cr2 vs dng (Page 2): RAW files have information known by the manufacturer but have not yet been decoded by anyone else -- including Adobe. The process continues to try to discover the...

aflundi Loc: Albuquerque, NM

russelray wrote:

I have been converting all of my CRW, CR1, and CR2 files to DNG ever since I discovered DNG, which was about 4 years ago. ...

RAW files have information known by the manufacturer but have not yet been decoded by anyone else -- including Adobe.

The process continues to try to discover the meaning of that data and as time goes on, more and more is found. If you convert to DNG, you may have limited the possible recoverable information to that known by Adobe at the time that version of the conversion software was written.

What benefit is there to converting to a format that likely drops information?

bob fleer Loc: Annapolis, MD

getting lots of good info from my fellow hoggers.
Thanks
Bob Fleer

anotherview Loc: California

Useful view.

Meanwhile, as to a standard for unprocessed digital images, I presume that the Adobe RAW file format (x.cr2) will stand in for it into the indefinite future. And likewise for other RAW file formats from other manufacturers.

We may presume further that if another standard arose either superior to these formats or out of necessity, then surely a utility for conversion to it would arise as well.

mwsilvers wrote:

Some will tell you that DNG is a cross platform st... (show quote)

Bill_de Loc: US

Oddly enough while Adobe would like everybody to sign up for the subscription, they provide a free dng convertor. The DNG convertor, which they have been keeping up to date, allows you to use raw files from new cameras in old software. DNG is also accepted in many other software programs. Unless DNG has been changed, it strips out information such as picture control settings that are not used by ACR. If shooting RAW it really doesn't matter.

As was pointed out, if you save your camera's raw files today you can convert them to DNG tomorrow. It doesn't work in reverse. I save my NEF files, and convert to DNG as needed.

The free DNG converter dispels a lot of talk about how greedy Adobe is. They have increased profits by going to a subscription plan. But, they are in fact supporting people with old Adobe or other brand software. I use DNG with PhotoShop CS5 with no ill effects.

--

Dngallagher Loc: Wilmington De.

Jrhoffman75 wrote:

"If you view a CR2 file in Canon's own softwa... (show quote)

I echo the same...I made use of DNG for years with my Nikon, then for a bit with my Canon. People always say that information is stripped out during the conversion, but can never point to specifically what is lost.

The picture control settings remain, as well as the focus points used, and if the proper plugin is used it can display the focus point used.

I converted from NEF & CR2 to eliminate the clutter of XMP files, and to make things quicker for loading. As time went on I switched CR2, and don’t worry about the clutter as I hardly ever use “finder” to view folder contents.

I would really love it if someone could explain in accurate details what data is stripped out that matters.

lsimpkins Loc: SE Pennsylvania

SharpShooter wrote:

I believe there are even a few small camera manufacturers that use dng as their native output.

Yes, small in market share, but not necessarily in reputation - Hasselblad, Leica, Pentax/Ricoh, Samsung, DxO. And now some higher end cell phones can also capture in dng format.

Still, if I were shooting other than Pentax, I would not bother converting a native raw file to dng unless the files from the camera were not supported.

russelray Loc: La Mesa CA

aflundi wrote:

RAW files have information known by the manufacturer but have not yet been decoded by anyone else -- including Adobe.

The process continues to try to discover the meaning of that data and as time goes on, more and more is found. If you convert to DNG, you may have limited the possible recoverable information to that known by Adobe at the time that version of the conversion software was written.

What benefit is there to converting to a format that likely drops information?

It's information that I don't need. According to my inventory catalog, not including this morning's pictures which have not yet been cataloged, I have 2,167,441 digital picture files on my photography hard drive. That does not include my Photographic Art, which comprises another 2,189 files. Guess how many times, and with how many pictures, I have accessed EXIF information. Yep. 0 times, 0 files. And when one takes an average of 500 pictures each and every day (took 512 today), storage space can be critical. DNG files are about 75% the size of CR2 files. More importantly for me, though, DNG eliminates the sidecar files which I despised from day one.

aflundi Loc: Albuquerque, NM

Dngallagher wrote:

... I would really love it if someone could explain in accurate details what data is stripped out that matters.

That would be nice but no one knows how to travel to the future and return. The point is that raw files contain huge amounts of metadata that hasn't yet been broken, but new fields are discovered as time goes on.

For a specific example, recently it was discovered in NEF files at least for the D850, but perhaps others, there is more information than previously known that allows one to pull both the mechanical shutter count as well as the electronic shutter count. That can be very useful and is likely not retained in DNGs.

rlboston

russelray wrote:

I have been converting all of my CRW, CR1, and CR2 files to DNG ever since I discovered DNG, which was about 4 years ago.
In my Photographic Art business, I use Photoshop, Lightroom, Elements, InDesign, Illustrator, CorelDRAW, Photo-Paint, Paintshop Pro, Topaz, Redfield, Nik, onOne, Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Photomatix, DxO Optics Pro, Watercolor Studio....
Those are just off the top of my head.
I have not had a problem using DNG files in any of them.

I've been doing this as well from the time I made the switch to digital. The digital Pentax I bought to replace the ancient film Pentax used DNG. When I made the transition to Sony I've continued in DNG with no issue. When I was recently exploring a Sony camera fail I submitted a file to an online site to get the shutter actuations.

aflundi Loc: Albuquerque, NM

russelray wrote:

... More importantly for me, though, DNG eliminates the sidecar files which I despised from day one.

So what happens it you want to process the same file in multiple different ways. My editor uses one raw file and creates a separate sidecar files for each edit path. How is that handled with DNGs?

rlboston

aflundi wrote:

So what happens it you want to process the same file in multiple different ways. My editor uses one raw file and creates a separate sidecar files for each edit path. How is that handled with DNGs?

In Lightroom Classic it's a virtual copy.

Dngallagher Loc: Wilmington De.

aflundi wrote:

That would be nice but no one knows how to travel ... (show quote)

Interesting - when I talk of looking and comparing, I do that using EXIFtool to walk thru the fields and “maker data” within each image. While there may be data discarded, I have yet to see what is discarded, inquiring minds want to know !

Perhaps it is time for me to take another deep dive into my CR2’s and a recent conversion

aflundi Loc: Albuquerque, NM

rlboston wrote:

In Lightroom Classic it's a virtual copy.

And the mechanism my editor uses to make a virtual copy is to add an additional sidecar file. What is the mechanism that Lightroom uses?

dcampbell52 Loc: Clearwater Fl

aflundi wrote:

RAW files have information known by the manufacturer but have not yet been decoded by anyone else -- including Adobe.

The process continues to try to discover the meaning of that data and as time goes on, more and more is found. If you convert to DNG, you may have limited the possible recoverable information to that known by Adobe at the time that version of the conversion software was written.

What benefit is there to converting to a format that likely drops information?

Actually, several of the manufacturers have a downloadable conversion applet that allows Adobe and other brands to translate their RAW. However, Adobe Lightroom/Photoshop has no issues reading and developing my Nikon NEF (RAW) files.

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Dngallagher wrote:

Interesting - when I talk of looking and comparing, I do that using EXIFtool to walk thru the fields and âmaker dataâ within each image. While there may be data discarded, I have yet to see what is discarded, inquiring minds want to know !

Perhaps it is time for me to take another deep dive into my CR2âs and a recent conversion

You could have done this yourself ....

a) dump the EXIF data from a CR2 using EXIFTOOL and pipe the output to a text file, use parameters: -list -EXIF:All -sort
b) with same parameters, dump the EXIF data from a DNG and pipe to second text file
c) import the data to Excel and run a look-up function comparing the two files and identify what is missing in the DNG
d) save the results to a text file and attach to UHH

From an EOS 7DII CR2 file, the attached list of 108 values are removed by Adobe in the DNG. The dump from the CR2 was 381 and from the DNG was 485 so in Excel, the VLOOKUP function was used to identify the CR2 values that do not exist in the DNG values.

Attached file:
(Download)