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Garry Black Photography |
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TECHNICAL NOTES |
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Should
you shoot in JPEG or RAW? The quick answer is RAW, if you want a brief explanation read on. The answer to this question depends on what you want to do with the photographs once you’ve shot them. It also depends on the camera that you’ve shot them with. On the internet you will find conflicting sides on which format to use, here are 2 of them. One from Petteri Sulonen, who is in favour of RAW and another from Ken Rockwell who is in favour of using JPEG. It can be confusing! But from my experience if you want the best digital file, which in turn will give you the best image quality, the RAW format is by far the best choice. If you want to make changes to your images, using an image software program such as Photoshop or Paint Shop, you should definitely think about shooting in RAW. If all you want is to get quick print(s) of your shots and that’s all, then shoot in JPEG. In other words for snapshots use JPEG and for serious work use RAW. Every time you save a JPEG image, some image data is lost due to compression even at the maximum quality level. This is a cumulative effect that occurs every time that you save the image. Over time the effects become noticeable as artifacts in the image. These distortions appear as banding, boxy/square areas, colour shifts and a general loss of sharpness. Image degradation is most noticeable in low resolution images, and doesn't represent a significant problem in high resolution images unless they're being worked on repeatedly. How many times you can save an image before artifacts become visible depends on a number of variables such as file size, amount of compression used, and the nature of the image itself, such as how much continuous tone area the image contains (blue skies for example). As a general rule artifacts are a problem for low resolution JPEGs or high resolution JPEGs that will be blown up considerably before printing. A considerable advantage that JPEGs have over RAW files is their smaller size. While the exact difference will vary depending on which camera you're shooting with and your subject matter. But no matter what, with JPEGs you’ll be able to fit more images onto your compact flash card. Shooting in the RAW format allows you to start with the highest quality image as every bit of detail that the camera captured is saved in the file. What you get with a RAW file is the ability to make changes without affecting the quality of the image. When converting the RAW image into a TIFF you can use the white balance setting, adjust the exposure, brightness, shadows, contrast, colours and saturation. With the ability to do all of this work in 16 bit as opposed to only 8 bit with JPEGs. With Photoshop CS (and maybe the software that comes with your camera) you can also sharpen the image when converting it from RAW, but I prefer not to sharpen it at this stage. I use PhotoKit Sharpener from PixelGenius, which is an amazing plug-in for Photoshop. A final word: You might want to consider shooting some of your pictures in JPEG and some others in RAW. This would probably depend on the subject that you’re photographing. You can change the shooting format from one shot to the next; you don’t have to change the compact flash cards. It’s exactly the same as changing the ISO setting. In fact there are some cameras that you to shot both RAW and JPEG simultaneously and record both to the flash card. |
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