Undecided Over RAW + JPEG...

[Disastrous]

I'm trying to make my mind up about something and thought I might canvas opinion from more experienced snappers on here...

I generally shoot RAW on my 60D and use Aperture for processing. That's fine and I'm happy with that. Normally, if I've gone to the bother of taking the 60D out, it's because I want to take 'proper' pictures that I can be bothered putting some time into editing.

Now, I picked up an EOS M yesterday and am off on holiday next week. It seems ideal for this use, but I'm struggling to decide whether to shoot JPEG, RAW or both.

My thinking being that JPEG appeals for the sort of 'quick and easy' holiday snaps I might want to quickly fire onto Facebook/Email the folks in the evening back at the hotel. I'll have the iPad with me and a camera connection kit so I imagine JPEG will be both much quicker and use less storage than RAW

RAW appeals because, well, all the additional options it gives you but at the cost of time and storage. Realistically, will I bother processing whilst on holiday? No...

So, JPEG + Raw. Seems good and I can mess with JPEGs on the iPad, and then import the RAW files of any that stand out when I get home. The downside being it slows the EOS M down a bit (I've noticed you can only really shoot burst in JPEG only) but that's the price you pay I suppose. Storage isn't a problem as I won't be taking more than a couple of hundred images I'd guess.

Is that a pretty sound thinking?

If so, would you bother importing the JPEG to the computer as well, or just stick with the RAW? I can't really see any reason to keep both but open to any suggestions...

Thanks!

[Simpo Two]

I think, as you say, that if you shoot only RAW you will never bother to process most of them properly, and maybe only batch process using one-size-fits-all settings which is rather pointless IMHO.

Hence I would shoot JPG for the 'this is my hotel' ' this is the beach' type photos, but if faced with a possible candidate for the wall, switch to RAW.

[squicky]

I switched from jpeg to raw a while ago; one of the reasons why was the ease of quick tweaking that picasa lets me do with the raw file. If it wasn't so easy; I would generally shoot mix and say switch back to the raw file for any pics that required more tweaking.

The key for me was seamless/quick editing of pictures once I've downloaded them. Picasa doing that with raw files was a bonus.

[Disastrous]

Simpo Two said:

I think, as you say, that if you shoot only RAW you will never bother to process most of them properly, and maybe only batch process using one-size-fits-all settings which is rather pointless IMHO.

Hence I would shoot JPG for the 'this is my hotel' ' this is the beach' type photos, but if faced with a possible candidate for the wall, switch to RAW.

Logic all sound there - I suppose I just have that nagging fear of missing something ace that later turns out to be superb had I only been in the right mode.

Case in point - the other night, I happened to notice I could just see the Commonwealth Opening Ceremony Fireworks from my window. I had the length of time it took the remainder of the display to play out (I guess 30 seconds) to run to another room, grab the camera, make a brief stab at exposure and fire it out the window. Fortunately it was already set to RAW as one of the images turned out to be a favourite and I was able to process it further.

Hence my reasoning for RAW + JPEG. That, and I'm a forgetful sod so can easily see myself forgetting to change!

Is there a good reason NOT to shoot both at once?

[Simpo Two]

Disastrous said:

Is there a good reason NOT to shoot both at once?

Not really - just more storage space, less buffering if using burst mode, and more sorting/deleting to do when home. Not major, just inconvenient.

[ExPat2B]

The only reason not to shoot RAW + Jpeg is that it will fill your buffer fast and take longer to clear.

I shoot RAW only, the reason is DXO Optics. Download a trial and set :

Exposure compensation to Smart.

Smart lighting to 100

Noise Reduction to Prime, luminance to auto

Distortion to Auto with DXO Optics module

Vignetting Auto with DXO Optics module

Cromatic aberration Auto with DXO Optics module. Intensity to 163, size to 7.
tick purple fringing

DXO lens softness Auto with DXO Optics module

Save as a preset and apply to all your shots you want to process.

Then use the crop tool to frame them properly, and maybe the split toning tool to pull back blown highlights or pull the shadows up further.

And it will just go ahead and fix your shots. They will be exposed properly, and there will be details in the shadows without noise, and they will be free of distortion, vignetting and Cromatic aberration.

No messing about with lightroom sliders. No awful adobe noise correction that turns everything to mush. No having to select which lens was used to take advantage of lens correction. Just automatic, smart correction that is right 90% of the time from one universal preset.

[Disastrous]

Thanks guys.

I've experimented and on the EOS M, the buffer is so st that it's irrelevant. Unless you're in JPEG only, you get 2/3 shots before the buffer packs in, either in RAW only or RAW + JPEG. Not a concern for me as I don't do much of that stuff but obviously, would need to do it in JPEG only if I did.

Is there any reason why I would ever want to import the JPEGS once I got home, assuming I've done all the holiday emails etc and have the RAWs as well?

Aperture has pretty clever import options that let you pick and choose which you import so can't see it being much effort to not import them.

Will have a look at that DxO stuff - never even heard of it! Presume it's a plugin or does it sit pre-processing software?

[andy-xr]

I only ever shoot jpegs for 'stuff'

There's enough detail held that you can still pullback anything you need to, and there's enough temperature changing options through either LR or gradients that the WB setting on auto, for me, is fine. Others might like to fine tune more, but a) Auto is near enough and b) I'm going to alter it afterwards somehow anyway

I find a 'fine' jpeg on my D7000 spits out around 5meg filesize of 4000x3000'ish which is plenty for 6x4 / 10x8 print

[Beggarall]

I have set my camera to record JPEG (highest quality) and RAW simultaneously. RAW files are generally more than twice as big as JPEGs so each shot may be something like 20Mb (depending on your camera) so memory is rapidly consumed. The beauty of digital is you can delete what you don't want - if you have courage - rigorous editing and discipline is hard to master but a necessary skill!

[VxDuncan]

Not sure if it still the case, but on my Nikon D300 the RAW file contains an exact copy of the JPEG anyway. No need to shoot both. There's a utility called instant jpeg from raw or similar that extracts the jpeg from the raw. I did a test on the D300 taking a shot in RAW+Jpeg, then compared the jpeg from the camera with the extracted jpeg in photoshop. Putting them one layer above the over and "blinking" between them at 100% scale reveals no differences. Change top layer to difference (to mathematically measure difference in pixel colour) and the image is totally black, eyedropper picks up no change in pixel values. They are the exact same image even down to the jpeg compression artifacts. EXIF data is preserved also.

Do your own test though, might be different for other Nikons.

[Zod]

Beggarall said:

I have set my camera to record JPEG (highest quality) and RAW simultaneously. RAW files are generally more than twice as big as JPEGs so each shot may be something like 20Mb (depending on your camera) so memory is rapidly consumed. The beauty of digital is you can delete what you don't want - if you have courage - rigorous editing and discipline is hard to master but a necessary skill!

That's what I do. With a 64GB CF card, I don't worry about the space they take.

[Gad-Westy]

VxDuncan said:

Not sure if it still the case, but on my Nikon D300 the RAW file contains an exact copy of the JPEG anyway. No need to shoot both. There's a utility called instant jpeg from raw or similar that extracts the jpeg from the raw. I did a test on the D300 taking a shot in RAW+Jpeg, then compared the jpeg from the camera with the extracted jpeg in photoshop. Putting them one layer above the over and "blinking" between them at 100% scale reveals no differences. Change top layer to difference (to mathematically measure difference in pixel colour) and the image is totally black, eyedropper picks up no change in pixel values. They are the exact same image even down to the jpeg compression artifacts. EXIF data is preserved also.

Do your own test though, might be different for other Nikons.

This touches a little on what I was going to mention. I should say before I rattle on, that everybody works differently, this isn't a question that has a right or wrong answer but this is my experience.

When I first got a DSLR, I only had Nikon's standard raw conversion software. That made life a real pain in terms of processing raw files and being honest I wasn't really aware on what the advantages of shooting raw were so I shot jpeg. A few months later, I bought Aperture for the mac which seamlessly handles raw files so that you're effectively only ever viewing a finished image with it's own pre-sets applied. Lightroom and others work in a similar fashion. These pre-sets are tweak-able and completely non-destructive so you can never cock up. Since getting aperture, the only time I ever shoot jpeg on a DSLR now is if I'm at work and need to instantly transfer an image to my work PC. The only downside of course is that the Raw's take up more space but space is cheap these days so not a massive concern.

So in summary, the decision might be heavily influenced by the software you intend to use for viewing/editing.

[Disastrous]

I know what you mean but I think it's 'yes and no' but also how much you can be bothered processing or adding presets.

If my understanding is correct, shooting in JPEG is effectively allowing the camera to make some creative decisions about processing, in-camera. So you get the finished article the instant you press the shutter.

This is sort of ideal for the 'here's my hotel', 'this is the city' type photos mentioned earlier. You would simply pull these into the ipad and email directly to whoever you like.

I appreciate that you could pull the RAW into Aperture, do a quick auto-enhance and do the same thing, but conventional wisdom seems to be that in-camera processing is actually pretty good, suggesting that Canon might make a better stab at an 'instant photo' than Apple.

My way of thinking is drifting towards using Aperture for RAWs to process 'proper' photos and just letting the camera handle snapshots as JPEGs, hence thinking about shooting in both...

[Gad-Westy]

Disastrous said:

I know what you mean but I think it's 'yes and no' but also how much you can be bothered processing or adding presets.

If my understanding is correct, shooting in JPEG is effectively allowing the camera to make some creative decisions about processing, in-camera. So you get the finished article the instant you press the shutter.

This is sort of ideal for the 'here's my hotel', 'this is the city' type photos mentioned earlier. You would simply pull these into the ipad and email directly to whoever you like.

I appreciate that you could pull the RAW into Aperture, do a quick auto-enhance and do the same thing, but conventional wisdom seems to be that in-camera processing is actually pretty good, suggesting that Canon might make a better stab at an 'instant photo' than Apple.

My way of thinking is drifting towards using Aperture for RAWs to process 'proper' photos and just letting the camera handle snapshots as JPEGs, hence thinking about shooting in both...

I think whatever works for you is the only right answer. But just to explain my own thinking, there are probably two reasons why I don't switch to jpeg for snapshots. Firstly I'd always be concerned that what I thought was going to be a snapshot turns into a shot that I actually want to play around with later on but too late to reshoot. The other reason (and I've fallen foul of this many times before) is that I'll forget to switch back to raw when I need it. It works okay for me.

[rich83]

Depends on the type of photography for me.

Track days, BTCC, BSB etc... JPEG.

Landscapes, wildlife etc RAW

[Disastrous]

Gad-Westy said:

Disastrous said:

I know what you mean but I think it's 'yes and no' but also how much you can be bothered processing or adding presets.

If my understanding is correct, shooting in JPEG is effectively allowing the camera to make some creative decisions about processing, in-camera. So you get the finished article the instant you press the shutter.

This is sort of ideal for the 'here's my hotel', 'this is the city' type photos mentioned earlier. You would simply pull these into the ipad and email directly to whoever you like.

I appreciate that you could pull the RAW into Aperture, do a quick auto-enhance and do the same thing, but conventional wisdom seems to be that in-camera processing is actually pretty good, suggesting that Canon might make a better stab at an 'instant photo' than Apple.

My way of thinking is drifting towards using Aperture for RAWs to process 'proper' photos and just letting the camera handle snapshots as JPEGs, hence thinking about shooting in both...

I think whatever works for you is the only right answer. But just to explain my own thinking, there are probably two reasons why I don't switch to jpeg for snapshots. Firstly I'd always be concerned that what I thought was going to be a snapshot turns into a shot that I actually want to play around with later on but too late to reshoot. The other reason (and I've fallen foul of this many times before) is that I'll forget to switch back to raw when I need it. It works okay for me.

Absolutely agreed. Hence my 'both' way of thinking. That way I can sift through the Jpegs on my ipad and if there are some proper 'photos', I have the RAW files as well for when I have time to edit.

But, and I suppose this is the crux of it, will Canon's onboard JPEG processing be 'better' than Aperture's 'auto-enhance + export as JPEG'?

[mojitomax]

I always shoot raw. Memory cards are cheap so storage isn't a concern. I don't edit or view my pics whilst on holiday though. I enjoy being on holiday and soaking if all in. If I want to post to Facebook, I take a snap from my phone (the 5S camera is really rather good) and upload it.

Then when I get home, I import everything into aperture. Whittle and cull the rejects, edit the keepers and done. If I want to share to Facebook, I can through aperture and if I want to share with friends/family I can either upload to icloud and share or export the keepers to jpegs.

It's fun getting home and not quite knowing what's on the camera. Reminds me of the good old days of film.

[HereBeMonsters]

mojitomax said:

It's fun getting home and not quite knowing what's on the camera. Reminds me of the good old days of film.

I try to do that with my good camera as well. Restrict myself to only taking a picture if I was going to on film. Otherwise when you get back you have 500+ photos of the same bloody stuff.

[mojitomax]

HereBeMonsters said:

I try to do that with my good camera as well. Restrict myself to only taking a picture if I was going to on film. Otherwise when you get back you have 500+ photos of the same bloody stuff.

I've been trying to do that too.

I've been through the 'just bought a digital cam, no printing costs, take pics of everything!' Phase but there's just more work to do at home sifting through junk.

Now my hit rate is about 1 in 3. Much easier to sift through

[Gad-Westy]

Disastrous said:

Gad-Westy said:

Disastrous said:

I know what you mean but I think it's 'yes and no' but also how much you can be bothered processing or adding presets.

If my understanding is correct, shooting in JPEG is effectively allowing the camera to make some creative decisions about processing, in-camera. So you get the finished article the instant you press the shutter.

This is sort of ideal for the 'here's my hotel', 'this is the city' type photos mentioned earlier. You would simply pull these into the ipad and email directly to whoever you like.

I appreciate that you could pull the RAW into Aperture, do a quick auto-enhance and do the same thing, but conventional wisdom seems to be that in-camera processing is actually pretty good, suggesting that Canon might make a better stab at an 'instant photo' than Apple.

My way of thinking is drifting towards using Aperture for RAWs to process 'proper' photos and just letting the camera handle snapshots as JPEGs, hence thinking about shooting in both...

I think whatever works for you is the only right answer. But just to explain my own thinking, there are probably two reasons why I don't switch to jpeg for snapshots. Firstly I'd always be concerned that what I thought was going to be a snapshot turns into a shot that I actually want to play around with later on but too late to reshoot. The other reason (and I've fallen foul of this many times before) is that I'll forget to switch back to raw when I need it. It works okay for me.

Absolutely agreed. Hence my 'both' way of thinking. That way I can sift through the Jpegs on my ipad and if there are some proper 'photos', I have the RAW files as well for when I have time to edit.

But, and I suppose this is the crux of it, will Canon's onboard JPEG processing be 'better' than Aperture's 'auto-enhance + export as JPEG'?

I never use an ipad for image review but can see the advantage in shooting jpeg if you do.

Just to cover that last bit because I didn't really mention it but many of my photos never end up as a jpeg file. I make a jpeg if I need one otherwise they stay as raw only forever more. What aperture displays is effectively a jpeg, it's just that an actual file isn't created until you request it. Whether Aperture's raw conversion is better than the camera's is debatable but it's never something I've worried about. If it's just a snap shot, I can just hit auto enhance and I'll likely be happy with the result. If its anything else, I'll be pulling the raw file all over the place anyway so it'll be irrelevant.