a6k Loc: Detroit & Sanibel

Only slightly off-topic..

In case anyone is unfamiliar with the free Sony software, here is a screenshot of it which shows how it emulates the camera. The name of the app is "Edit" and it is one of 3 you get in a suite.

You may also notice that it can send the picture to another editor - see the icons, top left. It shows Luminar, CaptureOne and RawTherapee.

This simply means that if you want to do so, you can shoot raw and keep all your options open. This will give you more pixels in the JPG than if you had used raw+jpg and, maybe, more than if you had shot the highest resolution jpg with in-camera settings.

This image was taken with my RX10m4. What you see here is Sony's interpretation of the raw image which it bases on the settings which were "standard". Those settings don't actually affect the raw image but they are how this app and most others start. The image is not altered, here; it's SOOC.

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

Larry is a jpegger with blinders on. He avoids raw as if it were both toxic and radioactive. He has never edited a raw file, and really has no basis for comparison, nor does he have the interest in comparing anything that involves raw conversion to what he does with his images, as if somehow shooting jpeg a)makes you a better photographer, and b)shooting raw involves, as he puts it "jumping through post-processing hoops" to arrive at a finished product. In my CIZ vs RAW/cropped/upsampled/to jpeg, of the 25 secs it took me to produce the latter, most of the time was spent cropping the image to the same field of view of the CIZ shot. He and I have had numerous discussions but he is absolutely closed-minded to the notion of raw processing, and never wastes an opportunity to mock those of us who use raw in their workflow. And for someone who has never touched a raw converter - he sure does have a lot of opinions about it. He is a good photographer, but sometimes leaves money on the table when it comes to his images. They could be better, or if he truly understood the process, he would take more pictures in marginal light that are just not possible when shooting jpeg. And those are often among the more interesting images. when done right.

Capture One is my favorite raw converter. Lightroom is my "go-to" mainly one the strength of its DAM, which is every bit as good as any higher-end enterprise, multiuser DAM,but at a fraction of the price.

I think that anyone who shoots raw and has tried CIZ ends up pretty much in the same place - it's cool, can be helpful in some situations, but isn't worth the compromises to make it a regular part of a shooting workflow. And it's not better than shooting raw and processing as needed. Perhaps future iterations may offer improvements, but for now, it has limited appeal to those who try and get as much image quality out of their gear. All in all, it's safe to say it's pretty amazing, but it needs to be qualified with "for what it is".

imagemeister Loc: mid east Florida

Thanks for your psycho-analysis ! LOL .......- but you are right, CIZ is pretty amazing for us low life photographers shooting JPEG !
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Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

At least we agree. . .

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

It doesn't change the resolution of the image. The pixel count remains the same regardless of whether you shoot raw, raw+jpeg, or jpeg fine. The jpeg quality settings also don't change the resolution - they only address compression, with fine having the least amount of compression, and presumably the highest quality (aka freedom from compression artifacts).

I prefer to open the raw file in Capture One. Though I do like the tethering in the Sony software. It seems to work as well as Capture One does with my Nikon gear.

a6k Loc: Detroit & Sanibel

Sorry, you are right. It changes the FILE SIZE but you are right and I goofed about the pixel count. The Edit app does the most to preserve the quality, using the least compression.

a6k Loc: Detroit & Sanibel

I also prefer to just go straight to CaptureOne. The point was that
A. it's free
B. it's a perfect emulation of what using JPG in the camera would have been except it does all umpteen versions.
C. it gives maximum quality (file size/compression).

imagemeister Loc: mid east Florida

I always like it when we agree
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gessman Loc: Colorado

LOL. I read and understood your comment and the examples and I didn't accuse you of saying it would turn a bike into a fish - I just used your example and confirmed that I had never seen it do that.



Can we assume that you processed the CIZ shot to see if you could more precisely duplicate the upsized Raw or is it SOOC? They're pretty close actually and it looks like a little color shift and sharpening might bring them closer together.



Since you think I'm partly correct, I would be curious to know where you think something I've said in this thread is incorrect so I won't be passing out bad information in the future - if you wouldn't mind sharing that with me. I can see how shooting Raw and upsampling could give a person more control and probably yield a better outcome but I'm not sure that it would be all that advantageous for a lot of people who often aren't serious and cannot really appreciate the finer points of what is an excellent image as opposed to a really good one, especially those who don't want to get bogged down in post processing.

As to dialing in a lens, my understanding is that Sony didn't make it possible to store non-Sony lens data as it does Sony lens data so if you're going to use an adapted lens of another manufacturer and you want it to autofocus fast and accurately, you do have to tell the camera what the focal length of the lens is with a menu change, not so CIZ can utilize it, but so it will autofocus. Obviously, this feature will work better with a prime lens and if you're going to be shooting with an adapted zoom you have to tell it what focal length you're going to be shooting at which means to me that if you're going to shoot a 70-300mm at 300mm you need to set that in the menu and not figure on zooming in to 70mm with the expectation that it will autofocus fast and accurately. It is clumsy with a zoom but works very well with a prime lens. I've gone from 200mm to 70mm with my Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 and it's slow and hunts some but still focuses after the zoom-in without the menu change. In a pinch it works ok, not optimal but it does work.



I certainly would agree with that.

gessman Loc: Colorado

gessman Loc: Colorado

I did a little processing on the CIZ example and apart from the orange in the sign being brighter and the blue turning black where it says "Notice," they seemed to come out pretty close on my monitor at least, maybe the bottom one needs a little more darkening. That's the CIZ. The top one is the Raw processed. At least this will give us an idea of how close they can be with very little processing. I can't imagine how it would be if someone who knew what they were doing got hold of it.

When you take them up to max magnification here the CIZ gets kinda fuzzy on the small lettering.

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imagemeister Loc: mid east Florida

Heather Iles Loc: UK, Somerset

Are you saying that you don't shoot Sony RAW? Please explain as I am new to Sony and is struggling.

Heather Iles Loc: UK, Somerset

OK. I have read the responses and have the answer now.

imagemeister Loc: mid east Florida

That is exactly what I am saying .....The only way to get all the neat features of Sony ( Clear Image Zoom, sweep pano, 3 exposure HDR ect. ect. ) is by shooting JPEG.
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