never shoot in raw?

[OsmosisStudios]

As an aside: I read Ken Rockwell's page on RAW files. I cant explain how insensed I was with his logic and arguments.

Drawn and quartered. He should be.

[Sixpak]

I actually have one of Tom Ang's books "Digital Photography Masterclass" and I can tell you that nowhere in there have I read to never shoot in raw. He does, and post processes his work and even goes so far as to show you several examples and techniques.

He does state that it's slower to write to memory, but the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. The only other caveat I can think of is that you can possibly do a worse job processing an image than your camera might, but that's why you keep an original and work in layers.

Oh, as others have mentioned... Ken Rockwell is awful, full of bad advice. Once in a while you can find a nugget of information, but take anything you read there with a grain of salt.

Six

Originally Posted by liverlipsyyz

i'm reading a book by tom ang and he states never to shoot in raw. everything i have read by scott kelby says you have to be crazy not to shoot in raw. other than file size is there any reason not to shoot in raw?

[Jim Bryant]

Well said mate

Originally Posted by RoyL

Tell Mr Ang that he is a moron. How anyone can say that a camera produced jpeg is better than Raw defies all logic. I don't know who the person is but if they are professional wildlife photographers in Africa then there is a possibility that they would say that. You would be amazed at the number of professionals that never get past Auto on their camera's, and they view anything else as Amateur.

I know I have said before that if the general consencis is then follow the one that isn't but in this case I think that the thousands of books, tutorials, courses, diploma's and degree's that stipulate that Raw is the best format would suggest that ang is wrong.

If all things being equal, Raw image has 10megapixels and the jpeg has 10megapixels, the jpeg does not contain a bit bucket for later processing it has already been processed on board the camera and even worse is that the contrast in teh image is increased by the camera to give the impression of sharpness to the eye, whereas Raw is just a collection of bits in a bucket (pixel) all 12 bits and each bit describes the tonality of that image. No Processing is done at all on a Raw image so what the fool is talking about I don't know.

[TDrag27]

I just took a beginning dSLR class and the instructor offered pros/cons to jpeg/raw.

RAW is higher quality since it's not compressed and you're able to fix some exposure/wb errors - but you do need some kind of software to process it.

But - There's an advantage to learn how to take good exposures from the camera and not having to rely on post-processing. And I've noticed that there is a slightly longer lag getting the picture on the screen when shooting in RAW (since you are processing more data).

His summation was that if you want the extra abilities with RAW, shoot in RAW+JPEG so that you always have access to a quick/easy file if you don't have time to process files for printing/etc.

Ultimately, I think it's a preference thing, depends on what you're doing, and there's probably no right/wrong answer.

[RoyL]

Originally Posted by windrider86

I can tell you one reason and its not my favorite. I purchased the Olympus E-520 and nothing I use recognizes the raw files that it produces- except for the Olympus program that doesn't really work well at all.
Not happy about it as shooting in raw has always been something i recommend because of its versatility.

Olympus is the most proprietory system there is. Some vendors have tried reverse engineering the files but that can be difficult, and unless Olympus change then it is the User, their customer, that needs to do something about it. Like I did.

I will no longer use anything Olympus because they cannot even manage their front office in Sydney. My whole kit was stolen at the front counter when it was sent in for repairs. They wanted everything, and I lost everything.

But Raw cannot be criticized because of One or two manufacturer's that may possibly fade into non existance eventually. That is assuming they will not change. There is also now debate over the lens system they use as it has not been adopted as expected but another story.

windrider86 is right, SilkyPix is lousy software, if that is what they are still bundling.

[RoyL]

Originally Posted by fletch

I'd listen to Scott Kelby over Ken Rockwell any day.

I would listen to me over anybody, but I am a bit strange The problem is that there are so many people out there that have their own idea's and bents, people like me. What seperates me is a comment made by someone else on this thread, "old schoolers" which I am but I am also very adaptable because of my training in IT. These old schoolers just will not change, they still insist on developing on paper that Kodak has stopped manufacture of and just is not available, or they only use a Leica with a 50m lens, or whatever. They are not adaptable.

When learning it is best to work with what you have, then once you understand it then learn elsewhere. Any other way and you will end up confused. What you should be doing is Adding to your knowledge, Enhancing your knowledge, not replacing it with someone elses. Your views may change over time but it is due to experience, not some idiots web site or book. The best photography book you can read is the camera manual, the best site you can visit is the manufacturer site.

Looking at Ken's site he si quite emotional isn't he. He is using emotion to send his views. I would gather that he has had a bad experience. About 70% of what he says mean's nothing, the rest is his bad experience. And ask yourself a question, "Why advertise something and put up a disclaimer stating that you can't vouch for its reliability as you buy elsewhere". Read the add on the right side. That was the first thing I noticed and normally I would move on but everyone is talking about it.

[RoyL]

Originally Posted by chopstickjayne

Does it matter if you use RAW or sRAW? What is the difference (explained in a way that a "regular" person can understand )?

THANKS!
Jayne

Not answering the question but using it for another purpose It should be Raw or raw or sRaw or sraw. Don't know when capitalization began but I noticed that even some books put it in capitals.

[RoyL]

By the way, I am really enjoying this thread. Normally such an emotive issue causes all sorts of fights but we have held it together really well

This tells a lot about the people on the forum because on others the whole thing would have fallen into disarray. Congrats

[jdepould]

Pah, I've been shooting NEFs since day one. Stuff like Aperture and Lightroom make the difference between raw and jpg negligible. I rarely need the speed of jpg, and I shoot a fair amount of sports, granted I don't usually shoot 8-9 fps (more like 6), but even so.

On the sRaw thing ... what's the point? If you're that worried about file size, just shoot jpg L-fine. You'll probably end up with better results using the full resolution.

I shoot 14-bit, lossless compressed NEFs.

A note on compression, if you have the option for lossless, use it. The camera just reorganizes the data so the most common values have the lowest number. Cuts down on file size with absolutely no effect on quality.

[MarioG]

Originally Posted by TDrag27

I just took a beginning dSLR class and the instructor offered pros/cons to jpeg/raw.

RAW is higher quality since it's not compressed and you're able to fix some exposure/wb errors - but you do need some kind of software to process it.

But - There's an advantage to learn how to take good exposures from the camera and not having to rely on post-processing. And I've noticed that there is a slightly longer lag getting the picture on the screen when shooting in RAW (since you are processing more data).

His summation was that if you want the extra abilities with RAW, shoot in RAW+JPEG so that you always have access to a quick/easy file if you don't have time to process files for printing/etc.

Ultimately, I think it's a preference thing, depends on what you're doing, and there's probably no right/wrong answer.

I started shooting JPEG, then RAW+JPEG, and now just RAW. generating JPEGs from the Raw is way easier than managing twice the number of files. I just upgraded to CS4, which comes with Camera Raw 5. I has very nice features for non destructive edits and batch processing.