stonecherub Loc: Tucson, AZ

I'm old and forget things. After taking some pedestrian family photos, I forgot to reset my Nikon D5000 to raw before going into the field. Four days of desert jpg were instructive, to say the least.

This day's shoot was planned to catch the volcano's two cones just after 2 pm, when the upper one was in shadow and the lower in sunlight. Clearly, I nailed it.

BUT, the sky has jpg stripes that are visible to me on the originals and I think I can see them in what I submitted here. The lower image was made to accentuate them. On the other hand, the lower image shows the two cones perfectly without having to write anything about the cones in a caption, just the damned stripes.

If I had remembered to set the quality to RAW, I could have post processed the image to show the different cones without the distraction.

RAW images are superior to JPG. With all the computing power and mass storage available to us, why the hell would anybody deliberately shoot jpg when image quality was an issue? Makes no damned sense.

Direct from the camera

(Download)

Dehaze and Clarity pulled to 100% in Lightroom

(Download)

Peterff Loc: O'er The Hills and Far Away, in Themyscira.

OK. I for one agree. What next?

mallen1330 Loc: Chicago western suburbs

I also agree in general. EXCEPT in my day job as architectural and real estate photographer, taking between 400 and 800 shots per day, I find that the bracketed JPGs are just fine for their purpose.

rgrenaderphoto Loc: Hollywood, CA

For this purpose, Jpgs are best for quick turnarounds

stonecherub Loc: Tucson, AZ

Clearly, I must agree with you, after all, I did set my camera to jpg for the family shoot and forgot to re-set it. I am not an enemy of jpg because I use them on my website. However, I dimly remember some acrimonious raw vs jpg arguments here on the hog. Each type has its uses and I posted mine to warn photographers that jpg does not treat sky very kindly.

oldtigger Loc: Roanoke Virginia-USA

on this shot, dehaze and clarify won't buy you much. A little midtone would help perhaps but that sky has had the weinie/

Peterff Loc: O'er The Hills and Far Away, in Themyscira.

So, in agreement, are we just back to the dynamic range of the scene and available bit depth? If so, you provide a good example for those that don't appreciate the difference, but there are also many images where 8bit and JPEG can be sufficient. Is it more about what happens when we push the limits? If so, then raw always wins, but for convenience JPEG is preferred by many. For myself I capture both, but when I want a print or any kind of post processing I always start with raw. It's a better starting point and often easier to process than JPEG if quality is the goal.

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

Been shooting RAW exclusively for the last 6 years. Those that want to shoot jpg, go ahead. No argument from me, but you have no idea what your missing.
--Bob

rjaywallace Loc: Wisconsin

I prefer Image #1 way over #2, but that's just me.

Peterff Loc: O'er The Hills and Far Away, in Themyscira.

Sure, but wasn't #2 an extreme example of what the limitations of JPEG can be?

WessoJPEG Loc: Cincinnati, Ohio

They both are ugly.

LennyP4868 Loc: NJ

the sky is over saturated in #2 and looks worked. tone it down and and bring down the situation and you will have a much better pic.

oldtigger Loc: Roanoke Virginia-USA

Its supposed to be over saturated and worked hard; the OP is making it easier for us to see
whats wrong with image #1