JPEG or RAW?

Ashley.elizabeth · Oct 30, 2015

I recently done a free family shoot, in which I shot in JPEG. I was pleased with my results, and I enjoyed editing these photos.

I have another shoot coming up in a few days and I was wondering if I should stay in JPEG or try shooting in RAW?

Does one really out-do the other, or is it more along the lines of personal preference?

Peakapot · Oct 30, 2015

I am pretty new to photography but from what iv learnt RAW comes into its own when you edit the photographs afterwards.

When a camera takes a picture in JPEG it burns all the settings into the meta data of the file. Because of this you are limited to editing the photos afterwards.

However when you take a photo in RAW these settings are not burned in.This means you can make massive changes to the exposure and so on without ruining your photo.

I personally have not yet grasped editing post shoot so I take my photos in JPEG and spend a little longer getting the right shot there and then.

If you have skills in Photoshop or some other editing software then RAW is the answer. If you dont then i suggest JPEG.

Hope this helps a little

Dan

Derrel · Oct 30, 2015

I really think raw capture offers the most post-shoot manipulation and adjustment potential, and is the best format to capture in. Raw capture files allow you to adjust the white balance and tint quite a bit, if necessary, and also allows much more adjustment of highlights and shadows, so it's worth it to shoot in raw mode.

You could also shoot in RAW + JPG mode.

TwilitLens · Oct 30, 2015

Ashley.elizabeth said:
I recently done a free family shoot, in which I shot in JPEG. I was pleased with my results, and I enjoyed editing these photos.

I have another shoot coming up in a few days and I was wondering if I should stay in JPEG or try shooting in RAW?

Does one really out-do the other, or is it more along the lines of personal preference?

Hi Ashley. Congrats on your upcoming photo op! Here are some additional thoughts you might find useful...

RAW is just what it sounds like: the raw data your camera captures. And since it's raw data, it can be manipulated in many ways. As Derrel just mentioned, this includes being able to easily change your white balance settings. The downside is that they take up more disk space on your card and on your computer.

JPEG files, by contrast, are smaller in format because they're meant for display on the web. This means that they are processed a bit, i.e. they are compressed. And each time any changes are made to a JPEG file, it gets compressed even more. So naturally these files have a tendency to lose quality over time as you refine them.

Long story short? RAW gives you more options.

Good luck on your next shoot!

Ashley.elizabeth · Oct 30, 2015

Thank you for your feedback, I'll definitely keep this in mind!

I've shot in JPEG previously, done a few edits, and uploaded to my site. Even if i hadn't made many edits, when I posted my photo, it appeared grainy. Would this be because I shot JPEG?

Peakapot · Oct 30, 2015

No I shoot in JPEG and i never have that problem. What ISO do you use typically? Using a high ISO can create "noise" in a photo. If these photos are then enlarged they can appear grainy. This however could be the result of loads of different things.

I shoot in JPEG and iv not had a problem with grainyness if thats even a word.

Dan

Derrel · Oct 30, 2015

Ashley.elizabeth said:
Thank you for your feedback, I'll definitely keep this in mind!

I've shot in JPEG previously, done a few edits, and uploaded to my site. Even if i hadn't made many edits, when I posted my photo, it appeared grainy. Would this be because I shot JPEG?

Grainy-looking digital images can be the result of a number of things, like high ISO settings, bad lighting and underexposure combined, or excessive re-adjustment of the original exposure in post processing software. Sometimes, if the exposures are adjusted too much, there will be some blotchiness or blockiness, or banding or "pixellation". A camera-generated JPEG is often nowhere near as malleable as a full bit-depth raw file; the raw file has MUCH more data in it, and can be "tweaked" quite a bit more than a camera-created JPEG file.

Ashley.elizabeth · Oct 30, 2015

I adjust my ISO correctly for my specific setting, but a friend of mine told me the images may look grainy depending on the screen resolution I'm using to view.
If I post on Facebook, it's not a great image, but let me view on iMac or in Photoshop itself, it's flawless. I just wanted to be sure it wasn't a JPEG issue.

I'll try in raw and see what happens. Thanks everybody!

vintagesnaps · Oct 30, 2015

Go practice shooting in Raw BEFORE you get out on a 'photo shoot' with people.

It sounds like you need a lot more practice and learning how to use your camera, just getting out with your camera taking pictures. Try that first THEN go do shoots with people. Is it fair to them for you to be trying to do or schedule a shoot/session when you don't know this stuff yet? Unless it's your own family and just for fun, otherwise it sounds like you're setting up shoots without the necessary skills to do it.

And what you're describing is noise; grain is in film - it's in the actual emulsion on one side of a roll of film (although a noisy digital image could look grainy.)

Scatterbrained · Oct 30, 2015

Ashley.elizabeth said:
I adjust my ISO correctly for my specific setting, but a friend of mine told me the images may look grainy depending on the screen resolution I'm using to view.
If I post on Facebook, it's not a great image, but let me view on iMac or in Photoshop itself, it's flawless. I just wanted to be sure it wasn't a JPEG issue.

I'll try in raw and see what happens. Thanks everybody!

When posting to sites like Facebook, it's best to export the image in the same resolution that it will be displayed on the site. Sites like Facebook do a really bad job of compressing images, which may be part of the issue you're having. Uploading at the appropriate size on your end keeps their website from having to resize the image, keeping your image looking the way you intended.

Ysarex · Oct 30, 2015

Ashley.elizabeth said:
I recently done a free family shoot, in which I shot in JPEG. I was pleased with my results, and I enjoyed editing these photos.

I have another shoot coming up in a few days and I was wondering if I should stay in JPEG or try shooting in RAW?

Does one really out-do the other, or is it more along the lines of personal preference?

Oh My Goodness.

http://photojoes.net/class_notes/chapter04.html

That's a link to some class notes. It answers your question. It starts you in the middle of the lesson (chpt. 4) since the first 3 chapters are somewhat preliminary however I suspect they may also be worthwhile for you. You'll encounter some continuity problems since this is only a piece of a much larger section of notes and you don't have access to what precedes this.

Joe

Ashley.elizabeth · Oct 30, 2015

Thank you Joe!

dennybeall · Oct 30, 2015

Considering where you are in the learning curve the suggestion to shoot in RAW + jpg is a good one. Do the shoot and use the jpg shots to accomplish what you want. Then use the raw files to learn about raw. You'll need post-process software like Lightroom or Photoshop to deal with the raw files. The learning path is a long one but a lot of fun.

sarahharrold123 · Oct 31, 2015

JPEG is a lossy compression technique for color images. Although it can reduce files sizes to about 5% of their normal size, some detail is lost in the compression. Raw files are named so because they are not yet processed and therefore are not ready to be printed or edited with a bitmap graphic editor.

If you have skills in Photoshop or some other editing software then RAW is the answer. If you dont then i suggest JPEG.

KmH · Oct 31, 2015

What is JPEG? Webopedia

Raw files have to be processed, in many ways, to be made photos.
That processing begins in the camera when the analog voltages developed by light hitting the image sensor pixels get converted to a digital number value in the A/D converter.

When a Raw file is written to the memory card in the camera it is a grayscale image that has no color.
Next a Raw file has to be processed in one ofg the many Raw Converter applications that then demosaices the the pixels so the scene colors can be interpolated, and the conversion software has to set a gamma curve so the light linearly captured by the pixels looks like how human eyes work, non-linearly.

JPEG was designed to be a ready-to-print file format that would not be edited outside the camera. We have only crude control over the in camera editing of a JPEG file.

The issues with JPEG and editing are the lossy compression and the limited color bit depth.
Photo Editing Tutorials