“Giving Me Advice”
© Copyright Vicki Tinnon
You may be reading a lot these days about the RAW file format and wondering, “Is it right for me?” You might also be asking yourself “What is it?” and “Why would I want to use it over JPEG?”
Well, the simple fact of the matter is that most of you will likely want to stick with the JPEG (or JPG) file format — that is, unless you do a lot of editing with photo editing software. Read on and we’ll explain. (Fortunately, we have the assistance of this savvy, little woodland creature in the photo shown above entitled “Giving Me Advice“, by Vicki Tinnon.)
JPEG is a universally-accepted and standardized file format that can be read by just about every computer operating system and software application on the market today. It’s the de-facto file format for most digital point-and-shoot cameras. The problem with JPEGs is that they are highly compressed. While this helps to make the file sizes smaller so that you can get more pictures on your memory card, the very act of compression removes some data from each of your pictures. Because of this, JPEG files do not technically have the same high quality as RAW files, which use what is called “lossless compression”.
To make matters worse — and here’s the rub — every time you resave a JPEG file, you risk recompressing it, which can make your pictures look even worse.
It’s these frustrations with JPEG’s “lossy compression” that have led most professional photographers to the RAW file format. But this relatively new format is not without its own drawbacks, which is why it is still not universally accepted and, therefore, still rarely used by amateur and hobbyist photographers today.
The main issue with RAW is that there is currently no standardization or even agreement among camera manufacturers, or even among camera models from the same manufacturer, on its technical specification. Yes, there are essentially two flavors: uncompressed and “virtually lossless”, which contains minimal compression, but Nikon uses the NEF extension, Canon uses the CR2 extension, and Olympus uses the ORF extension. Adobe Systems is marketing a RAW standard called DNG (Digital Negative), and they provide a free converter for both Windows and Macintosh users which converts camera RAW files from various camera manufacturers into DNG files. However, you still need to invest in a software program that supports this file format in order for it to be usable. Conveniently, Adobe also sells Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, and Lightroom, which use the DNG file format.
So, what file format do I recommend that you use? Well, if you’re doing a lot of photo editing, you may wish to investigate working with your camera’s RAW format or the DNG format. Otherwise, I’d advise you to continue to use JPEG and to wait until a clear RAW standard emerges.
If you’d like to read more about JPEG versus RAW, this article on fotohacker.com provides a good summary from the perspective of someone who uses RAW exclusively.
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Tags: Adobe, Canon, DNG, Lightroom, Nikon, Photo, Photography, Photos, Photoshop, RAW
