Why shoot in RAW?

JC32 wrote in post #9646442
"]Well I would love to try and shoot RAW, but I've heard that you need a ton of space on your PC because the files are so large...I know it would kill my PC if I tried to open just a few RAW files...It kinda sucks, cause I would love to try it...[/SIZE]

Hmm...what??? Have you updated your computer for the last 5 years? If not, I can see why. How long I have my computer??? 2007? Is a Pentium a dual core processor with 1gb of RAM. Windows XP. 500gb hard drive space. If I can work with a panorama shot in CS3 (the file can get as big as 400 MB), there is no excuse for not shooting raw other than for the obvious reasons.

Listen, you can get a 500gb hard drive for less than $100.

Lightroom 2 handles and organizes RAW files very well. My computer does drag a lot when trying to view RAW files in Windows Photo Gallery.

dugcross wrote in post #9645798
Adobe Photoshop CS4 software is the industry standard in digital image editing. Photoshop holds an important place in the pro photographer's toolbox, for detailed pixel-level editing and compositing, but photographers face a variety of workflow concerns beyond image editing. Lightroom 2 addresses these needs in a photographer-centric way. Each module in Lightroom is dedicated to an essential photographic task — use the Library for importing and managing photos; the Develop module for fundamental photographic adjustments and processing hundreds of photographs at a time; and the Slideshow, Web, and Print modules to easily present photos onscreen, online, or in print. Lightroom also goes further, enabling you to manage raw files, even if they are offline, with automatic importing from the folder on your computer used for tethered shooting.
Lightroom excels at processing large volumes of photographs, creating the perfect negative, and outputting collections to the web, print, and slide shows. Photoshop remains the ultimate pixel-level, individual image-editing, and compositing application. Together, Lightroom and Photoshop are the comprehensive software duo for post-processing and editing of digital imagery.
For example, you may have 2,000 photographs and need to quickly preview, sort and rate them, embed your copyright on each, correct white balance, change tonal and color values, and make monochrome copies (or add a wide array of other special effects). Then, you need to output to a slide show, print, or the web, and all under the pressure of time constraints. For this common type of photographic workflow, Lightroom is the ideal solution.
Now perhaps some of your photographs are destined for an advertising layout. After choosing the best images, you may need to add a special effect to a model's eyes or change the pattern of a dress or pull the model completely away from her background to create an intricate, multilayered composite. For this, Photoshop is the ideal solution.

I've heard it summed up this way:
Lightroom and Aperture are photo-management programs, with some basic editing capabilities.
Photoshop is a powerful editing program, with no photo-management capabilities.

hollis_f wrote in post #9646045
Although you can apply the same tools you won't get the same effects because the extra data just isn't there. I use Lightroom for all my shots and I've recently gone back to the pictures I took on my first trip to Africa. Unfortunately that was before I discovered the advantages of raw and was still shooting in jpeg.

It's heartbreaking looking at all these once-in-a-lifetime shots and knowing they could have been just that bit better if I hadn't thrown all those bits of data away into the Kalahari sands. It doesn't help that I'd only been using a proper camera for a couple of months and didn't always get it right in the camera.

I feel for you! Exactly the same thing happened to me. I'd inadvertently changed the WB, and the jpgs were completely unrecoverable. Since then always RAW, and I increasingly appreciate the amount of adjustment/recovery that's achievable.

Sid

hollis_f wrote in post #9646045
Although you can apply the same tools you won't get the same effects because the extra data just isn't there. I use Lightroom for all my shots and I've recently gone back to the pictures I took on my first trip to Africa. Unfortunately that was before I discovered the advantages of raw and was still shooting in jpeg.

It's heartbreaking looking at all these once-in-a-lifetime shots and knowing they could have been just that bit better if I hadn't thrown all those bits of data away into the Kalahari sands. It doesn't help that I'd only been using a proper camera for a couple of months and didn't always get it right in the camera.

Yeap, lots can and does go wrong. There's also many variables.
Shooting RAW gives you greater artistic control... by having all the shot data as you point out.

Why shoot Polaroids when you can shoot complete negatives?

blackhawk wrote in post #9648108
Yeap, lots can and does go wrong. There's also many variables.
Shooting RAW gives you greater artistic control... by having all the shot data as you point out.

Why shoot Polaroids when you can shoot complete negatives?

Jpegs are hardly comparable to Polaroids. 10 years ago you would have done cartwheels to get the results of modern jpegs.

YankeeMom wrote in post #9648449
Jpegs are hardly comparable to Polaroids. 10 years ago you would have done cartwheels to get the results of modern jpegs.

it's an analogy... a jpeg file is hardly comparable to a RAW file.

blackhawk wrote in post #9648467
it's an analogy... a jpeg file is hardly comparable to a RAW file.

Well, considering they both end up in the same place (as jpegs), I'm not getting the analogy.

YankeeMom wrote in post #9648486
Well, considering they both end up in the same place (as jpegs), I'm not getting the analogy.

You missed my whole point. It's all about having the data you need to build the final image. Jpegs are just one file type.

A RAW is like a film negative, it comprises a complete record of what the camera recorded.

blackhawk wrote in post #9648508
You missed my whole point. It's all about having the data you need to build the final image. Jpegs are just one file type.

A RAW is like a film negative, it comprises a complete record of what the camera recorded.

Yeah, I know.

YankeeMom wrote in post #9648486
Well, considering they both end up in the same place (as jpegs), I'm not getting the analogy.

As the song says, "It ain't necessarily so!" Often, shots wind up as TIFFs. This is especially true in legal and government work.

Unlike JPEGs, there is no compression loss with TIFFs. This allows critical data to be retained instead of compressed away.

All U.S. patents, for example, are archived as TIFFs.

I understand that you can edit TIFFS but -- SURPRISE! -- you can edit jpegs, too. Jpeg files can be very large and handle a decent amount of touchups if necessary (I expect that since most of you work on jpegs in Photoshop you know what I mean.) So much for the "Polaroid" comparison.

I am working hard to learn more about RAW and using DPP, but I'm not going to be ridiculous about it. Again, modern (large file) jpegs would have had you all doing cartwheels 10 years ago.

i agree with amemnon

the way I see it, jpeg is a finalized version of an edited raw for me (technically not). because i feel i have much more control over the photo in raw converting to jpeg because of file size and it's easier to access for everyone who don't know what a raw is.

neilwood32 wrote in post #9627337
Think of an example in a gym with your son/daughter about to score a goal to win a championship. You know that the photo you take will be hung on walls for years and friends and family will all want copies.
Do you
A) Shoot Jpeg and hope that your WB and exposure is perfect?
OR
B) shoot in RAW and know that even if the lighting has cycled, you can alter the WB and also recover that 1 stop of exposure because it was a dark section of the gym?

I know I can pretty much nail it 90% of the time, but I sure as heck want that comfort zone allowed by RAW just in case I didnt!

So, it's that 10% of the time that rules your life....WOW.

Did my first all RAW shoot yesterday and processed them in Lightroom. Much less painful than I thought. Thanks, guys!