questions on taking portraits

[OsmosisStudios]

I shoot RAW, regardless of subject matter.

As for portrait/landscape: It depends on what im shooting. Often I'll do both, as mentionned, and see what i prefer later.

[oldwolf]

RAW files do take up more space. They are the image that the camera actually sees and they allow you to tweak the image a bit better without losing image quality before you convert them to something else.

I normally keep my RAW files as well as my final file saved on my internal hard drive and a backup external.

The problems people are having with RAW files are IMO mostly due to not knowing what to do with them or not knowing how to use the program to manipulate the file. TBH I wasn't a fan of RAW files at first because they were huge and I didn't understand how to manipulate them. I used to shoot RAW and immediately convert to JPG or TIFF to work with. Now I do a lot more with the RAW file before I convert to TIFF to work with.

You can usually lose two stops and still fix it in RAW without too much image degradation.

[simplyjoed]

Originally Posted by oldwolf

RAW files do take up more space. They are the image that the camera actually sees and they allow you to tweak the image a bit better without losing image quality before you convert them to something else.

I normally keep my RAW files as well as my final file saved on my internal hard drive and a backup external.

The problems people are having with RAW files are IMO mostly due to not know what to do with them or not knowing how to use the program to manipulate the file. TBH I wasn't a fan of RAW files at first because they were huge and I didn't understand how to manipulate them. I used to shoot RAW and immediately convert to JPG or TIFF to work with. Now I do a lot more with the RAW file before I convert to TIFF to work with.

You can usually lose two stops and still fix it in RAW without too much image degradation.

Thanks for your reply Oldwolf. I guess I will be needing a backup drive.

[morts]

Originally Posted by trelaflip

I shoot everything in RAW then I verify all photos in Canon DPP. I then export all photos as JPG then into Lightroom to edit. RAWs then get deleted.

Reason why I switch to JPG is so I can keep the origional picture style / colors. Even with Adobe's Canon recently released calibration settings it still isn't a 100% match.

Only reason I do shoot RAW is for that 1 of photo I messed up or in a tricky enviroment where I know white balance can be tough.

90% of my photos though are shot vertical.

Use LR to import, convert to DNG. Problem solved!
For some reason, converting to DNG fixes the calibration settings issue!

[trelaflip]

Originally Posted by morts

Use LR to import, convert to DNG. Problem solved!
For some reason, converting to DNG fixes the calibration settings issue!

Really? I will have to try this. I never did try DNG.

[steelese]

So I just started converting to .dng. It makes a big difference knowing that my image files are future proof (maybe). I do shoot raw exclusively, and have for some time. My business partner shot .jpg for a long time and didn't like the extra work involved with RAW. He had a particularly difficult white balance shoot and shot in RAW fixed it in post, and has never gone back to .jpg.

As for how I shoot. I am one of those weird people who particularly love portraits in landscape. Don't get me wrong, I shoot both, but I prefer landscape. I think it is because my background is in film and video production as a PR and marketing guy. I just learned to see everything in a horizontal rectangle. I also thing the eye is led by visual cues more in landscape.

[cloverlane]

just want to say thank you to all for your wonderful responses, it helped me a lot....