which format, then use both!

You can download newer versions of Adobe Camera RAW to work with older versions of photoshop, so no problems using a new camera with older photoshop.

Some info from a Professional photographer on the subject

http://sebrogers.typepad.com/seb_rogers_blog/2007/02/shooting_raw_a_.html

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/RAW-file-format.htm

Once you start making great photos out of technically fluffed shots – it gets boring quickly.

bear in mind no one but you will ever care about how a picture came about, they judge on what they see alone and 'technically fluffed' exists only in your head

… and for me the excitement lays in the subject and I couldn't give a stuff about what the camera is doing to capture it, in the same way as I never concern myself about what size iris my eyes select

I never concern myself about what size iris my eyes select

You would if it decided to close completely, or you wanted to experience that dilated effect rather than an exact replica of the scene in front of you. 😆

Lightroom can as well.

What's Lightroom?

Sorry, I'm new to the software side of things!

Lightroom is another Adobe product, designed specifically for digital photos. It's a bit less of an editor than PS/Elements, and a bit more of a workflow & catalogue tool, but with some very useful & effective editing tools included. For 90% of my photo editing, Lightroom offers enough features.

You would if it decided to close completely

is that physically possible ? I would think it could only happen if I decided to look directly at the sun in which case I would want it to happen…

or you wanted to experience that dilated effect rather than an exact replica of the scene in front of you

I can see you really have fun times 🙂