Shootsmarter article on RAW vs JPEG for Professionals

Amazing analysis of the costs of shooting RAW for professionals. The time elements apply to amateurs like me, too.

I've been very careful in setting up my shots and getting some great results with JPEG. Admittedly, when I first got my camera, my skills were a little spottier and RAW would have helped. But when I get really good JPEG results, I sometimes feel almost like I'm cheating or should feel guilty about it, largely driven by the RAW fanatics. I still think both RAW and JPEG have their place, they're just different, and useful in different situations.

I think this article will really cause some "I only shoot RAW, 100% of the time" folks to get wide eyed. I think it's time JPEG stopped getting treated like a red-headed step child.

You may need to register to see this. I don't want to copy it here, because I am unsure of the legal/ethical ramifications of it. If it's the same as quoting a source, and identifying it properly, maybe someone else more confident in these issues might copy the text here. Or a mod. I'm just afraid to do it.

http://www.shootsmarte​r.com/infocenter/jt030​.htm

You'll find it an eye-opener, I think.

John

Yes you have to register and yes, do not post it here.

Not a single shot in my Gallery was shot in RAW, that's not because i purposely avoid it. I just haven't got round to it, and frankly i'm pretty happy with my shots as they are. Yes i'll get around to shooting Raw, but i don't think it's the be all and end all. I'm not really in to pp i have to admit, and as i said i'm happy with the results im getting right now. I've seen plenty of raw shots, and i'm not sure they are anything beyond my own shots.

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/​raw_vs_jpg.shtml

I shoot RAW for the insurance, not the quality. Being able to alter the white ballance, color profile (sRgb/aRgb), fix missed exposures later is very helpful. My aim is to go to a JPG workflow once i'm more confident in my skills.

It's not confidence with me, it's not enjoying pp that's guided me. I've been shooting nothing but manual since last May & i think i've just about got it now. But if it's crucial, i'll bracket the exposure.

I'm not anti Raw, i'm just happy with the results i'm getting

Tim, that was my takeaway from the article. It is good insurance, but the cost is more than I imagined. Interesting how he takes it all apart, piece by piece. His point, though, I think, is a good one. If you're dead confident in your abilities and shoot perfectly exposed and white balanced, JPG will give you as high quality an image as RAW.

I'm not there, either . But I think both RAW and JPG shooting have their place. One area where RAW would certainly shine is if you wanted to do more "artistic" processing of a well-exposed image. I came away from the article feeling better about shooting JPG, generally, though. Somehow I was getting the impression it's "second class" shooting.

John

I agree with most of what he says, and what you say John. JPG is great if you get it right all the time, personally I still stuff things up occasionally, if only slightly, and I want all the insurance I can get for weddings. If I get it right a batch conversion doesn't take too long.

I shoot RAW and JPG both. Just like I shoot auto, TV, AV, manual, etc, etc. I shoot manual focus and auto. I shoot all modes of metering. They all have their place. Do I have my favorites? Absolutely.

However, (and no I didn't read that article linked to as I don't desire to join that site) relying on RAW as "insurance" can result in bad photos. If your original exposure is wrong to begin with, then there are several factors that can be affected by a bad exposure.

You can lose details forever that will be unrecoverable no matter what you do, and also, which alot of people do not know, is that your colors can be thrown way off.

If you underexpose, your colors will be a bit too dark, no matter what you do. If you overexpose, your colors will be washed, no matter what you do.

The moral of the story here is to ALWAYS try and shoot the photo with proper exposure and white balance the first time and not rely on RAW as insurance, but instead for very minor tweaks for the perfect photo, which we always strive for daily.

Have I relied on RAW as insurance? You betchya.

There are times where a shot develops right before our eyes and there is ZERO time to make any adjustments. In cases like these it it always better to at least "get the shot" than to stand there and watch it go by.

I have always considered RAW as the negative film of digital photography and the JPEG file as the positive slide of digital photography.

I tend to agree, and that's where I shoot RAW. I usually get 5 or less keepers in a set, and I dedicate usually an hour per image with post processing. RAW has more information in it, so it benefits someone like me who's going to get into squeezing every bit out of a sensor's dynamic range and really tinkering with a shot. If you don't want that flexibility, then RAW likely isn't going to benefit you much

I have insurance on my car and my house, but I still drive carefully and don't leave candles burning unattended.

I can't remember the last time I shot a JPEG. But I think even the ordained preachers in the church of RAW understand that it's still important to get the exposure right.

I find myself changing the values of the image significantly and frequently. It's not that I'm getting the exposure wrong, it's that my visualization of the image and the sensitivity of the sensor don't match. So, I "dodge and burn in", sometimes in fairly extreme amounts.

That's why I mostly shoot raw. I want all 12 bits of sensor information, not just the 8 bits that get saved in a JPEG file.

If I was an event photographer and more interested in high production, then I might set up my workflow differently. When I do shoot events, I usually use medium format and film. I have a 10D and it's nice but I can't afford a digital camera that can compete with my Pentax 645 and Fuji's finest.

Usually, I use the camera for work documentation, which gets JPEG, or for fun photography, which includes all sorts of (usually somewhat static) subjects and gets raw.

As to the costs of raw, I can't imagine what they would be. I never exceed the storage on my card, haven't yet filled up my hard disk (or backup system), and don't spend more than about 15 seconds converting from raw. Though I didn't read the article, I'm at a loss as to what other costs there might be. Perhaps someone can summarize the article for those of us who don't want to register on that site.

Rick "who thinks 12 bits is 16 times more stretchable than 8 bits" Denney

Absolutely. I'm happy if I don't need to adjust exposure at all in RAW, the more experience I get the less of that I need to do.

Use what you like because it's not a big deal of either/or, but I use RAW 100% now I've taken time to explore its capabilities. So many here spend thousands on their gear and then shoot JPeg and they lose information they could otherwise have to play with. PPing RAW is simple and their extra size is so unimportant now we have cheap memory.

This is good one, so thanks for sharing. I almost always shoot jpeg, and I know why I do this. I also know why I shoot raw when I shoot it, but I always have trouble explaining to those "shoot raw! raw is best and if you don't shoot raw then you are nothing" people, that there's nothing which would do best in all occassions. Well... I just don't bother to explain this anymore. And usually on the end it all comes down to time "Yes with my ultrasuper raw converter I can convert whole set of photos in batch". Yeah and I can set custom wb and we are on same. And that's exactly what that guy wrote... if you are happy with batch conversion why bother with raw on first place.
But as RFMSports said... there's no jpeg is best, or raw is best. For some things raw is better, for other jpeg is better, and if you are good enough, then you should know when to use best possible option.

This to me seems a pretty redundant argument - each format has it's pros and cons and these are pretty well documented and understood.

When modern DSLRs allow you to save RAW+JPEG, surely you simply decide which to process depending on the intended use/how well the picture was taken? Even on my 300D I can extract JPEGs from my RAW files!

Case in point: shot tons of photos at my sister's wedding and it will take ages to process all the RAW files (but probably not much longer than the adjusting I would make to JPEGs anyway) to to display on my gallery. However, I simply extracted the jpegs from the raws and posted them as thumbnails on my website - when all the orders are in from family, I shall process only the raw files for the pics that people want... should save a fair whack of time.