JPEG or RAW?

[KmH]

UP TO 2 stops of leeway with Raw files.

You get 2 stops of leeway if none or 1 color channel is clipped.
You get 1 stop of leeway if 2 color channels are clipped.
You get 0 leeway at all if all 3 color channels are clipped.

 

[pgriz]

With 32GB memory cards available for very little, the discussion of not using RAW for sake of "saving" memory space is kinda meaningless. More relevant is how accurately does the final JPG out of camera represent your intention? Most of us do not make perfect decisions, and need the lee-way provided by the RAW to revisit our decisions with respect to sharpening, WB, saturation, etc. Of course, using RAW also means that you're committing yourself to post-processing. If you have no intention or need of doing post-processing, then going to JPG is a reasonable choice. ..

FWIW, I wouldn't saw very little. The cost of Extreme Pro SD cards to me is expensive - the OP has another thread about getting fast cards. So when you pick fast cards the cost goes up quite quickly. I can see how the cheaper cards are worth it as general storage. But if you are also looking at speed you end up spending alot $$$.

True, but cost is relative. If you're shooting in your home (or conveniently close), then the cost to do a retake is minimal (unless it was a one-time-in-a-lifetime kind of thing). However, if you're travelling, or at an event, or capturing something that is unique and potentially unrepeatable, then the cost of the extra storage is actually an insurance cost against (inevitable) screw-ups. Given the amount of money most of us invest in our gear, and in travelling to places where pictures are gorgeous, then skimping on the actual repository of the imagery (the card), seems dubious economizing to me. Especially, being human, since we are going to screw up somewhere. Personally, I'd like the "insurance" of being able to get a semi-decent image from a remote or unrepeatable shoot, then pat myself on the back for "saving" less than $100 but missing out on the imagery. But that's my balancing of priorities.

 

[pgriz]

UP TO 2 stops of leeway with Raw files.

You get 2 stops of leeway if none or 1 color channel is clipped.
You get 1 stop of leeway if 2 color channels are clipped.
You get 0 leeway at all if all 3 color channels are clipped.

Actually, in my own testing to determine the "real" dynamic range of my camera, ( http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/...rmine-dynamic-range-camera-my-experiment.html), it appears my camera has about 7 stops of dynamic range at the JPG level, and closer to 11 stops at the RAW level, which confirms your numbers.

 

[hamlet]

With 32GB memory cards available for very little, the discussion of not using RAW for sake of "saving" memory space is kinda meaningless. More relevant is how accurately does the final JPG out of camera represent your intention? Most of us do not make perfect decisions, and need the lee-way provided by the RAW to revisit our decisions with respect to sharpening, WB, saturation, etc. Of course, using RAW also means that you're committing yourself to post-processing. If you have no intention or need of doing post-processing, then going to JPG is a reasonable choice.

The links Keith gave you explain many of the technical underpinnings of why using RAW "may" be a good choice for you. If you are the kind of person who NEVER revisits his choices, and NEVER would want the option of going back to re-do some aspect of an image, then using RAW would be a waste of memory space. If, on the other hand, you make mistakes and need to salvage an unrepeatable situation, then RAW is a good insurance policy to allow you to retrieve something from what would otherwise be a complete loss.

Can i convert images by the hundreds to jpg in lightroom?

 

[lambertpix]

Can i convert images by the hundreds to jpg in lightroom?

Piece of cake. Just export the ones you want to save as JPG, sized however you want, sharpened for screen or print, add a watermark, etc. I'm probably missing a few options, too. Until you figure out your workflow, it might seem a little awkward, but it's really nice once you've been through the dialog a couple times.

 

[hamlet]

Then raw it is. :cheer: I jumped the ships fairly quickly from film, jpeg to raw. This is all going so fast. A month ago i thought people were still shooting in film.

 

[480sparky]

Can i convert images by the hundreds to jpg in lightroom?

I can't imagine it not having a batch process option.

 

[astroNikon]

Yes you can select all the pictures in your Collection to batch convert to JPEG or specific settings that you may like.
I 've recently did that for my kids soccer games this past weekend and uploaded them to Flicker for all the parents.

Now "how" one selected photos is kinda counter intuitive at first until you understand it ... lol

 

[lambertpix]

Yes you can select all the pictures in your Collection to batch convert to JPEG or specific settings that you may like.
I 've recently did that for my kids soccer games this past weekend and uploaded them to Flicker for all the parents.

Now "how" one selected photos is kinda counter intuitive at first until you understand it ... lol

Check out the Flickr publisher -- you can select a bunch of photos, create a photoset, and publish straight to Flickr in one operation. It'll even pull Flickr comments back into LR so you can see them there. It's not revolutionary by any stretch, but it knocks out a step or two and saves generating a bunch of JPGs that suck up disk space (the JPGs still have to be generated, of course, but they're treated as temp files that can be cleaned up without fear of losing any useful info).

 

[astroNikon]

Yes you can select all the pictures in your Collection to batch convert to JPEG or specific settings that you may like.
I 've recently did that for my kids soccer games this past weekend and uploaded them to Flicker for all the parents.

Now "how" one selected photos is kinda counter intuitive at first until you understand it ... lol

Check out the Flickr publisher -- you can select a bunch of photos, create a photoset, and publish straight to Flickr in one operation. It'll even pull Flickr comments back into LR so you can see them there. It's not revolutionary by any stretch, but it knocks out a step or two and saves generating a bunch of JPGs that suck up disk space (the JPGs still have to be generated, of course, but they're treated as temp files that can be cleaned up without fear of losing any useful info).

Thanks. I'll look at it. But I'm done for this season. so I at least have time to figure it out.

I'm curious if anyone shoots RAW for sports ?
I shoot Raw for alot of things, just not sports as I need the burst rate.

 

[hopdaddy]

Also I've found myself shooting much differently with raw. I tend to shoot everything 1 stop darker than what is metered. I do this because I know I can it's easier to bring up dark than to bring down highlights.

WHAT? sttr much????

 

[cynicaster]

One thing that I never see get mentioned when a noob to RAW asks this question--perhaps because it is assumed to be self-evident by those with experience--is that until you actually learn how to process a RAW file (rather than just blindly moving sliders around), you're not necessarily going to see any benefit. In fact, you might see results that look crappier than the JPEG made by the camera.

I remember it took me a while to get it. To be honest, I almost gave up on RAW entirely because I didn't see it to be worth all the extra effort. Then, I went on a trip and captured some difficult shots during a storm that would be impossible to go back and recapture, but unfortunately the shots had slight exposure and color cast issues. I had a real "A-HA!" moment when I put my mind to working on those particular RAW files because I was staggered at how much better they looked than the camera JPEGs. Absolutely no comparison in that instance. I became a believer in RAW, but still, there are lots of situations where I end up just deleting the RAW files and going with the camera JPEGs because they look fine.

To be clear, I'm not discouraging use of raw simply because somebody is inexperienced with it. The great thing is, once you get to be good at it, you reserve the option to go back and re-process your old work if you want, because raw editing is non-destructive.

 

[skieur]

With RAW, if you see something interesting and tar a quick snap only to realize that it's underexposed and the white balance is wrong, you can adjust it in LR fairly easily unless it's just really over/underexposed.

I am unfamiliar how its easy to edit the pictures? How is it easy?

It never seems to get mentioned that in order to make use of greater picture info. and editing latitude of the RAW format, there are certain REQUIREMENTS:

1. You need to be able to see weaknesses in white balance, highlight and shadow detail, colours, exposure, sharpness, background, etc. and what needs to be changed or tweaked and by how much.

2. You also need to be able to use the software to make exactly the level of change that is needed as in not too little or too much.

If you don't have these visual and editing skills yet, then I would doubt that there is much advantage to using RAW.

 

[lambertpix]

If you don't have these visual and editing skills yet, then I would doubt that there is much advantage to using RAW.

Fair enough. But if you're improving as a photographer, and you intend to improve further still in the future, then I'd predict there will come a day when you'll finally "get it". At that point, you'll start looking back over all those photos you've taken and wish you had RAW files for them.

One of the reasons I shoot RAW is that I can't go back and re-shoot some stuff, but I sure can go back and re-process photos.

 

[480sparky]

Fair enough. But if you're improving as a photographer, and you intend to improve further still in the future, then I'd predict there will come a day when you'll finally "get it". At that point, you'll start looking back over all those photos you've taken and wish you had RAW files for them.........

Bin dere, dun dat.