New article on RAW conversion on my website...

[regnaD kciN]

...and you can read it here.

[NashVegas]

1. Good Essay

I'm still very mixed how I feel about RAW.

Although I'm happy about the rescue possibilities, I also agree with those who call it a time waster; the amount of time it takes to fiddle gets crazy. I feel more like I'm assisting the computer than it's helping me.

[ManiacJoe]

3. RAW is not always the be-all-end-all.

RAW has two advantages over JPG: (1) no data is discarded due to compression, (2) the color space is bigger than the 8-bits used in Jpg. The bigger color space is great for making adjustments for bad shoots and allows for a slightly bigger dynamic range in the photo.

If what you are shooting does not benefit from either of those advantages, then shooting jpeg may work fine for you. For example, when shooting landscapes I use RAW mostly for reason 1 with a little #2 for artistic liberties. When shooting sports I use jpg. I get the exposures correct, and the small amounts of lost data will not be noticed on web sites or pic smaller than 8x10. The size difference between raw and jpg also means faster shooting and more pics per memory card.

If you truly do not want to spend time post-processing, you can shoot jpgs and set the camera to process them to some extent, keeping in mind the restrictions/trade-offs.

[JeffR]

2. Nicely done.

Bravo. You've done a fine job of making the case for shooting in RAW.

Most of my post-processing is done with RAW files, so there's barely anything to be done with the resulting TIFFs beyond resizing and sometimes adding a little USM after resizing if necessary. The control RAW gives is really a godsend.