Lousy JPEG quality

[Jamie]

I have to admit that my Canon S45 is the first digital camera I've bought, so I have nothing to compare it with, but I'm very disappointed with the image quality of JPEGs.

There's no high quality JPEG setting!

It seems stupid to me. The highest quality JPEG setting is not very high. You can see artifacts all over the picture when you zoom in. The only way to get higher quality photos is to store the photos as huge RAW files.

I don't mind saving photos as RAW files. But why isn't there just a very high JPEG setting?

If the images were saved as very high quality JPEGs, they would appear identical to the RAW photos, but would be half the filesize.

I loaded a RAW photo into Photoshop and saved it as a maximum quality JPEG. It was (virtually) indistinguishable from the original, yet half the filesize. Why can't the camera do that? A highest quality JPEG setting would let people take full quality photos at half the filesize. Plus it would save having to convert them to a more useful format on the computer!

Are all canon cameras like this or is it just the S45? Am I the only one who finds this very annoying? Does anyone have a good reason why there isn't a "proper" JPEG setting on the cameras?

[CyberDyneSystems]

The S45 has four resolution settings for jpegs
• 2272 x 1704 (3.8 megapixels)
• 1600 x 1200
• 1024 x 768
• 640 x 480

...and three quality settings for jpegs

• Super-Fine
• Fine
• Normal

Make sure of your ISO setting as well when you take the time to re-read that manual and find the settings for the jpeg compression :D

[Jamie]

I think you've misunderstood me. I don't have trouble using my camera. I'm just disappointed that there's no high quality jpeg setting. The highest setting available is nowhere near RAW quality.

If Canon had only offered a truly high quality JPEG setting, then people could take full quality photos at half the filesize (ie twice as many photos). But at present you have to choose between poor quality (JPEG) or huge files (RAW).

[CyberDyneSystems]

????

I guess I was misunderstanding what you said?

Are you saying that even with the Camera set to full resolution and "Super-Fine" jpeg setting you are disapointed with the quality of the jpeg?

I get it now. (I thought you were saying you were disapointed that there was no way to adjust the quality to a higher standard)

Hmm,. I have been satisfied with the jpegs that my Canon produces,. but it is not an S45. (in fact I sometimes shoot in "normal" as opposed to "Fine")

Also,. I have only had experience with 4 brands of Digital Camera, (Olympus, Canon,. Fuji, Agfa) but none of these Cameras offered jpegs with file sizes approaching 1/2 the size of the RAW or TIFF settings. In most cases the best jpeg was about 1/4 to 1/3 the file size of the raw.

..and yet the S45's RAW files are approx 3.8 MB and it's largest jpegs are 1.8 MB,.. just about exactly half the size of the raw. The next step down is the "fine" quality which are about 1 MB in size.

Can you post any examples? I am curious now. :)

[Jamie]

Look at this example I made:

http://www.graphix.plus.com/member/user/canon.jpg

[Conk]

I need to ask to try and understand a little better.
How are your photos straight from the camera? Is it only after you save the images?
I know it is alway recommended to never edit your originals but rather to make copies from them and to save as Tiff. to prevent jpg. degrading.
I'm not sure why you would save your photos to raw as the images from your camera are not raw.

[CyberDyneSystems]

Conk,

I believe the S45 does have RAW as a file option.

The Sharpening within the camera is normal. Again,. I don't have your model camera,. but half the motivation for a jpeg output is to have a finished printable image straight from the camera. Unlike the RAW image,. jpegs allready have "processing" implemented to the images by the camera. This will include sharpening,. white balance etc.

If no sharpening or processing took place ,. the jpegs would be somewhat "less than finished"

Part of the reason many use RAW is to avoid the processing that the camera imparts all together so that the photographer can make all those decisions in the "Digital darkroom"

Again,. to the best of my understanding all digitals do some in camera "processing" to achieve a usable image straight out of the camera. As the expectation in the industry is that anyone wantig to do all the processing themselves will use RAW,. there is no setting for an "Unprocessed jpeg" (in fact the conversion to jpeg is proccessing of a sort anyway)

[Jamie]

My point is that the superfine jpeg is clearly inferior to the original raw image. It's noisy. Even in blank areas.

I think they should've made the highest jpeg setting a lot higher, so the jpegs looked identical to the original photo. It's only about 600k more per image.

[daveh]

In looking at your pictures and the comments on your link, it seems to me that you're not complaining about jpeg but about the sharpening. What sharpening settings were used? I don't have an S45, but usually sharpening affects only jpegs and on many cameras the lowest setting still isn't off/none.

You also say that the jpges look "artificially sharpened" but sharpening that is appropriate to any resolution will look artificial when viewed at a much lower resolution as your link does.

I have a 10D myself, so I spend most time watching complaints on the flip-side - ie people who use RAW to get maximum quality and then complain about a lack of sharpness.

Jamie wrote:
If the images were saved as very high quality JPEGs, they would appear identical to the RAW photos, but would be half the filesize.

Would they? RAW files are compressed too.

[Jamie]

daveh wrote:

Would they? RAW files are compressed too.



Yeah, they'd be just over half the filesize. On that test photo, the RAW file was 3.78mb and the highest quality photoshop jpeg was 2.19mb. That's just under three fifths of the RAW size.

If the filesize of the jpeg was anywhere near the size of the RAW file then I would just use RAW.

[daveh]

I thought you were talking about a theoretical "super jpeg" with the same image quality of the RAW file. That would require 12 bits per pixel and lossless compression. I don't think you're going to get that and still be three fifths the size.

Anyway, what about the sharpening settings?

[Jamie]

No, there are no sharpening or other effects turned on on my camera. I would never use them.

[daveh]

You probably want to soot raw then. In browsing around, it appears that the S45 doesn't offer a true "off" setting for sharpening jpegs. For what it's worth there is a general consensus that the Canons do much less in-camera sharpening than other brands but to turn it off all the way, you need RAW. (This usually comes up in the context of someone complaining about not enough sharpening so this is a refreshing change.:)) You might also want to verify that you really have a problem with the sharpening at normal magnification levels.

[Jamie]

Hmmm... what you said about automatic sharpening makes sense.

I don't really mind a little sharpening, because Canon photos aren't too sharp anyway, and I like the convenience of having my photos turned instantly into jpegs.

So I think I'll just stick to highest quality jpeg from now on. After looking at my "sample photo", there isn't that much difference. If you weren't looking for it, you wouldn't see it.

I think this has cleared up my problem, thanks for the help guys.