# tips for shooting in Raw mode? (digital)



## Dew (Sep 17, 2003)

i experimented with shooting in Raw mode (uncompressed, straight out of the camera, no features) for the first time ... i was very unpleased with the results    .... do u have any tips or experience in Raw mode on your digital cam? .... editing tips? ... reason's for shooting in this mode? ... advantages?


here are 2 sample photos i shot 5 seconds apart, one in Raw mode, the other minimal compressed .jpg with SHQ camera settings.. no additional editting was done on either .. straight out the camera, resized for web


Raw mode 









SHQ .jpg camera settings.. no additional editing done, just resized


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## metroshane (Sep 17, 2003)

That's wierd.  My understanding is that raw is just a larger image file.  There shouldn't be any color difference.


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## Dew (Sep 17, 2003)

the way my camera manual explained Raw mode, there are no settings used, this includes: white balance, sharpening, iso, aperture, and contrast ... just as its suppose to be in "real life" ... now the room was dark when i photographed it, but the settings (aperture, iso, white balance) were set to get the result that i wanted...


tiff for my cam is uncompressed data, with settings specified from the camera (aperture, iso, white balance, contrast and so on)


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## Jeff Canes (Sep 17, 2003)

What color is the room?
Is the raw file closer to the natural light?


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## Dew (Sep 17, 2003)

the color of the room is a light blue, closer to the second color, but the room was dark, but with the settings of the camera, u can manipulate it to get the desired results (for example.. on dark/dim lit rooms, u would go with a higher iso) ... fyi, i always use the second photo settings, it gives me the results i want ... i played with the first one in photoshop and the "darkness/contrast" gave me some interesting looking b&w photos ...

"why on god's earth would somebody choose Raw mode?  :?  ... is their a special reason for this?


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## Dew (Sep 17, 2003)

im sorry, the color of the room is the first one, but it looks rather shabby  :roll: ... there are 2 colors in the photo, green walls and the "make-shift" book stand is blue ... over towards the window is also green


in the second photo, it makes everything blue ... when in fact, the "book stand" is blue and the walls are green  :?  ... but the first one does look a little "primitive" to me  :no smile:


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## photobug (Sep 19, 2003)

RAW mode is just that- raw. No corrections as your manual states. Why would you shoot raw? Because it's an uncompressed & uncorrected format you can apply custom settings for WB, sharpness etc. without losing anything of the original pic.

Mostly used by people who like to seriously tweak photos trying to get the last bit of sharpness/color/whatever from their pics. Oh, and anybody shooting a Sigma SD-9, since it only shoots RAW mode.   

RAW is probably as close to film as digital can get at this point. It's what the lens saw. What you do with the result is up to you. 

If you're happy with the images you get in jpg mode you can probably skip RAW. If you're wanting to make large prints (>11x14) it's worth looking at. Unfortunately, not all RAW software is ready for prime time, but that will change as it becomes more common. Some folks can't live without it. YMMV.  

Jim


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## GerryDavid (Sep 19, 2003)

Hello Dew, thats odd, I always thought Raw was just uncompressed.  Why go throught eh bother of using all the settings if it doesnt show up in the result?  :0).  Then again my camera doestn have raw mode, just jpg raw and jpg compressed, I use the 2nd, its the same as the first and 1/3 the file size.  :0).

What camera do you have?


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## Dew (Sep 19, 2003)

i've been experimenting a little more with it, on my hubby   and im actually starting to like it ... it works great with b&w and duotone/tritones .. gives u great contrast ... they say u can get a plug in for PS to read Raw .. but it works great with Graphic Converter (for MAC) .. and i just transfer it to .tiff and work on it with PS ....  this thing just may catch on   

 .... i have an Olympus E20 (digital)


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## GerryDavid (Sep 19, 2003)

Dew said:
			
		

> i have an Olympus E20 (digital)



Hehe, computers.com doesnt have it but this other site that reviews cameras does.  4.5 stars out of 5, not bad.  :0).  But the price, wow.  :0).  Seems a bit high for a 5mp camera, for that price you can get 8 or 10mp some places.  But maybe it produces a great picture with more ease and offers additional features.  :0)  Be nice if mine had a hotshoe for an additional flash or let me expose a picture longer than 3 seconds.  *Smiles*.

How's the weight and feel of it in your hands?  :0).


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## Dew (Sep 19, 2003)

this camera is great   .. i love it ... it offers me total control ... the body is a little heavier than my other Olympus 2500L (or was it 2700L) ... with a wide angle lens its murder  :x ... but its worth it.

sure i could have gotten a higher MP cam for the price of this one ($1300 and some change) .. but i think there are other qualities that has to be considered. .. my first cam was an Olympus and i loved the quality .. so im sticking with it ... i love the colors it gives me ... it takes me 2 seconds to touch up my photos in PS (mostly resizing) ... i cant complain 

last night i was exposing my hubby in almost total darkness .. and his photos cam out crisp and clear, and i was in Raw mode


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## GerryDavid (Sep 20, 2003)

Dew said:
			
		

> sure i could have gotten a higher MP cam for the price of this one ($1300 and some change) .. but i think there are other qualities that has to be considered. .. my first cam was an Olympus and i loved the quality .. so im sticking with it ... i love the colors it gives me ... it takes me 2 seconds to touch up my photos in PS (mostly resizing) ... i cant complain
> 
> last night i was exposing my hubby in almost total darkness .. and his photos cam out crisp and clear, and i was in Raw mode



Did you use flash to take pictures of your husband or just use the natural ambient light?  Im assuming the last one since you seemed amazed by it, and with a flash, its not that amazing thing, hehe.  Although I was amazed how much my new digi light up a room with its flash when I first got it.  :0).

And you mentioned that it takes you a couple seconds per picture to resize them in ps, just thought Id mention that with my fujifilm finepix 3800 digital camera, the software it came with to download hte pictures off of the camera onto the hard drive lets you do a batch resize *something I found out the other day, after making a computer program to do this for me, thats not as user friendly as Id like it*, so I thougth Id mention that incase your software does that and you dont realize it.  Mine wasnt obvious, I decided to right click on a picture to see if I could get properties or something and there was the option, along with some others, some of which I also made a program to do, hehe.  Well im still making that program.

And on a random note, I had an idea tonight, hehe.  What if they made a camera that had a rotating lense/mirror on the front so you could take 9 simotaneous *spelling?* pictures in a row, a 3X3 grid to turn a 5mp camera into a "virtual" 35mp camera, with software that lets you stitch them up, hehe.  Just a thought.  *note to the camera companies that see this, if you use it, I expect royalties*, hehe.

I think ive rambled enough here.  Audiose.


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## Dew (Sep 20, 2003)

when i photographed my hubby, i didnt use flash .. just messing around .. him being my unassuming subject   ... some of them might end up on our website (blackmail photos :twisted: ) ....

PS offers programable keys to do it in one step ...my hubby does that alot  ... i like to have control over each photo .. so i do it one-by-one.. im just trying to test this "Raw" thing enough before i go out and do an actual shoot ... i wanna know what my results look like and if i can control the outcome


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## Dew (Sep 21, 2003)

Mr. doxx got me a plug-in for PS enabling Raw mode ... things are looking bright, im getting 16 bit channels   ... still gotta test it some more


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## GerryDavid (Sep 21, 2003)

Dew said:
			
		

> when i photographed my hubby, i didnt use flash .. just messing around .. him being my unassuming subject   ... some of them might end up on our website (blackmail photos :twisted: ) ....



Hmm, hehe, so when you photographed your husband with no flash in the dark, did you expose the picture for a longer period of time than usual or just the normal picture time?  :0)  If its the 2nd case, thats sweet, hehe, and if its the first one, when I do that its usually a bit blurry since no one stands still for a few seconds.  :0).


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## Dew (Sep 21, 2003)

i exposed him for about 20-30 seconds in Raw mode ... there was a little light coming in from another room ... i got his shadow on the wall ... it looked like a horror flick


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## GerryDavid (Sep 21, 2003)

Dew said:
			
		

> i exposed him for about 20-30 seconds in Raw mode ... there was a little light coming in from another room ... i got his shadow on the wall ... it looked like a horror flick



Hehe, are you going to share any of these experiments?  At least screen sized samples? : 0)

So Dew, you mentioned before you got some ideas for photo shoots, mind sharing some?  :0)  I got an urge to go for a walk in the woods and see what I can come up with but im waitign till Tuesday for that, but its forcasted rain for that day so I may have to wait even longer, hehe.


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## Dew (Sep 21, 2003)

the ones that i took of him in the dark were just experiments, so i didnt keep them ... i deleted them all .... i called my hubby in the room ... being the nutcase that he is, he grabbed a butcher's knife ... so he looked  like Jason from _Friday the 13th_   ... i didnt really want to show those photos, they looked a little violent  :roll: .. plus i dont want u guys to get the wrong idea  :lmao: 


this idea that i have brewing in my head is sort of eccentric ... it will be the first time that i've "staged" something with more than one person ... i got the "subjects" ... im still looking for the perfect location ... the set up will be in a bathroom .... i think i'll be shooting everything in Raw mode ... i still have more testing to do... but i dont want to blow it  :?


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