Michael Reichmann has a new and interesting RAW / JPG comparison article... JPG Follies

Nice link. Thank you.

one could argue based on that article, if you don't have problems with WB or exposure than JPEG isn't a problem. It sounds like this article is promoting using RAW as a crutch.

...The bait is carefully placed and the trap is set.

Now we wait...

Shooting raw does much more than correct for exposure or wb, if you plan on doing any post work i.e. bring out more color etc. you are better off working in raw. Every time you adjust a jpg you lose quality, now if you are only slightly adjusting levels or curves, jpg would be fine, but if you want more control; shoot raw!
my .02
Candy

I can't nail every whitebalance, so RAW is certainly my crutch.

Shot jpg this year for about 4 weddings - couldn't nail WB everytime.
Those weddings don't look nearly as good as the ones I shot RAW.

Went back to RAW and loving the freedom and versatility it brings.

Gooooooo RAW!

Check this out!

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0710/07100402dxo5.asp

I used to love Raw until I got my S5... now I'm a happy Jpeg shooter. Sure if I do mess up an image, it is harder to work with--but I've found that the jpeg files from that camera are just amazing, and I spend less time tweaking them in general. (and I'm not shooting 20+ gigs at a wedding anymore... thank goodness! )

When I use my D200, I definitely still shoot RAW though...

btw Damon, your new avatar totally cracks me up...

Say, when you send me those RAW files, can you also send duplicate jpgs of the same shot? I really want to see how good the fuji is in jpg/raw.

Goodness you ask for the world don't you...

kidding kidding kidding... I'll go shoot some now.

I am bossy and directive. Plus I was the youngest of 3 (and the only boy) so I am also a bit spoiled.

No rush. Whenever you can get it to me.

Right now, most cameras are not fast enough and most people don't have access to enough memory and disc space (and efficient backup methods) to make shooting exclusively Raw practical. (Not to mention that different Raw converters offer different quality and it takes a while for them to appear after a new camera comes out.)

And it's ridiculous (like in the LL article) to say that Raw is better because you can salvage shots you shouldn't have taken in the first place.

+1000

To all debating::

I say, great, do what works best for your workflow. Not everyone can learn RAW workflow fast and efficiently. Once you have your system down it's hard to change. RAW personally works for me because of my editing style & the freedom I have. I bring all my files into photoshop intentionally "flat" looking, and I edit in PS with curves & layers. This is what works for me.

But remember EVERY TIME YOU SAVE A JPG over and over again you loose information, degrading the file each time.

This argument is over. RAW wins. It's a fact. You can't get perfect color and clarity with jpg the way you can with RAW. I've done all sorts of tests, shot jpg for years. Anyone that tells you that they get just as good from jpg are one of three things: 1) not picky, 2) oblivious to reality, or 3) lying.

How's that for fuel?

Cory

You rock Cory. Even though I was (1) trying to play fair & (2) not get pulled in to the argument to begin with!

Back in late '99 when I went all digital - I shot jpg.
It wasn't until late early 2003 when I converted to an all RAW workflow.

When I went to RAW, I felt like I had purchased a new camera.
The color, the detail, the flexibility... I was hooked.

BUT - file sizes are huge, and storage becomes an issue.
Then you wonder about future compatability and so on.

So, after years of RAW shooting, and seeing how well modern cameras shot jpg. Plus having LR to tweak those jpgs - I decided to try going back.

BIG MISTAKE... it was like I stepped down a level in quality, clarity and color. Yuck.

So - I agree with Cory on his statement.

Now, each person has different needs and quality standards.
And MOST clients cannot tell the difference anyway.

But I sleep better at night knowing I have the ability, now and in the future, to produce the best possible image from my RAW file.

GOOOO RAW!

There's no such thing as perfect color. The only person who should always shoot Raw is the commercial shooter who needs to match product colors exactly.

And there are always trade-offs. Unless you are shooting only for yourself, there is always a tradeoff between time, "quality," artistry, etc. A commercial photographer is paid to get the image the client needs - no more and no less - and it's the same with wedding photographers. Otherwise we'd all be shooting with 1Ds MkIIIs for candids and Hasselblads with digital backs for the "important" shots. (Just like I used to use an RB67 for formals.)

We shot weddings with ISO 400 color negative film because it was fast enough for most situations, yet we could live with the grain. No one in their right mind ever shot an entire wedding on Kodachrome 25 or slide film.

Hate to be openly contrary, but we have both the fast cameras (D2X) and memory (6TB and counting). Shooting NEF is what we do.

How is that being contrary? Loan me $20K and I'll get the same setup. (There's a reason why most photographers don't.)

raw raw raw....sorry.....had to do that....

rawr...here me roar

Actually, assuming you already have your camera of choice, you can get an 8-bay Burly box ($855) with 4TB of storage (<$800) and a PCIx card ($150) in a RAID configuration that will allow you to do 40 or so weddings at 50GB per wedding.

Grand total: $1850

That's if you KEEP the RAW (I mean... "raw", sorry Kevin) files forever. If you discard the RAWs and only archive the JPEGs when production is done, then we're talking about at least 10 YEARS of storage. Even if you keep the RAWs forever, just add drives or upgrade them as you need to. With 1TB drives at around $250 there's not really a valid business reason for using the cost of a storage solutions as an argument against RAW shooting.

BenV

** Just for Damon's amusement**

Nazi's shoot JPEG... don't be a Nazi.

Internet Posting Rule #219

The first person who uses 'Nazi' for a comparison loses the argument.

ive just shot RAW for so long im honestly not even in the debate anymore. im curious as to how people edit JPEGs? that's a serious question, we've just dialed ours in and done it one way for so long i dont know other ways (which has been cool with me, keep it simple and consistent). for my own personal weddings i shoot RAW and mostly copy and paste settings across the board to similar images. anything in the getting ready room is going to have similar color balance and we dial in the shadows, contrast, vignette, etc for that series and paste it. move on to the ceremony, portraits, and reception and we're good. snag a couple here and there that really need an exposure adjustment (they're proofs, most of them should be acceptable out of camera) and we're good. this seems like a basic edit most people do of their weddings... but how do people do that with JPEGs?

also storage seems like a pretty weak excuse to not shoot RAW now a days. storage? the same 4 gig extreme cards that cost $59 at circuit city the other week on sale? the same external hard drives where you can get enough storage for a whole years worth of weddings for $500-$1000? storage now a days is insanely cheap, back when we were buying $150 1 gig sandisk cards i could totally understand that arguement. but not anymore.

Luke,

Do you use Lightroom or DPP or ...? Just curious.

It actually handles JPEGs pretty well for minor editing but you don't have the leeway that RAW gives you. Things can get ugly pretty fast with JPEGs.

For example, I think that Becker basically delivers the JPEGs out of the camera as proofs. He [used to?] batch a PS contrast bump but basically doesn't do a color/exposure edit.

I do it the same way as you, pretty much: cull in Photo Mechanic, batch color/exposure in Lightroom, export to JPEG, resize for proofs. Any file that is in the slideshow or blog or album goes JPEG->Photoshop.

BenV

First, I don't have my camera of choice. I have one 20D and a couple of 10Ds. You don't shoot raw with 10Ds. I also have cards sized to shoot jpgs and not raw.

Second for me $2K on storage plus cards and a couple of new cameras now is not a practical business expense (even more so since I have no intention of staying with Canon).

(I also wouldn't do it that way. I'd use smaller, single external drives and archive them as I go along, so I have fewer eggs in one basket.)


Raw gives you a bit more leeway, but not a lot.

Wow, I thought I was the only one who edited like that. Whenever I explained my workflow to other photogs, they looked at me like I was crazy. We be soul sistas!

Instead of buying HD's, we incorporated the cost of new CF cards into every wedding. This way, instead of clearing the CF cards, I dump them off, tape of the cards with the clients name and stick em in the safety deposit box. This way...you dont keep buying HD's, and you also have a sure fire backup in case anything goes south.

With the cost of CF cards so low...it only makes sense, and the benefits from this outweigh the cons.

But you have to store them on hard drive anyway, at least while you are in production, right? Then basically you're backing up with CF cards as opposed to DVDs or the like, right? With you're method you have a static amount of HD space but do you backup the processed files, the "final set" that is delivered to the client? I would think so.

With a decent CF card (Sandisk Ultra II) running $35 for 4GB (or $8.75/GB) and drive storage running at about $99 for 500GB (or $0.20/GB) it doesn't make much financial sense. If the workflow advantages offset the 44X increase in cost, then I suppose it makes sense but I just don't see the advantages especially when you have to go to the safety deposit box to pull an image.

Actually, I buy drives in pairs and set them up redundantly so the cost is twice the above at around $0.40/GB (still 22X less than CF cards) and I have immediate access to every image I have EVER shot, complete redundancy and if you add offsite backups to another hard drive, it's still roughly 16x less than buying CF cards for every wedding.

I'm interested in your thoughts...

BenV

Holy cow $99 for a 500GB drive? Name brand? New? Warranty? If thats the case, then I may go back to the way we were doing it. I appreciate the time you took to for calculations, and the like.

I keep small jpegs on the the PC. I can only imagine how many weddings I'd fit into a shoe box on CF cards, as opposed to stacks and stacks of HD's. Also...I have a SEVERE paranoia of someone breaking in, fire, etc. If I kept all my work in one place, at my house, i'd be asking for it. I feel safe that that every thing I ever shot fits into a 1 ft space somewhere other than my house.

Thanks again for chiming in!

Every 2-3 weeks Fry's has sales on drives and they rotate brands (Seagate, WD, Fujitsu). In the last 6 months they have come down from $129 for a 300GB drive to $99 for a 500GB drive. I ONLY BUY Seagate Barracuda drives and I buy 2 at a time. These are 500GB SATAII 300Mb/sec drives. I imagine that by this time next year $99 will buy a 750G or 1TB drive, which are in the $179 and $280 ranges right now.


Right now, I keep EVERYTHING but I am getting ready to go back and remove all the RAW files for projects older than 18 months or so. All the archived JPEGs (no RAWs, no PSDs) will probably fit on a single 300GB drive which goes off-site, and of course would fit into a shoebox too.

BenV

Friiking Fry's rocks! Unfortunately...we dont have those in Florida! THe first time I walked into one in TX I was like..OMG....the prices there are phenomenal!

ack... my raws and jpgs look about the same.... what am I doing wrong?

Can you provide details of what you mean?


A RAW file will look pretty bland when you are browsing or previewing it - most of the time, it all depends on your camera settings and the raw file converter you are using. For it to truly shine, you have to play with the sliders.

A lot of folks set parameters on their cams when shooting jpg. And if you can get it dialed in where you like it, you may not need to do any major post work at all.

Well, perhaps if you started shooting RAW, you'd be making enough money to pay for the equipment you wanted. (pauses to wipe the VERY friendly sarcasm out of his eyes) I mean, you are also going Nikon, which means you are going to lose even MORE money, but I suppose if the ARTIST in you really needs it. You could just shoot everything on glass plates. Sure, they have limitations, but you are GOOOOOD, right?

Seriously, why do people get so mad about it? Shoot what you want to shoot! If it works better for you, why defend it? It's not as if it's Mac vs PC where the rational pros and cons for photographers are so obviously weighted in Mac's favor, right?

There are good reasons for using both. RAW gives you better access to shoot more aggressively (less carefully) in hard light situations without having to worry about your settings being spot on at the expense of using more memory and clogging up your buffer. JPG lets you shoot faster using less memory offering less flexible images in your output. Nuff sed.

That said, I have about 30 professional photogs living in my building (the guy across the hall is Ruven Afenedor's right-hand man...gah!) ALL of them shoot either film or RAW. I shoot RAW because I am not as facile with the settings as I would like to be. It is a crutch, but it also teaches me to shoot fewer images. JPG shooters use it as a crutch too as they may to want to shoot so fast simply because they can. Crutches for everyone! Wait...cameras are a crutch. If we had any talent we'd be using film...no, we'd be painting! NO, we'd be blowing paint past our hands onto stone!!! YES! The ultimate art! Do your weddings Aborigine-style!

You know, this debate will never end no matter what comes out, but I have to say for those studios that shoot more then 30-40 weddings a year its pretty hard to shoot RAW. My studio for instance runs through about 1TB of space every two months. Now if we were to shoot all raw we would be going through hard drives like CRAZY! And we can come very close to nailing our exposures and when we don't Lightroom is there to help us out.

Now thats not to say we wont shoot RAW because we will if its going to be for a magazine or something that we need to enlarge bigger then 30x40 but for the most part its all JPG.

Brody

I love shooting in Raw. I used to hate it but i Just find that the colour is stronger. It is way easier to shoot in JPG but I shoot both so i can quickly process for the bride the proofs and then when she orders I go to the Raw.

outpost.com Fry's website they ship