OpenRAW survey

[Choogster]

Do your bit.

http://openraw.org/survey/

[Kirsty]

what is raw??

[Choogster]

http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/why_use_raw.html#what_is_raw

[tonymidd]

Hi Kirsty,
Basically RAW is the unaltered data as captured by the camera, you process this in your main computer. You have far more control over how the image will look than relying upon the incamera processing which can be fairly brutal.

This link to Adobe's site gives you uptodate info and an insight into why the survey is important.

http://www.digitalmediadesigner.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=28283

[Kirsty]

so.. its the unaltered image when you get it on your pc?

[Stemmy]

No Kirsty.

On your camera you will have different settings for how the picture is saved to the compact flash card.

ie. Large Jpeg - Medium Jpeg - Small Jpeg etc

On these settings the camera takes the image as seen by the sensor and converts it into a Jpeg image. This image has been compressed.

Some cameras have a setting called RAW in addition to the Jpeg settings.

Select this setting and the camera will save the image as seen by the sensor without any adjustments at all. No compression.

These RAW images have a much larger file size (therefore better quality) and can be edited much more exactly in Photoshop.

[DennisB]

Kirsty

In addition to Stemmy's words of wisdom, not all cameras have raw format as an option, so if you have not heard of it before and your camera does not have a raw setting, then I would just treat it as academic until you need or want to know more

[Stemmy]

Finally had time to have a good read of Choogsters link.

Very very interesting. I think this should be of great importance to anybody who values their photography.

I am going to "Sticky" this thread to try and increase its hits.

Please if you shoot RAW the have a read and complete the survey. :)

Thanke for the link Choogs.

[tonymidd]

The link choogster posted is an excelent intro to RAW pp but it does not address the problem that the survey is intended to bring to manufacturers attention. As things stand at the present you may not be able to open your current RAW files in the near future unless they, the manufacturers, adopt a universal format ie DNG. Unless this universal format is adopted we may have a similar problem as the Betamax v VHS gave the video world; only more so.
http://www.adobe.com/products/dng/main.html
gives more info on the whys and wherefores.
Take the Minolta RAW format, as they no longer make cameras how long do you think it will be before PS, RSE, C1 etc cease supporting it? Especially as Sony also have their own RAW format and will probably keep using that in preference to the Minolta one.
I read on an other forum that the early Canon Raw files pose some dificulties, as I do'nt use Canon I can't be certain about this.

[Stemmy]

Sorry Tony I said link I meant the first link to the survey :o

[tonymidd]

Sorry Tony I said link I meant the first link to the survey :o Not a prob Martin, I was not having a dig at you but making a general comment. http://www.wedding-photography.org/forum/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

[james]

Just started to read this thread and linked to the survay and completed it. Just a pressed submit i noticed that it closes in 4 minutes. Just got in on time i think.
Those that shoot RAW will have an opinion on this one i would have thought. My own thoughts are that when the picture is taken, it should be my own choice as to how i develope that. Always was in the past.

[Hisham]

Well Raw means not altered or like they say to describe the meat Raw-not cooked not touched.

So the final process of the image is done over the computer not in the Camera.
Raw have positive side that the white balance of the picture can always be altered so you may produce tiff-jpg but one with flurosent filter and one with a warming filter and the Raw stay as the Digital Negative-example if you have shot with an undirect light like canon 580exwith 20d. and the wall happens to have the yellow color and you didn't happen to know that the picture will have a yellowish tone-Raw will solve the problem by giving the Image a bit of blue and the white balance will be corrected.

In the Ad business and I AM IN IT I always shoot raws-it give me large files like 20*30 resoltion of 300 dpi tiff 25 mega bites Canon 20 d files .I have already hanged billboard 3*4 meters they look like medium format.

negative side of Raws- large files on my lexar 1gb 80 x pro I get 80 RAWS PICTUES.so if you are in a wedding shoot large jpg or you will be out of space with no time.