Still working and learning. I have a Canon T3i and am getting better. I still have so much trouble with indoor flash shots in general indoor shots in my living room with mostly artificial light. Looking for Speed-light suggestions. I understand if I bounce the light off the white ceiling it might provide softer lighting. But i really don't understand much about the features on a Speedlight attachment or what to look for. I want to purchase something, maybe around $100-$150. What should I look for, if not a Canon brand, then what? I'm attaching a few of my granddaughter. Lighting can be fixed a bit in Lightroom ( attaching the originals before any post processing ), but want a better pic to start with.....Thanks for any and all advice.

I'm going to keep it simple this time.

Perhaps you will consider what the Nikon web site says about the NEF format:

http://www.nikonusa.com/en/Learn-And-Explore/Article/ftlzi4ri/nikon-electronic-format-nef.html

"Exclusive to Nikon cameras, the NEF is Nikon's RAW file format. RAW image files, sometimes referred to as digital negatives, contain all the image information captured by the camera's sensor, along with the image's metadata (the camera's identification and its settings, the lens used and other information). The NEF file is written to the memory card in either an uncompressed or "lossless" compressed form.
The primary benefit of writing images to the memory card in NEF format rather than TIFF or JPEG is that no in-camera processing for white balance, hue, tone and sharpening are applied to the NEF file; rather, those values are retained as instruction sets included in the file. You can change the instruction set as many times as you like without ever disturbing the original image's RAW data. Another benefit of the NEF file is that depending on the camera, it retains 12-bit or 14-bit data, resulting in an image with a far greater tonal range than an eight-bit JPEG or TIFF file.
After-capture processing of the NEF file by Nikon's Capture NX2 software, or other imaging programs, offers greater control over the final image than the processing of a JPEG or a TIFF. After processing, the NEF file can be saved as a TIFF, JPEG or again as a NEF with the addition of any applied Capture NX2 processing saved inside the file as a second or alternate instruction set. As long as the original NEF file is preserved, the "digital negative" remains untouched; processing a NEF file does not alter the original instruction set."

And just one other point. Perhaps WB data stored in the RAW file is non-essential to you. But I do set custom white balance with white or gray cards or ExpoDisc, and the preservation of that data is essential for my RAW data processing. Because the sensor image data is not changed, I need the WB metadata to be preserved and used to correct the image in post processing.

Sorry, but there is still material to understand here. You have, despite your best intentions, managed to muddy the waters a bit.

Raw files are proprietary files but they are not image files. You cannot see/print/edit a raw file, but you can view the interpretation of a raw file in the jpg preview, and you use that preview to edit. But in addition to the list of contents you provide, you left out the most important one - it contains the proprietary picture control settings specific to the camera and manufacturer. These are not read by generic raw converters like Lightroom, Capture One, etc, but can be read by the mfgr's raw software.

Bayer is not a sensor, it is a filter that separates light into the three different colors so that it can be interpreted as color when recombined in software and processed into an image file.

White balance is not "saved" in a raw file - you assign the white balance when you process it. The raw file contains only the white balance setting, and will display it when you view the jpg preview, but assigning the white balance in a raw converter is absolute, and not an adjustment to an existing value, hence you change nothing. You assign it, or you can select to keep the value that the camera was set to.

All cameras shoot raw. Nearly all cameras have built in raw conversion to jpg, which they do according to the camera settings at time of capture.

The key and most important feature of raw files is that all image parameters are nondestructively adjustable, with greater range, than anything possible in the camera, and you can do this with no data loss, at a higher bit depth (more accurate colors and smoother tonal and color transitions), with finer detail capture, a much larger color palette, (billions of colors and tones vs 16.7M) and greater dynamic range than is possible with an 8 bit compressed jpeg image.

Technically, jpeg is not an image or a format, but a compression algorithm. You can make exposure adjustments in a raw file before you commit to an image format with far less negative impact than you can to a jpg file, which is hugely destructive. Tiff files are preferable, as they can be 16 bit, large color space (ProPhoto), and far less destructive, primarily because of the greater bit depth and absence of compression. You simply cannot adjust a jpeg to the same degree you can a raw file or even a tiff file and still maintain the same image integrity.

So I will compliment you on attempting to clarify things, but if you are going to do that, please make sure you "own" the material you present. CanonLee was absolutely on target with his commentary, you just wandered off into the forest without your map and compass (or GPS these days). Nothing personal, but it is important to make sure that information presented as fact is in fact accurate.

Nothing here to "understand" other than you are wrong.

RAW files are camera dependent image file formats that contain minimally processed image sensor data, camera sensor metadata, image metadata, image thumbnail, an optional JPG preview, and the sensor image data (which for the common Bayer sensor is a pattern of two green, one blue, and one red pixels).

Unless the camera can produce a RAW file output, it cannot "shoot in RAW". Smaller cameras usually do not produce a RAW file output, but some do. Many non-DSLR cameras can output RAW files (mirrorless, bridge, and some compact cameras).

Every camera I have seen that can produce a RAW file output can produce a combined RAW+JPG output.

A key advantage of RAW files is that white balance can be changed without degrading image quality (because the color channel data is preserved in the RAW file). Exposure can be changed in RAW or JPG without issue (other than the IQ degradation due to saving JPG files multiple times).

JPG format is NOT a pixel format, it is a compressed format.

Printers can print from a number of image formats; depends upon the printer. But if you are printing from your computer, the printer interface is not based upon JPG. The application you use and the printer driver will convert JPG to whatever format is used by the printer, usually a raster image format.