WHAT AM I MISSING?

[FlyingScot]

Watling for a friend to arrive and being a little bored and trying to learn more about this new to me camera i took some pictures of my car at the various quality settings on my Nikon D700 with a nice prime Nikkor 85mm 1.8 lens

settings were RAW TIFF JPEG Fine, Normal and then Basic

Blowing them up to full size i could not see much difference - at 400% not a lot of difference either and i dont have time ATM to do a print out - is the problem my screen resolution or?

ORIGINAL PICTURE

RAW

TIFF

JPEG FINE

JPEG NORMAL

JPEG BASIC

I was also somewhat surprised at how flat and dull the RAW image was straight out of the camera.

 

[480sparky]

Typically, the raw file doesn't have any of the in-camera picture controls applied to it. There's no sharpening, no saturation added, no increased contrast, etc. That's what's so nice about shooting raw..... you get to do all that in post. You can either mimic those in-cam settings in post and apply them globally with batch processing, or apply a different setting to individual frames as you see fit.

The differences in the jpegs will become evident if you increase your magnification. When you go from fine to normal or normal to basic, you're compressing the image. This means you're telling the camera to discard some of the information in order to make the file size smaller. Look closer at the subtle color gradiations in the reflections in the paint. As you drop down in file size, you'll start to see distinct differences between shades of blue.... instead of a nice smooth transition, you'll see a sudden and noticable change in color.

 

[ann]

:thumbup: he beat me too it

 

[480sparky]

I can reproduce the various compression levels just by taking an image and saving it at different JPEG percent levels.

I'll use this image for a demonstration:

I will save this image at 100%, 80%, 60%, 40% and 20% levels, and run the magnification up to 800% to view the area in the black box.

At 100%, you get all the detail the camera saved.

At 80%, I threw away some of the data. You really can't see much difference, but the file size is smaller.

At 60%, you start to see some of the effects of pitching data overboard.

At 40%, it really starts to get bad.

At 20%, it's hopeless.

 

[FlyingScot]

The crops are as big magnification wise as i can make them and i dont see any real differences in the JPEG crops that i posted here apart from there being more colour in the tax disc/road fund licence on the normal and the basic which seems perverse.

I fully appreciate that the RAW image IS RAW Data i just expected that to be more punchy

The JPEG's dont have any additional sharpening or increased saturation contrast etc. everything is set as normal I do appreciate that the camera does some work on the RAW image to get a JPEG using in camera set parameters such as white balance, saturation, sharpness, contrast etc then it is subjected to the JPEG compression before being written to the memory card. Also i fully appreciate that the RAW is 14 bit and the JPEG is 8 bit

Looking at what i have posted here - can you really see differences in the JPEG images?

Also the TIFF looks the best and it is lossless compression BUT it is enormous RAW is 14.6 TIFF is 35.9 JPEG FINE is 2.5 JPEG NORMAL is 5.7 JPED BASIC is 2.9 Now there is a thing i had assumed fine compression was less work on the image and basic was the most work on the image that would appear to be arse about tit. Need to go RTFM again.

Also since i will be printing on a 8 bit printer IF at all it looks like JPEG normal will give me everything i need without too much compression and if push comes to shove and i need to get a few more pictures into a memory card dropping to JPEG fine is going to have no real visible impact on the final image.

 

[FlyingScot]

I can reproduce the various compression levels just by taking an image and saving it at different JPEG percent levels.

I'll use this image for a demonstration:

I will save this image at 100%, 80%, 60%, 40% and 20% levels, and run the magnification up to 800% to view the area in the black box.

At 100%, you get all the detail the camera saved.

At 80%, I threw away some of the data. You really can't see much difference, but the file size is smaller.

At 60%, you start to see some of the effects of pitching data overboard.

At 40%, it really starts to get bad.

At 20%, it's hopeless.

yes i totally get that - but you are saving a compressed file (which means you have to throw away lots of the image data) then enlarging it back up - you cant recreate image data that is not there so you have to do some clever averaging or something like that - you are not doing that in camera - what i was comparing was in camera compression.

 

[480sparky]

yes i totally get that - but you are saving a compressed file (which means you have to throw away lots of the image data) then enlarging it back up - you cant recreate image data that is not there so you have to do some clever averaging or something like that - you are not doing that in camera - what i was comparing was in camera compression.

Changing the camera's setting from Fine to Normal or Normal to Basic does the same thing. Not that Basic saves the image at 20%, but the principle is identical. Fine may be saving the image at the equivalent of 95 or 100%, Normal might be in the 70-90% range and Basic in the 60-80% area.

 

[Kerbouchard]

The part that you are missing is that when the JPEG is created, the sharpening, contrast, white balance, etc are all a part of the image. You can't go back and say I would have liked a little less sharpening, or if shooting B&W, you don't get to go back and decide you want color.

The main issues are the exposure and white balance. RAW gives you a bit more control over exposure adjustments because a lot of what a JPEG throws away is at the high end of the exposure levels...i.e, the whites. White balance is a completely different story. We've all seen the horrible greens or blue color casts by a wrong white balance. In RAW, it can be adjusted afterwards.

If you're work isn't all that critical, or you always make sure everything is spot on, and you can customize the picture controls to your liking, then I would say you aren't missing anything. Sounds like there would be no advantage to you shooting RAW and possibly a few disadvantages.

As far as the JPEG settings, I would tend to agree with your assessment. JPEG Normal would probably meet the requirements of 99% of the shooters who don't need the additional options from RAW.

 

[FlyingScot]

The part that you are missing is that when the JPEG is created, the sharpening, contrast, white balance, etc are all a part of the image. You can't go back and say I would have liked a little less sharpening, or if shooting B&W, you don't get to go back and decide you want color.

The main issues are the exposure and white balance. RAW gives you a bit more control over exposure adjustments because a lot of what a JPEG throws away is at the high end of the exposure levels...i.e, the whites. White balance is a completely different story. We've all seen the horrible greens or blue color casts by a wrong white balance. In RAW, it can be adjusted afterwards.

If you're work isn't all that critical, or you always make sure everything is spot on, and you can customize the picture controls to your liking, then I would say you aren't missing anything. Sounds like there would be no advantage to you shooting RAW and possibly a few disadvantages.

As far as the JPEG settings, I would tend to agree with your assessment. JPEG Normal would probably meet the requirements of 99% of the shooters who don't need the additional options from RAW.

au contraire - did you not read what i wrote previously " I do appreciate that the camera does some work on the RAW image to get a JPEG using in camera set parameters such as white balance, saturation, sharpness, contrast etc then it is subjected to the JPEG compression before being written to the memory card. Also i fully appreciate that the RAW is 14 bit and the JPEG is 8 bit"

And i fullyappreaciate that i can tweak these setting in a positive and a negative way in camera.

I also fully understand why in extremis i might want to shoot RAW so i can play around with the RAW data to get whatever i want from the images assuming that is possible and shooting RAW will give me a better chance of getting what i want rather than manipulating a JPEG Image.

Sadly this appears to have drifted into the technicalities of RAW vs JPEG

ALL and i repeat ALL i am asking is can YOU see any differences in the three crops i took at the three different JPEG compression levels available to me on the D700 I CANT.

 

[Kerbouchard]

I went into the detail that I did to qualify my last sentence...not sure if you didn't get to the last part of my post, but I did give my my opinion.

It was an important qualifier and I wanted to make sure that sentence was not read out of context.

 

[FlyingScot]

yes i totally get that - but you are saving a compressed file (which means you have to throw away lots of the image data) then enlarging it back up - you cant recreate image data that is not there so you have to do some clever averaging or something like that - you are not doing that in camera - what i was comparing was in camera compression.

Changing the camera's setting from Fine to Normal or Normal to Basic does the same thing. Not that Basic saves the image at 20%, but the principle is identical. Fine may be saving the image at the equivalent of 95 or 100%, Normal might be in the 70-90% range and Basic in the 60-80% area.

Ignoring the percentages that is what i had assumed however from the post i made previously that seems not to be the case. Fine is smallest file size Basic is larger again with Normal being the largest - see below

Also the TIFF looks the best and it is lossless compression BUT it is enormous RAW is 14.6 TIFF is 35.9 JPEG FINE is 2.5 JPEG NORMAL is 5.7 JPED BASIC is 2.9 Now there is a thing i had assumed fine compression was less work on the image and basic was the most work on the image that would appear to be arse about tit. Need to go RTFM again.

 

[FlyingScot]

I went into the detail that I did to qualify my last sentence...not sure if you just decided to stop reading half-way through, but I did give my my opinion.

It was an important qualifier and I wanted to make sure that sentence was not read out of context.

yes i did read it all but you did say "the part that I was missing is" - difficult as it is here i will accept that this was not actually what you mean to say - had you said I see you understand that when the.......................... then i would not have needed to reply to your post

HOWEVER my initial question is still open and un-answered can you see any differences in the three JPEG Crops? Yes No Maybe are all valid answers

 

[Overread]

Your JPEG fine is out of focus that I can see clearly.

Also remember that many of these finer points might not show up in the first save (ie initial recording in the camera) of the photo; the little differences won't be that visible in ideal conditions. However start playing with the curves, saturation, contrast, white balance, etc... Once you start editing even if you only edit a little, the differences between the compressions on JPEG will start to show. Your JPEG fine will weather the best, whilst the smaller versions will start to show more banding, artifacts and other limitations more rapidly.

That is in addition to what Sparky said in his first post, last paragraph - where you end up getting worse graduations in the original even before editing (remembering that the camera, even on basic, is applying some editing to the photo).

Generally speaking, with memory cards so comparatively cheap, you'd generally never have an excuse not to shoot in at least JPEG fine - - shooting lower only if you are really forced by the conditions.

 

[Kerbouchard]

Okay, we'll try again. With JPEG compression, what you are throwing away is color data. A Jpeg works by looking for areas of similar color and grouping them together. The Basic, Normal, and Fine options allow you to choose the standard that is used when it comes to differentiating color detail.

The image you chose does not have a lot of gradients. It has a few relatively solid colors so you would be unlikely to see a huge difference in this shot. As far as the file size discrepancy, you missed focus on the jpeg fine which blurred some of the colors together and allowed the JPEG engine to group more of the colors together, which is what resulted in the smaller file size.

yes i did read it all but you did say "the part that I was missing is" - difficult as it is here i will accept that this was not actually what you mean to say - had you said I see you understand that when the.......................... then i would not have needed to reply to your post

HOWEVER my initial question is still open and un-answered can you see any differences in the three JPEG Crops? Yes No Maybe are all valid answers

 

[FlyingScot]

NO one answered the question i asked really - hocus focus!!! - actually what i did was accidentally mix up my naming of the crops - the camera is set so the shutter is locked out until it gets a focus lock - so i cant see how I or it missed focus - but lets not go there - i really was just looking out the window and wondering about JPEG quality i did not set up a full tonal test or do anything other than take that shot - but if all i have learned is that my understanding of Fine Normal & Basic is correct that will do for today