File Utility - 16bit

I've processed raw images and saved them in 16bit TIF format. When I open the saved TIF the colors are way out of wack. When I save in 8bit it looks fine.

I heard someone mention the difference between JPG and RAW in the Drebel/10D/20D is 8bit vs. 12 bit color. Can anyone explain this all?

THanks.

When you say that the colors are way out of wack, do you mean that the whole image looks very dark? If that's the case, then go into your FVU preferences and uncheck Linear box and try it again.

With what application are you opening the 16bit tiffs that result in "whacked" colors?

FYI I have seen this before.. in an older version of ACDsee viewer.. it would almost randomly assign the colors in tiffs... so that every time you opened the file it would look totally different.. you could open the same file in 12 different windows and get twelve totally different color renditions..

..can't recall what the cause was.

With what software are you opening the image? I've noticed that the Windows XP Picture Viewer doesn't always handle 16-bit images correctly. Maybe you're using software that doesn't know how to handle 16-bit images properly.

Software that showed colors funky as if in 256 colors: Roxio Photosuite 5 which is probably a couple years old. Even Adobe Elements 2 said it was of an unsupported color depeth and needed to convert to a useable depth to use the file.

Yes Irfanview 3.91 shows the image right away.

Well,. this may certainly be the trouble.. not all applications can open a 16 bit tiff.

Photoshop Elements 2.0 doesn't support 16-bit images - the new Photoshop Elements 3.0 and Photoshop CS do.

I had the same problem, I bet you are using EOS viewer.
My advise is to stop using it.
I also has a few bad cases of moire with that program.

When I installed the other program that comes with my 20D (can't remember the name and can't look for it now, I'm at work all the problems dissapeared.