RAW v JPEG - Motorsport

[bobski1]

Reading the internet some people shoot JPEG because of panning & enables them to shoot more/quicker without the camera buffer getting full. Others say no matter what RAW is always best due to the information it retains & the ability to correct more things.

What are peoples opinion on this?

All the shots I have done in the past have been JPEG but I am planning to do RAW+JPEG at this weekend's Sunday Service

[vsonix]

I suspect it would boil down to shooting style, equipment and individual technique. Obviously the more data and less compression the better, but when speed is of the essence you need to be able to be quick. So, horses for courses.

[Lynchie999]

bobski1 said:

Reading the internet some people shoot JPEG because of panning & enables them to shoot more/quicker without the camera buffer getting full. Others say no matter what RAW is always best due to the information it retains & the ability to correct more things.

What are peoples opinion on this?

All the shots I have done in the past have been JPEG but I am planning to do RAW+JPEG at this weekend's Sunday Service

so you end up with 8-12 JPGs of the same "shot" ... instead of 6-8 RAWs ?? more / faster burst isn't better... just learn, shoot RAW and you will only need 2-3 burst shots to get THE shot...

[Mutley]

I shoot motorsport on JPG, because of buffer and turnaround time of post work and I can meet my requirements quicker. Most pros shoot on JPG for that same reason.

eg. You're shooting the start of a race, and want to get as many different shots of the pack together (not burst shots). Card buffers on RAW very quickly and you end up missing possiblt the shot.

I do, on occasion, shoot RAW if I'm doing the odd arty shot. But on the whole, JPG, not machinegunned

[Mutley]

bobski1 said:

..All the shots I have done in the past have been JPEG but I am planning to do RAW+JPEG at this weekend's Sunday Service

Hope you have a place to download to during the race, your card(s) will fill very quickly, and take an age to download

[ukaskew]

I shoot RAW for everything but motorsport, just don't see the need. And I'm very much a single shot kinda guy, so nothing to do with the buffer.

[jurbie]

As above I shoot RAW for everything except 99% of my motorsport. The 1% of motorsport I shoot in RAW is early morning or late evening when I might need to push the exposure a little bit or when I'm faced with a spectacular scene and I want to make sure I get it right.

[RobDickinson]

Depends on your gear, shooting technique and use.

if you need a finished image right now then jpg is the way to go.

if your camera has a small raw buffer and you are often waiting for it to clear, missing shots, then shoot jpg

if you have a decent sized buffer thats not an issue, or dont machine gun ( more confidence in your skills at getting the shot) shoot raw.

[GravelBen]

Mutley said:

I shoot motorsport on JPG, because of buffer and turnaround time of post work...

+1

And to be honest, my photos which seem to be most popular among motorsport people are often the ones that I didn't think were that good from a photographic point of view anyway - probably 99% of viewers/potential image buyers in that market aren't going to notice any difference.

Edited by GravelBen on Friday 28th October 00:22

[Craikeybaby]

I always shot motorsport on raw.

[Mutley]

Why?

[Lynchie999]

Mutley said:

Why?

why not ?



either you want / need / like to post process your shots afterwards and shoot RAW ... or you don't and shoot JPG...

[Craikeybaby]

Mutley said:

Why?

I don't tend to machine gun, so never had buffer issues. I also had a good workflow in Lightroom, which does a lot of my standard processing on import, so didn't really add much time to processing, but gave me the flexibilty to process further if I wanted.

[Nigel_O]

I always shoot everything RAW, on the basis I can rattle off 40+ shots without buffer issues. I don't think I've ever done a burst of more than ten, as anything that's moving has usually gone by then and anything that's not moving doesn't need ten shots to catch it....

[danllama]

I never have buffer issues shooting RAW either, and I shoot everything I do in raw. Only using a 6d btw and 60d as back up.

But I don't machine gun either. I used to, but quickly got out of the habit to save myself hours in post processing.

To be honest, motorsport is probably one of the few types of photography where you could get away with jpg. I just prefer doing my own processing.

[Mutley]

Lynchie999 said:

why not ?

• yawn* I can too, the question was why the need.

For all you who constantly shoot in RAW, how many do you keep? The storage is 3x that of a jpg, so must eat into your available data store at home

[Lynchie999]

Mutley said:

Lynchie999 said:

why not ?

• yawn* I can too, the question was why the need.

For all you who constantly shoot in RAW, how many do you keep? The storage is 3x that of a jpg, so must eat into your available data store at home

I answered your question in the rest of my post that you didn't quote...



because some people like to edit fully the images themselves when they get back to the computer...

[danllama]

Mutley said:

• yawn* I can too, the question was why the need.

For all you who constantly shoot in RAW, how many do you keep? The storage is 3x that of a jpg, so must eat into your available data store at home

I keep the ones that I am happy enough to process, then export them as jpg's for online use and keep the RAW for future use. The rest are binned. Storage is cheap as chips these days, so its not an issue.

[Craikeybaby]

Mutley said:

For all you who constantly shoot in RAW, how many do you keep? The storage is 3x that of a jpg, so must eat into your available data store at home

Everything gets uploaded to Lightroom and my archive. Rejects, or anything that I haven't published/sold after 6 months gets removed from Ligthroom.