RAW file format

[Pea-n-Me]

 

[ssanders79]

I wish I started shooting in RAW when I first got my dSLR. There are so many images that I wish I had more control over in post.

 

[Sewfun]

I never throw my digital pictures, out so I just back them up onto DVD and an external hard drive. I have only been shooting in RAW for 2 months, so I don't have more than a few thousand. LOL!

Here is another question regarding RAW. Is there a way to convert a whole folder at a time to JPG rather than one at a time? I hate the time consuming conversion process. I don't want to stop shooting in RAW, but I start back to school in a couple of weeks and I don't want to spend hours and hours converting images. Is there a program or way to do alot at one time??

Thanks,
Tammy

 

[ColleenG]

Tammy, did your camera come with software that will convert from RAW to JPG? I have a Canon and the software it came with can do a batch conversion. It takes a few minutes depending how many pictures I'm doing, but at least I can walk away and do something else in the mean time.

 

[Sewfun]

Tammy, did your camera come with software that will convert from RAW to JPG? I have a Canon and the software it came with can do a batch conversion. It takes a few minutes depending how many pictures I'm doing, but at least I can walk away and do something else in the mean time.

The Sony software says it can do a batch conversion but I haven't seen how to do it yet. Of course, if I took the time to read stuff I probably would figure it out.

 

[ColleenG]

The Sony software says it can do a batch conversion but I haven't seen how to do it yet. Of course, if I took the time to read stuff I probably would figure it out.

I know what you mean, I'm not much of one for reading the manual. But one night I resigned my self that that was what I was going to do, at least to get the basics. Once I did it, it all became pretty easy. I take waaaayyyyy too many pictures to convert them one by one.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I don't trust disks and tapes and all that stuff. I prefer to keep a hard copy. I convert my RAW files to hexidecimal and print them out on good, reliable blue-bar paper. This way is something ever happens to my file I can just rekey it.

 

[pdmedic]

Getting ready for the trip...Only a couple more days left before we head Southeast to see the mouse. I'm trying to decide if I should take all my pictures in RAW or not. I'm carrying a 4 gig card for my camera (Olympus E-510) and have a 160 gig portable drive I plan to dump them to on a regular basis. We are planning on coming back to the room around mid-day for a break. So I guess the question is should I plan to take everything in RAW or just some and do the rest in .jpg?

I think I'm leaning toward taking them in RAW but just not sure someone help push me one direction or the other.

Thanks
Travis

 

[boBQuincy]

When I started using a dSLR in late 2001 I didn't have enough memory cards so I used JPG. Later I started using RAW only for photos I thought would be really good. Finally I started using RAW all the time, because of the increased amount of data that is saved in the image.

I really wish I had started with RAW from the beginning, some of the JPGs would be so much better and the cost of the memory cards is not much compared to having better images. Plus, RAW converters are always getting better and some of my early RAW images look better than ever when run through the newer converters.

Memory card space is always an issue but if the goal is to bring home the best photos you possibly can then there is no debate, RAW is the obvious choice.

 

[VVFF]

Depends how many shots you take before you can get to the hard drive. I would fill that 4GB card with RAW in less than a day on vacation so I would have to stop taking pictures.

I just bought 48GB (6 x 8GB) of CF memory cards for my 50D. At only $30 a piece for Extreme IV cards I don't see any reason not to have more than enough space. However, unlike you I don't intend to take a laptop on vacation with us.

Plus the 15MP 50D has 20MB raw files. That fills up those 8GB cards pretty darn fast.

 

[pdmedic]

That's my concern is filling the card I may have to get another 4 gig card before I leave. With the laptop in the room with the external drive to load onto I should be okay just swapping between 1 or 2 cards using raw.

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

RAW and I would pick up at least an 8GB card or 2 so you are not so pressured to have to dump your cards daily.

 

[YesDear]

RAW RAW RAW!

If you are using SD cards, they are so cheap today I agree that another card is a good thing. If compact flash, they are consistently more expensive but also cheap comparatively speaking.

I use very fast compact flash and have three 8gb cards and four 4gb cards. I can take almost 300 images on the 8gb card shooting lossless RAW which on my camera is about a 25mb image. I buy the fast so I do not have lag time with the large files.

I normally take a laptop that burns DVD's and a portable photo hard drive. ( I have a wolverine) I copy to the hard drive then burn a DVD. When I get home I copy wolverine to my storage drive.

 

[jann1033]

i agree with bobq. i did the same thing and now wish i had just used raw to begin with.
when i bought my new camera i picked up a 16 gb cf card for about $30. i have never filled it in one day with a 10mp camera shooting in large raw, it holds over 1000 shots( more than the counter in the camera counts ). it is not a super fast card but i have never had a problem having to wait to take a shot ( even with 6fps burst). worth the $$ imo. buy it before you go though since you can't always find a good deal when you are at a tourist location.
one benefit to a larger card is since you aren't changing them as often you have less of a chance of bending a pin which i recently read can cause major problems, even short out your camera.

 

[pointandshoot]

Raw IF you do not mind a little post processing of your images. If you plan to take a ton vacation pics and send them to be printed, be prepared to spend a little time tweaking images.

I shoot in Raw + JPEG mode. Storage is cheap.

Chuck

 

[YEKCIM]

RAW. You will be able to adjust exposure, recover (some) overexposed highlights, reduce noise, change white balance, and adjust saturation (at least in ACR you can do those things), just to name a few.

~Ed

 

[wenrob]

Another vote for RAW. Buy extra cards, ideally one for every day. Back them up to the hard drive but don't erase them. Keep them in two different places and you're covered. Or if you can't get a card for each day burn them to disk as John mentioned. I wouldn't trust all my photos to an EHD that could be dropped or fail for no reason. Two copies, always.

 

[Quicklabs]

Another vote for RAW. I did shoot JPEG for Lights, Action, Motor Cars (or whatever that show is called) because my camera buffer couldn't handle the continuous shooting. And then I forgot to switch the settings! Grrrrrrrrrrr. I shot JPEG until about a year and a half ago, and like BobQuincy, I'm really regretting that. Get the memory cards. You'll have them a long time.

 

[ssanders79]

I am like some of the above posts. I wish I shot RAW from the day I got my dslr. I recently started shooting RAW+Jpg. Why both? Well the answer is simple. My wife wants quick access to the images to email and get quick prints if I am not around.

If you are shooting action, you might want to drop down to JPEG for more frames per second shooting.

I've started to look back at my old images that I shot in just jpeg (fine) and I am kicking myself as they could be so much better with some post processing in Lightroom.

Even if you do not want to deal with processing the RAWs you will still have them for future use if you make the transition in the future.

SD media is cheap. Grab an extra card or shoot with a quality vs quantity mentality. I made the switch from quantity to quality shots as I was tired of having 5 shots of the same 2 seconds in time.

 

[Morganw42]

Another vote for RAW. Unless your camera has a really fast frame rate you can buy SD media for cheap, no need for extreme III. I don't know of any SD only cameras that can push write speeds on sd cards past their limits on the camera end, unless you're taking huge bursts and hitting your buffer.
File transfer from the card to computer is an other issue, there you'll see some benefit from expensive memory. Personally, I just start the import and take a break from the computer.