BigDaddy Loc: Pittsburgh, PA

I see. As I stated, your x-ray eyes, cape, and 16 bit monitor see stuff normal people can't see. I think you managed to get your brain so tangled up in technical minutia you can't see the trees.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

I see trees.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Nothing you can actually say of substance about the topic so you throw a dumb insult.

It's telling that from my corrections to your last misinformation post you single out the item (editing degradation w/JPEGS) where I have always agreed whenever I mention it that it's of minor significance and you ignore my correction of your more fundamental error that really presents good reasons to shoot and process raw as opposed to JPEG.

You know where you said this; "Most (all) camera's produce jpgs out of it's raw data, and if the raw data is good, the jpg will be good." [my bold] That is nonsense.

I've agreed that you can edit JPEGs and pay little penalty in the way of added degradation. That doesn't mean that you can edit a JPEG and achieve equivalent results to processing the raw file. In this thread you've already demonstrated that if the JPEG white balance is off you can't correct it easily if at all (you couldn't even get a grayscale gray).

(Excepting work in a controlled studio) the camera will not simply create a good JPEG let alone the image you want from good raw data. And when it doesn't, you can edit the JPEG but not as much and not as successfully. Often you will have to settle for less than what you could get from the raw file. That's the real bottom line.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

If the RAW data was good and the JPEG lousy,
I'd get a different camera brand.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

I think it may be a very long time if ever that the new AI software still to come in our cameras will recognize what we're photographing and after recommending we make changes to the lighting then process the raw data to best advantage.

I was just out in the garden and grabbed some snaps of the flowers. Our glads are blooming now. I really like the white ones and I took the photo below. I told the camera that I wanted the background behind the flower darkened and that I knew half the flower stalk was in shade but please lighten those flowers and don't let them get too blue. But did it listen to me?

So the camera JPEG doesn't meet my expectations. Could I have adjusted the camera settings so the JPEG would meet my expectations? No. So where's that leave me? I have to edit the JPEG. How am I winning that one?
.

The photo I wanted to take -- and did.

(Download)

Photo taken by dumb camera.

(Download)

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Win against whom? the camera? Your alter ego?
Don't make it a contest!.!

Use the JPEG settings you prefer the most.
Won't work in EVERY situation, I can guarantee that, unless you want to adjust them in the camera for each shot.
(I wouldn't!)
Much easier to adjust in post at home.
Just shoot and edit if needed.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Still won't work if you adjust them in camera for each shot -- won't work for most situations even if you adjust settings in camera for each shot.

Much easier = winning!

Editing raws is much easier and takes less time than editing JPEGs. Much easier = winning!

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Lordy, we have a winner!!!!!!!

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Delderby Loc: Derby UK

Interesting - two days ago I told my camera to shoot this. It carried out my instructions to the letter. (only 600mb)

(Download)

selmslie Loc: Fernandina Beach, FL, USA

Until that day arrives I guess we will have to rely on our own native intelligence and experience.

Anyone who understands exposure could have taken that image on manual at Sunny 16. There was no need for aperture priority and exposure compensation.

That would take care of the highlights, Daylight WB (obviously) would take care of the color and there would be very little left to do during the raw conversion. Darkening the background can be done as easily to JPEG or raw.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Nice photo, but when I see it my eye is drawn to the leaf in the back that's facing up to the light. It's the same brightness as the brightest (smaller) highlight on the rose, and because it's larger it's the brightest thing in the photo. Try as I may I can't devote my full concentration to the rose without that leaf constantly pulling on me. I would have told the camera to burn that down in the finished image. And what control do you use in the camera to do that?

If you decide to do that now PP the JPEG you'll find it very difficult since it's basically a highlight without detail. In fact it looks like it was clipped and pulled back. If you had a raw file odds are there would be detail there that could be successfully burned in.

selmslie Loc: Fernandina Beach, FL, USA

The odds are that it's blown in the raw file as well.

The simple explanation is that, if this was exposed in broad daylight, it was exposed 3 stops brighter (ISO 400, 1/400 @ f/5.6) than Sunny 16 (ISO 400, 1/400 @ f/16).

The rose is not variegated so what looks white is actually blown, just not enough to ruin the image. But since it was not a simple shiny surface there is still some texture. The leaf is clearly shinier and the reflection on it is definitely specular and would probably blow out even at Sunny 16.

The notion that the JPEG blows out before the raw file is a myth. Here is one of many tests I have done.



The raw values are converted to the JPEG range of 0-255 with LOG(raw,2)*256/14 so they can share the same vertical scale.

I get pretty much the same results (slightly different numbers) with every camera I have tested.

Note that in this case the raw file and the JPEG green channel (72% of the luminance information) both reach their maximum value at +3 - three stops above the camera's middle gray.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Darkening the background would require PP for JPEG or raw. That's my point. As for easy, yes darkening the background would be as easy for both however lightening the shadow side of the flower stalk and shifting it's color less blue could be more difficult with the JPEG especially if, heaven forbid, I was dumb enough to set a sunny 16 exposure (more than 1 stop less than the exposure I did set) and if I set the WB to Fuji's preset Daylight which would put a cyan color cast over the entire photo.

selmslie Loc: Fernandina Beach, FL, USA

Unless there is something wrong with your camera's DR, underexposing by 1 stop will do no harm to the image. There would still be plenty of shadow information that could be recovered from raw. I have never had an issue with any of my cameras at 1/3 stop darker (LV 15) than Sunny 16 (LV 14.67).

But we don't really care about the shadows in this case. You darkened them significantly, nearly exterminated them.

Whenever you see a cyan color cast you have probably blown some of the red channel. As you can see from the plots, if the red channel gets blown, the blue and green channels are also blown.

If you see a magenta color cast you have probably blown the green channel.

It pays to learn about the relationship between raw highlights and exposure values whether you are shooting raw or JPEG.