JPEG vs. RAW - Discuss

bribrius · Mar 5, 2015

oh, and i will probably never print it either. So both shooting raw and that forty minutes is truly a waste of time. I gotta stop doing that....Especially if i don't think i will print it. No point in editing a photo you aren't going to print anyway. WTH am i even thinking... Forty minutes gone......... i could have been jerking off or something... (oh wait, i guess that pretty much was

480sparky said:
bribrius said:

i spent forty minutes on one last night and i still don't like it. Too many options for edits. If i just shot it jpeg i would have saved forty minutes of my life.

Click to expand...

Um, it's not a requirement to apply every option.

But I gotta ask.... what options are you trying to do that the camera somehow magically does better?

Also, are you using custom presets?

i have a couple custom presets in nikon capture. i also, admittedly, have mentioned many times i have serious workflow and processing ignorance. It was just a portrait. uploaded in n2 bw conversion. Transferred to nikon capture. Played iwth the curves. Didnt like the skin and eyes, uploaded again in elements. didnt work it ruined it. Transferred to nik collection. By then i about had it. Looked worse when i finished then when i started.. Was playing with the artistic side too. So kind of wanted something "different". shot it with a standard two light setup 30mm dialed down flash 400 iso with the idea of a soft nice color. Think it went down hill when i decided i wanted to see what i could do with it in bw for something other than a normal portait shot. so really my own fault. i shot it one way suddenly i thought "hey i wonder if...." and it went down hill from there...

480sparky · Mar 5, 2015

bribrius said:
...............i have a couple custom presets in nikon capture. i also, admittedly, have mentioned many times i have serious workflow and processing ignorance. It was just a portrait. uploaded in n2 bw conversion. Transferred to nikon capture. Played iwth the curves. Didnt like the skin and eyes, uploaded again in elements. didnt work it ruined it. Transferred to nik collection. By then i about had it. Looked worse when i finished then when i started.. Was playing with the artistic side too. So kind of wanted something "different". shot it with a standard two light setup 30mm dialed down flash 400 iso with the idea of a soft nice color. Think it went down hill when i decided i wanted to see what i could do with it in bw for something other than a normal portait shot. so really my own fault. i shot it one way suddenly i thought "hey i wonder if...." and it went down hill from there...

Looks like you need to learn what each option in the software you choose can actually do.

Instead of taking a shot, then spending 40 minutes trying to 'fix' whatever is wrong with it, it's better to know in advance what the software is capable of before you push the shutter button.

Post-processing is part of my 'vision' of the image. Not only am I concerned with focal length, shutter speed, aperture, ISO, composition, lighting, etc that is available at the scene/on the subject, I also project the image all the way through PP steps needed to a finished image.

I see no need to take an image and start 'playing' with sliders and settings and options and presets just to see if the outcome is something I 'like'. PP steps are already chosen when the shutter closes.

bribrius · Mar 5, 2015

480sparky said:
bribrius said:

...............i have a couple custom presets in nikon capture. i also, admittedly, have mentioned many times i have serious workflow and processing ignorance. It was just a portrait. uploaded in n2 bw conversion. Transferred to nikon capture. Played iwth the curves. Didnt like the skin and eyes, uploaded again in elements. didnt work it ruined it. Transferred to nik collection. By then i about had it. Looked worse when i finished then when i started.. Was playing with the artistic side too. So kind of wanted something "different". shot it with a standard two light setup 30mm dialed down flash 400 iso with the idea of a soft nice color. Think it went down hill when i decided i wanted to see what i could do with it in bw for something other than a normal portait shot. so really my own fault. i shot it one way suddenly i thought "hey i wonder if...." and it went down hill from there...

Click to expand...

Looks like you need to learn what each option in the software you choose can actually do.

Instead of taking a shot, then spending 40 minutes trying to 'fix' whatever is wrong with it, it's better to know in advance what the software is capable of before you push the shutter button.

Post-processing is part of my 'vision' of the image. Not only am I concerned with focal length, shutter speed, aperture, ISO, composition, lighting, etc that is available at the scene/on the subject, I also project the image all the way through PP steps needed to a finished image.

I see no need to take an image and start 'playing' with sliders and settings and options and presets just to see if the outcome is something I 'like'. PP steps are already chosen when the shutter closes.

No way to know what the options are without trying them first..and yep. I was totally playing.

480sparky · Mar 5, 2015

bribrius said:
No way to know what the options are without trying them first..and yep. I was totally playing.

That's no reason to condemn shooting raw files, however. One can spend just as much time trying out settings and options and sliders and presets on .JPGs as well.

Benjo255 · Mar 5, 2015

If you end up using a lightroom preset, I see no difference in using an in camera JPG preset, beside the fact I dont' have to open the raw files in lightroom.

JPG from camera aren't "magical" or superior to LR ones. they're just faster and easier. That's it.

That said, I repeat: I'm not against shooting in raw and I shoot raw everyday for my project. But I don't process the image in 2 minutes. I usually spend may be 30-40 minutes on each image, creating copies, trying different solutions and comparing them, processing the image through niksoft and similar. until I'm really happy (and I'm hard to please).

I see it's splitting between the main stream "RAW ALWAYS AND EVERYWHERE" and the minority report "I shoot only JPG".

I think both of them are useful, depending from the context. A serie of pictures of a landscape? A serie of street photography where I'll think I'm going to keep only the decisive one? Ok. I'll shoot raw and process it until the final image will be as I want. Not because I must. But because I CAN.

A reportage? A travel diary? A commercial of a great numbers of shot? A wedding? I set the camera ONLY JPG. I don't want any raw. I don't want even the temptation of starting to process. And if I have to...I'll be content of the jpg processing range. In this case it's better for me to work on the number of shots than to saving a single wrong shot. They're just photographs and time will never be given back.

sashbar · Mar 5, 2015

Ysarex said:
I never leave the house without my pocket camera that's about the size of an iphone (little smaller width and height but thicker). So if I see a shot and want to take it I take it. Most people always have a phone with them; I always have a camera with me.
I was recently walking in the park with my wife and took this photo:
View attachment 96502
I posted it here already, but in this context it's worth posting again because a phone camera or any camera shooting only JPEG would have crashed and burned on the lighting in this scene.
Joe

Same here, I often carry a poket camera and can not resist taking some silly photos, just because something caught my eye. Something like bright spot or color or shape. Somethind like this. This is SOO(pocket)C JPEG btw. Looks good enough to me. Why should I waste my time with the RAW file?

astroNikon · Mar 5, 2015

sashbar said:
... This is SOO(pocket)C JPEG btw. Looks good enough to me. Why should I waste my time with the RAW file?
View attachment 96524

Because you know what you are doing for the result you want ...

DarkShadow · Mar 5, 2015

[/QUOTE]
i spent forty minutes on one last night and i still don't like it. Too many options for edits. If i just shot it jpeg i would have saved forty minutes of my life.[/QUOTE]

Good god,40 minutes is extremely long.Like sparky said a minute or two for me.I will Crop it,maybe add a little contrast then sharpen and save it Done.Thats on birds so maybe entirely different then what your doing but still 40 minutes is a long time.What takes longer is loading 200 hundred raw bird files on the put.Even at that it don't take very long on a i7 processor with 16 gigs of ram.

weepete · Mar 5, 2015

If you want to custom edit your shots shoot raw.

If you don't, shoot jpeg.

Simples.

Buckster · Mar 5, 2015

Benjo255 said:
If you end up using a lightroom preset, I see no difference in using an in camera JPG preset, beside the fact I dont' have to open the raw files in lightroom.

...and the fact that IF one of those files turns out to be something you REALLY want to tweak and NEED a RAW to do it, you have it.

I shoot RAW personally, because I don't believe in throwing away data unless and until I'VE determined I don't need it anymore. I don't let the camera manufacturer make that decision for me.

If I really want to punch out a thousand JPGs, I can still do that with a few clicks from LR in an automated process. I can even let it pick "auto" everything, just like the camera, if I really want to, or I can do a whole lot more with just a few more adjustment clicks before I punch them out in bulk - no problem. It doesn't take that long, and it runs in the background while I do something else. It's not like I have nothing else to do, and have to sit there staring at the LR screen while it works.

And when it's all said and done, if there's that one shot that really jumps up and lights my fire, and I want the full ability to edit it the way I want, I can open up that RAW file and have my way with it to my heart's content.

But that's just me. To each his/her own. Go shoot Polaroids and live with whatever pops out, if that's what floats your boat. It's no skin off my nose what anyone else does or how they do it. If it's working for them, why should I care? And vice-versa.

bribrius · Mar 5, 2015

I miss my old polaroids. something about that instant gratification of having it spit the photo out right then......

Buckster · Mar 5, 2015

bribrius said:
I miss my old polaroids. something about that instant gratification of having it spit the photo out right then......

So go shoot them. Nobody's stopping you.

bribrius · Mar 5, 2015

Buckster said:
bribrius said:

I miss my old polaroids. something about that instant gratification of having it spit the photo out right then......

Click to expand...

So go shoot them. Nobody's stopping you.