RAW file format

[dpic]

To begin, I'm not a professional, nor do I claim to have expert knowledge. I have, however, owned a couple of DSLR's and have taken thousands of photos and have learned a trick or two.

One thing I see constantly with people's photos on the Disboards are white balance issues. One of the huge advantages of a DSLR is the conveniences of shooting in RAW. Briefly, shooting in RAW allows the photographer to decide how the captured data will be processed to make an accurate representation of the scene. If you shoot in Jpeg, the camera makes the decisions. Since the camera is just a fancy calculator, it doesn't have a clue what you actually saw. It's making decisions based on formulas, and it normally doesn't do a bad job, but where white balance is concerned--especially indoors or night with artificial lighting--it often misses the mark.

Below are two photos: one is a jpeg where the camera made the white balance choice. The next was shot in RAW, and I made the while balance choice.

I'm sure you see that the bottom Jiko's flatbread looks much more realistic (and yummier) than the top one. To choose a white balance point simply use your camera's RAW processing software and select some white or gray area in the photo. If your first choice doesn't look quite correct, choose another one. With people, my favorite white balance point is the whites in someone's eyes. It's a very simple process and greatly improves your photos.

After a while, you'll get experienced enough to notice slight color casts in your images you once thought were perfect--this isn't a bad thing. It's a good thing to attempt to reproduce the scene way it actually appeared. Obviously, there are time when a color cast is perfectly acceptable. Many times when I first started using RAW, I took the warmth out of sunsets by trying to get a neutral white point--mistake, sunsets have a warm color cast.

Also, with huge hard drives and dvd burners at relatively reasonable prices, I keep all my RAW files--especially vacation images. Often I find I have increased my skills and experience and go back and reprocess RAW files and have noticed huge improvements in the final image.

Yes, RAW is more work. However, anyone who made the financial commitment to purchase a DSLR has already decided they want better images. RAW is a huge benefit to the DSLR owner and is an excellent tool to better images. Lastly, again, I don't want people to think I want to be the "white balance" police. I simply see many people who obviously have a desire to take great images. Shooting in RAW and setting white balance is very simple procedure and greatly improves your images. Also, if anyone wants to jump in and clearify or correct something I've said--please do so. We're all here to learn and share, myself included.

 

[jann1033]

To begin, I'm not a professional, nor do I claim to have expert knowledge. I have, however, owned a couple of DSLR's and have taken thousands of photos and have learned a trick or two.

One thing I see constantly with people's photos on the Disboards are white balance issues. One of the huge advantages of a DSLR is the conveniences of shooting in RAW. Briefly, shooting in RAW allows the photographer to decide how the captured data will be processed to make an accurate representation of the scene. If you shoot in Jpeg, the camera makes the decisions. Since the camera is just a fancy calculator, it doesn't have a clue what you actually saw. It's making decisions based on formulas, and it normally doesn't do a bad job, but where white balance is concerned--especially indoors or night with artificial lighting--it often misses the mark.

Below are two photos: one is a jpeg where the camera made the white balance choice. The next was shot in RAW, and I made the while balance choice.

I'm sure you see that the bottom Jiko's flatbread looks much more realistic (and yummier) than the top one. To choose a white balance point simply use your camera's RAW processing software and select some white or gray area in the photo. If your first choice doesn't look quite correct, choose another one. With people, my favorite white balance point is the whites in someone's eyes. It's a very simple process and greatly improves your photos.

After a while, you'll get experienced enough to notice slight color casts in your images you once thought were perfect--this isn't a bad thing. It's a good thing to attempt to reproduce the scene way it actually appeared. Obviously, there are time when a color cast is perfectly acceptable. Many times when I first started using RAW, I took the warmth out of sunsets by trying to get a neutral white point--mistake, sunsets have a warm color cast.

Also, with huge hard drives and dvd burners at relatively reasonable prices, I keep all my RAW files--especially vacation images. Often I find I have increased my skills and experience and go back and reprocess RAW files and have noticed huge improvements in the final image.

Yes, RAW is more work. However, anyone who made the financial commitment to purchase a DSLR has already decided they want better images. RAW is a huge benefit to the DSLR owner and is an excellent tool to better images. Lastly, again, I don't want people to think I want to be the "white balance" police. I simply see many people who obviously have a desire to take great images. Shooting in RAW and setting white balance is very simple procedure and greatly improves your images. Also, if anyone wants to jump in and clearify or correct something I've said--please do so. We're all here to learn and share, myself included.

if you use lightroom it's pretty easy, you can either use the wb presets and tweak with the slider if your want or use the eyedropper in the wb area and with the navigator on you can see what your photo will look like choosing the target the dropper is on. technically i think it's supposed to be best on a gray area and the rgb # pretty close rather than white but then again it depends on what you want your photo to look like

 

[dpic]

if you use lightroom it's pretty easy, you can either use the wb presets and tweak with the slider if your want or use the eyedropper in the wb area and with the navigator on you can see what your photo will look like choosing the target the dropper is on. technically i think it's supposed to be best on a gray area and the rgb # pretty close rather than white but then again it depends on what you want your photo to look like

Yes, 18% gray is the best (I use a card for that). That's pretty hard to find in a photo, though, so white (say in a shadow--that's why the eye is good because usually the eye isn't in direct sunlight) will do the trick.

 

[PoohJen]

Thanks for the tip, Dan.

Here's some ultra-ignoramus questions: My favorite thing to shoot is my son's baseball team. Always outdoors and, fingers crossed, in nice daylight. I typically shoot on the automatic sports setting, though I do play around from time to time with the manual settings.

There are times when the pics seem overexposed slightly, and photoshopping them still looks "fake" or "off".

I shoot w/ a Canon 40D and have Photoshop Elements 6.

Do you think Raw would make a difference in my baseball shots?

 

[VVFF]

Thanks for the tip, Dan.

Here's some ultra-ignoramus questions: My favorite thing to shoot is my son's baseball team. Always outdoors and, fingers crossed, in nice daylight. I typically shoot on the automatic sports setting, though I do play around from time to time with the manual settings.

There are times when the pics seem overexposed slightly, and photoshopping them still looks "fake" or "off".

I shoot w/ a Canon 40D and have Photoshop Elements 6.

Do you think Raw would make a difference in my baseball shots?

Shooting in raw would get you some more headroom in terms of being able to bring back those slightly overexposed areas. First things first though...stop shooting in auto modes

 

[Quicklabs]

Those two comparison photos speak a thousand words about the power of Raw. I started shooting Raw in October of last year and never looked back.

 

[annnewjerz]

Those two comparison photos speak a thousand words about the power of Raw. I started shooting Raw in October of last year and never looked back.

I couldn't agree more. Here is a shot I took the first night in .jpeg, when I got my D60. This is my sort of brown dog and my very yellow looking couch under artificial lighting in the living room...hadn't a clue at the time of how to adjust the white balance to reflect the correct colors of the dog or the couch (neither of which should be yellow).

If I never learned how to fix this, I might have never taken a shot indoors again because the coloring is absolutely horrible.

 

[Quicklabs]

Your chocolate baby is sooooooo smoochable, white balance problems and all! Geez, but I'm a sucker for Labs.

 

[annnewjerz]

Your chocolate baby is sooooooo smoochable, white balance problems and all! Geez, but I'm a sucker for Labs.

Want to borrow him? For as smoochable as he is, our Golden Retriever Mickey is definitely the better behaved of the two. This chocolate is a little rascal...he may be in store for some long overdue obedience training this Spring if he doesn't watch it!

 

[dpic]

Thanks for the tip, Dan.

Here's some ultra-ignoramus questions: My favorite thing to shoot is my son's baseball team. Always outdoors and, fingers crossed, in nice daylight. I typically shoot on the automatic sports setting, though I do play around from time to time with the manual settings.

There are times when the pics seem overexposed slightly, and photoshopping them still looks "fake" or "off".

I shoot w/ a Canon 40D and have Photoshop Elements 6.

Do you think Raw would make a difference in my baseball shots?

Yup. as VVFF said it's time to move on beyond the auto modes. Personally, I use aperture mode most (Av). I normally set it a stop or two beyond wide open which is the lower number of the lens setting (lens normally give sharper images when "stopped" down a bit), then adjust the ISO so I get fast enough shutter speed to ensure a blur-free photo. There are other reasons I use aperture mode, too, but I don't want to complicate things.

In your case, I'd stop the lens down a little then set ISO so you get at least double the focal length of whatever lens you're using to ensure sharp photos (ie. if you use a 200mm telephoto, keep your film speed at 1/400 or faster). With sporting events you may even want to triple the focal length of the lens because the kids are moving pretty quick sometimes. Then I would use RAW. On the 40D, use the histogram on the rear screen to check your exposures as you shoot (press the info button until you get the graph thingie). Your best exposures will have the little hill in the middle and not slammed up against one side or the other (unless you're shooting at night). Here's an image I grabbed off a website to show a proper histogram.

One trick to using RAW is called "shooting to the right." This means trying to get that little hill more toward the right of the histogram by increasing exposure compensation without information "climbing" up the right side--this is overexposing, or "blowing out" the highlights. Using this technique will ensure that you have a good exposure to properly process the image. When processing RAW images, it's much easier to darken a bright image than brighten a dark image--assuming you're not overexposed. This is because there is more image information in brighter areas than darker areas (it's a math thing with the way digital cameras work).

I probably will give a little primer on the histograph down the road. If you're ever at a sporting event, watch the pros shoot. When they check the back of their cameras, they aren't looking at the photo they just took--they're usually looking at the histogram. If you have a good histogram you have a properly exposed image. Learn to use the histogram--it's truly one of the great tools of a DSLR.

 

[jann1033]

Yes, 18% gray is the best (I use a card for that). That's pretty hard to find in a photo, though, so white (say in a shadow--that's why the eye is good because usually the eye isn't in direct sunlight) will do the trick.

with the lightroom dropper it doesn't have to actually be 18% gray, any more neutral color( ie not a bright yellow), as long as the rgb# are fairly close but they recommend not using pure white with that, a light neutral or gray. but like i said it depends on the photo, some things you might want more warm/cool cast which is why the dropper works really well as you can see it in the navigator without having to actually click the photo then undo it in history if you don't like it.
i think the gray cards are really for exposure, not wb

Jen if you are hesitant to go fully "creative" as canon calls it, you can use p and raw. that way the camera is doing a lot of the work but you still can tweak it. raw really can cover a multitude of sins camera raw ( think that is what elements uses if i am recalling it right)is fairly similar to lightroom but not sure if the wb features are the same

i don't ever shoot sports but i know with birds that move, al servo really helps as well as it locks focus on moving targets or al focus is for something stationary that then moves...i think auto sets the focus mode automatically but you can probably change it in p( not sure about the 40d, in mine you can)

 

[zackiedawg]

Above advice is great, and quite true that there are alot of white balance issues in photos posted by amateurs that could use a little adjustment. Just wanted to throw out a few point/counterpoints too, in the spirit of full disclosure and information!

First off, though RAW is by far the most powerful tool to use as far as post-processing photos goes - since it provides the most latitude to correct many different elements of the photograph - but some of these adjustments can be made to jpgs too...so if you don't shoot in RAW or don't have it on your camera, you don't have to give up! Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro, as well as most post-processing programs, can adjust the color temperature, color, remove color cast, and do a fairly good job of making reasonable white balance and color adjustments to even P&S .jpg shots. If it's too far off, it won't recover as well as a Raw file would, but for moderate adjustments, there are many gains to be made.

Second point I'd like to bring up is more of a counter-point...and the basic message is this - don't get too obsessed with the white balance tool on every shot, because there are instances when it will actually alter a shot AWAY from what it looked like to the naked eye, and in some cases take away the very desirable look and atmosphere of some shots. For example, the golden hour before sunset will cast a very distinct yellow glow on everything - whites basically cease to exist. it's quite a pleasant and warm look that translates well in photographs - but technically, if you were to adjust the whites in the shot for a perfect white balance, you'd remove that natural and real yellow cast that you saw and captured. The same may go for the various tints or color casts from windows on interiors, or the strange blue color cast that sometimes hits under pure moonlight...it is a natural color that the naked eye sees too, so you probably shouldn't try to adjust the white balance on those types of shots. Even interior lighting, which depending on the bulb can take on different hues, is a personal choice on how to display it - maybe you want to allow the orange-like hue of a sodium bulb to color the scene, or the blueish tint of a flourescent...sure, it's throwing off a perfect white balance, but it may just be the atmosphere you are going for to impart what it looked like to the eye.

Anyway...80% of the time the advice given is correct, and so many more photos are unintentionally 'off' on white balance that could use this very good advice by the OP. But just remember that there's always exceptions to the rule, and to just think about what you are trying to capture and convey before making final adjustments!

 

[oogieboogieman]

Those two comparison photos speak a thousand words about the power of Raw. I started shooting Raw in October of last year and never looked back.

After using my DSLR for about 1 1/2 years I'm attempting to in RAW format. It is interesting!

So far only 2 things I don't care for...
1. I now need more memory cards.
2. I don't really care for the Olympus Master Software that came with my camera. I'm too cheap to buy Lightroom (and in the need of a student to get it at a discount price). I also like to complain to my wife how I need this new software and how it would benefit my upcoming photos of WDW in August.

 

[PoohJen]

Thanks Dan and everyone! We have a tournament in a few weeks, and another (hopefully much warmer) at the beginning of April, so that will give me lots of opportunity to practice! -stay tuned for more questions, though, as it gets closer!

Jann, it's not so much that I'm hesitant, but that I don't practice consistently enough, so that I am always forgetting the right manual settings - Doh!

I did have to go manual this winter for DS's musical and other DS's basketball. A couple - not alot - of good shots from the musical....um, basketball, not so much.

I promise to practice more...and maybe even read that 40D book I bought w/ the camera!

 

[jann1033]

Thanks Dan and everyone! We have a tournament in a few weeks, and another (hopefully much warmer) at the beginning of April, so that will give me lots of opportunity to practice! -stay tuned for more questions, though, as it gets closer!

Jann, it's not so much that I'm hesitant, but that I don't practice consistently enough, so that I am always forgetting the right manual settings - Doh!

I did have to go manual this winter for DS's musical and other DS's basketball. A couple - not alot - of good shots from the musical....um, basketball, not so much.

I promise to practice more...and maybe even read that 40D book I bought w/ the camera!

i think that is a good point( not just with Jen). i read somewhere(???) the settings to use have to become second nature, so you see a shot and automatically know what would be the technical info needed to get it so then you can have time to work on composition etc before the opportunity for the shot is gone.
i think that would especially apply with something like sports/nature where the action is fast and fleeting and no way to do that but practice. it's not really something you can totally learn via reading about it since things aren't so black and white in the reality of the moment

 

[BorisMD]

Here's an example of the changes one can make to a JPEG. I took this shot under incandescent lights, and the walls are yellow -- so the photo gets a bit of the yellow cast.

For the changed photo, I just used Apple's iPhoto program and did a temp correction, slight adjustment to saturation, and slid over the levels slider. The changed photo has color that is pretty true to what I see.

I'm not trying to say that shooting RAW is a bad idea, but to reinforce that JPEG is not a lost cause.

Regards,

Boris

 

[Gdad]

Mmmmmmmm. Jiko.

 

[WillowBelle]

My DH bought me the Canon 50D for Christmas . My sisters DBF installed CS3 on my computer. From looking and reading this board, everyone talking about shooting in RAW I decided to give it a shot.

I can not for the life of me figure out how to open a RAW photo in CS3. Would someone be nice enough to explain in a very elementary level how to go about this? The PS help said something about converting the photo to a DNG file, I can't even figure out how to do that!

Thanks so much for the help,
Willow

 

[boBQuincy]

From what I see you will need Adobe Camera Raw version 4.6, or whatever is the latest version supported by CS3. Once that is installed you may need to purge the cache to see the images in the browser.

Once all is working well CS3 should open the RAW files just by double clicking them (unless you have the file type mapped to another program).

 

[ukcatfan]

You will probably have to download and install Adobe Camera RAW (ACR). I do not believe it ever is part of the standard install. Also, you do not need to convert to DNG. I personally find ACR pretty weak in terms of what you can do. You might consider purchasing Lightroom, Bibble, etc. for RAW if you get serious with it.