julian.gang

Is the only real difference the freedom to correct the white balance of the picture, won't Lightroom do that too?...Julian

williejoha

No it is not. Use the net to read up on the difference.
WJH

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Please do a search on UHH for ‘JPEG vs raw’. You will find hundreds of pages of discussion and bloviation on this topic.

It’s (mostly) all been said before.

Dr.Nikon Loc: Honolulu Hawaii

In RAW.., I can work on a grain of sand in Post Editing more easily than JPEG .. 😎👏👏👏👏👏👏

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

If you mean will Lightroom correct the white balance of a JPEG just as well as it will a RAW file, that couldn't be further from the truth. You could shoot a RAW file which is way off in white balance and easily correct it. A JPEG with the white balance way off can't be made right. And there are many other advantages of RAW, which you could search for here as others have suggested.

charles tabb Loc: Richmond VA.

Gosh !
It must be really tiresome to do a beach sean.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

This topic should be banished to Links & Resources. It is asked nearly Daily!

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

Buying an expensive camera to take jpegs is like buying Stradivarius violin, removing three of the four strings, and just using the remaining string. Yes, you can make music with a one string violin, but it would be much better if you used all the strings, and took the necessary lessons to learn how to use all of them.

AlohaJim Loc: Retired. Hawaii >> N. Arizona.

Good one!

mwsilvers Loc: Central New Jersey

Jpegs contain only a subset of the shooting information when an image was captured. Raw files contain all the shooting information when the image was captured. The main advantage of raw over jpeg is the much greater latitude you have when making adjustments in post processing. Just a couple of the many reasons to use raw in post processing rather than jpegs is much superior noise removal, and much superior extraction of detail information from deep shadow areas. There are many others. Post-processing on raw files is also non-destructive while post-processing on jpeg files is destructive.

Depending on what type of post-processing you're doing and the extent of the edits, JPEG files can often give you "acceptable" results. However, those of us who post process regularly and extensively understand the limitations of using jpegs and the superiority of using raw files. Some here may suggest that there is no advantage shooting in raw. Generally, those people that express that thought are light users and simply not as well schooled in the use of post processing to get the best from your images.

brucewells Loc: Central Kentucky

I have always associated a raw image to the negative from film days, and a JPG is a print from that negative, meant to be shared. There are worlds of differences.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

I love music analogies. Sock it too 'em!

I am going to have to deal with that with one of my best friends who has just renewed his interest in (digital) photography. He first showed me how to print around 1975. He just this Saturday bought a Nikon D750 and 24-120mm f4 Zoom Lens for himself as a BD gift. Cool, but he is shooting JPEGs on it and PP with (8-bit) PSE. I am going to have to ween him off that.

mwsilvers Loc: Central New Jersey

While he can certainly do better then editing jpegs in PSE. I would just suggest the advantages of raw and other software and let him discover on his own the best approach as most of us did. Pushing him in a direction he does not want to go too early might possibly unnecessarily annoy him. I did not start shooting raw for almost 2 years after I got my first DSLR. The more knowledge I acquired the more I experimented. For the last 7 years I have only shot Raw.

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

I too started out with JPEG and later discovered RAW. I was already an experienced film shooter, and some of my JPEGs were images I really liked. When I discovered what could be done with RAW, I wished I had shot those earlier shots in RAW so I could have improved them more than I could as JPEGs. That is why I would advise digital beginners to shoot RAW+JPEG even if they aren't ready to process the RAWs, so when they are ready they could go back and work on the RAW files.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Hey, guys, raw is great, but it’s not a religion. JPEGs do have their place. The trick is to keep *both* raw and JPEG workflows in their places!

Lots of pros use SOOC JPEGs for certain types of work because they have to, for reasons of deadline, law (forensics...), or processing massive volumes of school portrait images.

Situations where lighting is LOCKED DOWN (controlled and consistent) — and camera menus, exposure, and custom white balance are also locked down — work best. It takes professional attention to precision and detail to pull that off well.

OTOH, I would use raw for weddings, events, most full sun settings, landscapes, real estate, and work where creative post-processing is both allowable and desirable.

There isn’t a panacea. Every tool in the box has a specific best use case!