Hi, I took my new SX50 out today for the first time - only got it last night. I was driving a bunch of daycare kids to a stable, so I thought it was a good chance to try it out.

Here are a couple of samples, including my first HDR attempt, made using the supplied DPP program. The horse moved between shots, but the program handled it well.
Most of the horse shots I took have kids in them, so I can't post them here.

Anyway, I have CS2, and I have been reading a book called "Camera Raw with CS2", or words to that effect. It says in there that Camera Raw will start as soon as you point Bridge at a folder which contains raw files. Well, it doesn't. Not only that, but the "open in Camera Raw" option on the menu is greyed out. Can anyone tell me what I am missing here? This is the first time I have had access to any raw files to try this out.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that the program I use for general viewing (Irfanview) handled the raw files with no problem at all. I didn't try to edit them in there, though.

My first impressions of the camera itself are a bit mixed. It is very small in the hands, but with all the extra controls it has over my little P&S, my thumb keeps selecting stuff accidentally. I had bracketting turned on for a while, until I could figure out how to turn it off again! Good job film is cheap! Also, the self-timer kept setting itself. I am sure I will get to grips with it, though.

I am impressed with the 'reach' of the lens, of course. The 3rd picture shows that quite well. My old camera has a whopping 5x zoom on it, so this is an embarrasment of riches in that regard!

I appreciate comments, but do bear in mind that this was just my first stumbling try, and it was freezing cold, too!

I don't think you understand, let me try to explain.

All cameras take pictures in raw. The camera can convert them to jpeg and store them. Converting them to jpeg means the camera does 5 things to the image in a standard predetermined way,
1) adjust the contrast and lighting,
2)reduce the electronic noise,
3)compress the file (jpg is a lossy compression which means every time you open or edit the pic you will slightly degrade it, other compressions may be lossless),
4) crop the image,
5) replace the raw extension with a .jpg extension.

Jpeg was originally designed to display images, not edit them.

When you convert a raw image like .cr2, you have to do some if not all the above. The advantage is that you can adjust things to your liking. Once you do the adjustments, you can choose to save the image as a jpeg, or any one of many file formats.

This is a lot to chew on. I hope this is clear.