NEF to JPEG

[jeremyk_12]

Hey friends, I was wondrring if there was a way to convert from Nef to Jpeg after edits without losing any quality...if not...what do you use to convert

 

[KmH]

The issue is mainly about bit depth - Photo Editing Tutorials

NEF is a 12 or 14-bit depth file type. Being Raw files, NEF's need to be edited in a Raw converter like Adobe Camera Raw (ACR - CS 6/CC Camera Raw or Lightroom's Develop module)

JPEG is limited to an 8-bit depth file type making it a lossy file type. JPEG was designed to be a finished, ready-to-print file type.
Most of the loss going from 12 or 14 bits is from discarding color information. Additional loss is from grouping image pixels into Minimum Coded Units (MCU's).
The loss of the color data and the conversion of pixels into MCU's leave little, if any, headroom for editing headroom.

14-bits can code 16,384 gradations of tone per color channel.
12-bits can code 4096 gradations of tone per color channel.
8-bits can can code 256 gradations of tone per color channel.

 

[jeremyk_12]

The issue is mainly about bit depth - Photo Editing Tutorials

NEF is a 12 or 14-bit depth file type. Being Raw files, NEF's need to be edited in a Raw converter like Adobe Camera Raw (ACR - CS 6/CC Camera Raw or Lightroom's Develop module)

JPEG is limited to an 8-bit depth file type making it a lossy file type. JPEG was designed to be a finished, ready-to-print file type.
Most of the loss going from 12 or 14 bits is from discarding color information. Additional loss is from grouping image pixels into Minimum Coded Units (MCU's).
The loss of the color data and the conversion of pixels into MCU's leave little, if any, headroom for editing headroom.

14-bits can code 16,384 gradations of tone per color channel.
12-bits can code 4096 gradations of tone per color channel.
8-bits can can code 256 gradations of tone per color channel.

Thank you is it a huge discrepancy in color and will my edit be lost?

 

[Murray Bloom]

I'd recommend that you do at least your basic editing in your RAW converter. You can bring all your basic parameters into the ballpark and then fine tune them in Photoshop or whatever editor you're using. I use Photoshop and .PSD as the file default, and Adobe RGB for the working (as well as shooting) color space. I don't convert the image to another format unless there's a reason. For example, if the image will be displayed on the web or uploaded to a POD printer, JPEG conversion is more or less mandatory. Use the highest quality you can (12 in PS), consistent with the destination's image size limits. Make sure you understand their color space requirements. Some printers will print from Adobe RGB, while others specify sRGB.

One thing to remember, it's almost always best to edit your images in your editor's native format, rather than JPEG because, as we all know, every time a JPEG image is altered and saved, it will suffer some degradation; sometimes subtle, sometimes noticeable.

 

[Tinderbox (UK)]

there is a free app called "instant jpeg from raw" once installed you can click on as many raw files as you want and within seconds it will extract the embedded jpegs and put them into a separated directory, the jpegs seems to have any colour mods you have set.

Give it a try though it`s not for everybody.

John

 

[Gavjenks]

If you want a decently compressed format that you can save your edits in, without throwing away 8 of your bits, I suggest you use a compressed 16 bit TIFF.

For instance, import the NEF into photoshop in 16 bits (in my version, you click on a link in the import software to change your import preferences to 16 bit), do your edits in 16 bits, and then while still in 16 bit mode, save as a TIFF. Choose LZW or ZIP compression options, and you'll end up with a file only 2-3 times larger than a jpeg, but without loss of data, and still preserving the full 16 bits (zip is lossless compression).

This version will save with your completed edits (unlike just saving the original RAW file), and it will do so in 16 bits (unlike a jpeg, which only goes up to 8).



As a bonus, your TIFF can be sent directly to some printing businesses in TIFF format.

 

[Garbz]

there is a free app called "instant jpeg from raw" once installed you can click on as many raw files as you want and within seconds it will extract the embedded jpegs and put them into a separated directory, the jpegs seems to have any colour mods you have set.

This program extracts the embedded JPEG in the RAW file. If your camera is anything like most then the embedded image will be heavily compressed and have quality issues. Just use the software that came with the camera or shoot in RAW+JPEG. I'm not sure about now but the original Capture NX software from Nikon allowed batch conversions.

 

[SCraig]

This program extracts the embedded JPEG in the RAW file. If your camera is anything like most then the embedded image will be heavily compressed and have quality issues. Just use the software that came with the camera or shoot in RAW+JPEG. I'm not sure about now but the original Capture NX software from Nikon allowed batch conversions.

It still does, however it is retail software. What comes with the cameras is time-limited (30 days, 60 days, something). They also supply View NX2 which is NOT time-limited, but I don't know if it has a batch mode.