Yes you are missing something rather simple. If you are viewing it via your computers picture viewer what ever that may be. The reason you see little to no difference between the jpeg shot in camera and the raw rendered on your screen is because your computer has to convert that raw file to a jpg thumbnail for you to view it on the screen of your computer. Raw files are just pure digital data and must be converted to jpg to be viewed. It does not change the raw file at all it just converts it temporarily to a format you can see where as your camara actually edits and converts. If you view it in Adobe raw or other raw editor you will see a much flatter image which is the actual raw rendering.

These issues have already been addressed, but to review:

(1) Yes, processing in camera may cause exposure changes. If I don't like them, I can adjust levels using gimp in a minute or so.

(2) My ultimate goal is a JPEG file; I use minimal compression - if there were a tiny detail lost, that would happen also when I converted to JPEG at the end. Since I don't normally pixel peek, but look at the entire picture at once, most likely I would't miss that detail anyway.

(3) I do just one EXPORT to JPEG {in gimp, SAVE results in a native file}. My careful testing has shown that I can do that one EXPORT without losing anything {this whole subject was the subject of an extensive thread here}

I follow the same workflow documented in use at the Olympics. That seems entirely appropriate to me since I envision the same kind of mission for my work, in my case "capturing my world today before tomorrow comes and everything changes", that they have.

refering to comment #2... The "ultimate goal" is always a print, so the last thing in your editing procedure (in RAW) is to export in JPEG> JPEG is the final step to make an image. Raw is "data" which creates a JPEG image for print. Original Raw data is preserved. Jpeg on the other hand is "changed" and looses resolution, where RAW data is not..

refering to comment #1.. shooting in Jpeg compresses ( throwing out pixels) reducing picture quality. "Minimal commpression", you are still starting out with less resolution, LESS. So to begin with you are starting out with less pixels to work your magic with. If you really want to capture detail then shoot in RAW.

refering to comment#3.. Once you compress to jpeg, any additional edits you might want to make, will result in "less" picture quality when you "save" the changes. Raw you always have the "original" data to create a new and fresh jpeg... RAW is not a photo its data, jpeg is created from data. The original data can be changed endless times without loosing any quality.. In RAW you create a new Jpeg not a jpeg reworked.

Professionals use LR and shoot in RAW. I know of no professional that shoots in JPEG, unless shooting for fast buffer time, or news journaling.. Studio work is always RAW...

Again, I cant understand why anyone would want to shoot in jpeg. I hope its not due to the price of LR raw converter program.

ADL allows the camera to recover some of the highlight and shadow information much like you would when recovering that information when you develop from the raw file. If that's the only correction you need then the JPEG SOOC might be just as good as the JPEG you develop from raw. There are a cfew caveats:
- Just as good may be good enough.
- If you want to do further editing of the JPEG tonality, you need to convert to 16-bit TIFF.
- ADL is arbitrary. You can't recover highlightsor shadows separately. You may need to bracket. You may also need to adapt the level of ADL to the scene.

There are few decent JPEG-only editors but if all you need to do is crop and resize, ADL may be all you need.

While it is possible to accomplish almost the same result using ADL, it's still easier to develop from raw. At least you are starting with more than 8-bit color.

I know this is an old topic; but maybe I can some. I am heading to antelope canyon on a photo tour in about a month and want to make sure I get good shots. I am assuming that the raw photos will improve my chances of fixing improper exposures.

This discussion is directed to those who use raw. I have read many of the on-line explanations about raw photos having more color depth, levels of brightness and the file not degrading when it is edited. I notice for my d500 that for the same photo the jpeg is 13.9 mp (5568x3712x24b) and the raw 25.7 mb (5568x3712x48b) there does not appear to be much if any difference between the jpeg and the raw . On the screen of the 4 year old 23" PA248 ASUS the images look the same and the same for the Dell ultra sharp. Resolution is set at 1920 x 1200 for both. The color space is Adobe RGB. The shots were at iso 200, f/10, 1/100s and 18mm with auto white balance facing north on a sunny morning. The shot goes from light shade to bright sun on the trees. I shoot both raw, compressed, 14 bit and jpeg large fine.
Maybe I am missing something; but I think most of the good shots do not need postprocessing. If the shot is important I bracket expose and may change the f-stop and shutter speed.
It seems to me one shoots raw to fix shots that were incorrectly exposed.
I print my photos on an Epson Artisan 810. So far, I have not tried any shop for a larger print. The local drugs stores and other similar places do not good work.
Questions and comments
1. Should I switch to rRGB color space and why?
2. How can I tell how much brightness levels are in the photo? Is it in the histogram? The histogram for the two photos are not the same.
3. The apparent brightness in greater in the jpeg.
4. What changes do you make to most raw shots?
5. Are there good on lind articles on how to process raw photos?
6. What format do you save them in after post processing?

Thanks to all those help