Further details on Microsoft's RAW File Support!

[PhotosGuy]

This came in a newsletter for anyone who is interested:
Following up on our story from last Wednesday about Microsoft's announced plans to support a variety of RAW file formats in their upcoming Longhorn operating system, we spoke with Josh Weisberg, Group Product Manager for Windows Digital Media at Microsoft.

http://www.imaging-resource.com/NEWS/1118162160.html

[BrandonSi]

http://www.imaging-resource.com/NPICS1/msoft_raw_05l.jpg

That is going to be so useful.

[Jesper]

Sounds good, it will at least make browsing through RAW files easier. But I think we shouldn't expect a full, high quality RAW converter in Windows Longhorn:
...I want to be clear that we're not going after professional-level RAW conversion. We want to make sure that there are still opportunities for Adobe, Phase One, and others to have a business opportunity to develop and market their pro-level conversion software. They'll continue to be able to provide much broader abilities to tweak the image data, workflow solutions, etc.

Q: So this is really a "business class" conversion service then? - A convenient way to get files into applications like PowerPoint or an email program, but not really intended as a means for professional photographers to manipulate their images?

A: Well, yes and no. It's really a bit more than that, something in the middle somewhere. There is support for 16 bit data, so you can certainly get at a lot more image data than you can with a JPEG. There's also the whole matter of browsing and organizing images. You may want to sort through your RAW images without having to perform a conversion, but today you have to convert them before you can look at them. (The biggest winners from an application developer standpoint will likely be the asset manager publishers. This will mean they won't have to be constantly adding support for new RAW formats as they're developed.)
We'll still want to use the RAW conversion programs that we're using today (Capture One, Rawshooter, Photoshop, ...).

[Hellashot]

Microsoft should stick to operating systems and word processing and leave the other applications to the professionals. They already disbanded their gaming department.

[300Dplus]

I'm sure Microsoft raw browsing funtionality will be much greater, but to cover the simple need of just seeing your raw pics before conversion in windows explorer after downloading them, I've been using for months now "dpmagic" and it works fine...http://www.dpmagic.com/

[arpi]

not so much related to this topic, but MShoft is releasing (well, they bought the program from another company) a vector graphics program as part of their new OS.

http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/ (http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/)

[Jesper]

Oh cool, there's already RAW support available for Windows XP from Microsoft!
see this thread: http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=79509

[PhotosGuy]

Oh cool, there's already RAW support available for Windows XP from Microsoft!
see this thread: http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=79509

Better read my posts before you install it! Problems... :evil:

[ScottE]

I downloaded MS Raw Viewer to give it a test run.

I found it to be a quick way to preview an file full of RAW images, before you decide which ones to keep. Pictures load very quickly, you can quickly see 100% views for evaluating sharpness and if you find a shot you want to do further editing on you can directly open it with the file editing or converting program of your choice.

I think the initial pre-view of a file full of pictures is about the only time I will use this program, although I have now set it as the default viewer for several types of files.

If I open a large folder full of RAW files with RawShooter, it takes a long time for the program to index all the files. After that it opens quickly, and if I have corrected colour, exposure or other factors, those corrections show up in the future, even though the original RAW file was not changed. As a result, for a second look at photos in a file I will use RawShooter.

The MS program may replace some of the things I currently use BreezeBrowser for.

Scott

[MTalley]

I was looking forward to having more Exif information available in the "Details" view. Unfortunately, they only populate for Raw images and not JPG's. Oh well, I needed to update to SP2 anyway, and this was as good excuse as any.

By the way, if you don't have SP2 loaded, the Raw Powertoy will do a full install, reboot the computer and then when you log in, tell you that you need SP2. Real nice way to waste 1/2 hour (I thought I had upgraded to SP2, but it was the desktop computer that I had done, instead).

[nigelch]

You could always buy a Mac. Have the most stable OS around, and use the Canon 20D software as the Almighty intended.
Microsoft always take someone else's ideas, and try to produce their own proprietary version. I have worked in design and print for years, we always used TIFF files. Not good enough for MS, they introduced BMP. No gain in quality, huge gain in file size. Not impressed with this announcement.
N