I find Flickr and Google Web Albums/Photos indispensable when researching any camera/lens purchases because you can easily search photos for specific cameras and or lenses.

Start by clicking here:
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=tokina%2011%20-%2016 (which is set up to show pics taken with Tokina 11 - 16 lenses), select any photo - when it loads you can scroll down to see EXIF data.

Then just enter any other search term in the search field in the upper right corner - like - Nikon 10 - 24.

Like i said above - indispensable when researching cameras and lenses.

Thanks for the link. It and Dave's "What's with this "ERADR" and "EBTR" stuff?" UHH thread cleared up the questions I asked.

Thanks Dave - After posting the above I found your "What's with this "ERADR" and "EBTR" stuff?" UHH thread (for some reason your link was getting me to a UHH 404 page). I'll do the tests.

I'm trying to parse out what appears to be some pretty good information in your paragraphs. Questions:

What is UniWB? My Nikon D5300 only has the standard ones plus Pre (custom from photo or measurement). Does histogram track left/right with WB?

"It just requires lower contrast..." Are you saying that if you conform your jpg-oriented camera's static settings for less contrast, brightness and saturation you will skew the histogram to the right for a better RAW capture?

I understand (I think) the contrast and brightness connection, but "...most of all backing off on saturation." How does saturation impact histogram? Is the saturation reduction to avoid masked channel-clipping?

A little background - I've been bracketing RAW shots for HDR PP through several generations of Canon Powershots with CHDK. CHDK allowed the Powershots to save RAW (dng) files, bracket as many shots as desired, full color live histograms, etc. Because I generally had 5 to 7 bracketed shots to work with the whole ETTR-thing was merely academic.

Thanks to Chuck's thread and "that other one", I learned the difference between jpg "proper exposure" and RAW "proper exposure".

The reason for the above clarifying questions is I have been limited to 3-shot RAW+jpg brackets with my D5100 and D5300. I'm trying digest these revelations to set up my Nikon to ETTR the whole RAW bracket set.

Or am I just overthinking the whole thing - maybe just routinely bump up everything by +2/3 or +1?

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

I engaged in the same search for an UWA lens about a year ago for a European river trip. Bought the Tokina 11-16 DX II (has AF). Tokina 11-16 vs Nikon 10-24 Google searches turn up many good hits like:

http://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/38187654
http://www.flickr.com/groups/nikondigital/discuss/72157618461773425/

I bought it for the fixed f2.8, the excellent photos you can search for on Flickr, and because of the claims that it was mechanically robust.

I can certainly attest to the robustness. Being a neck strap AND wrist strap type of guy I was horrified when I stood up from a seat on a London train and my D5100 with the Tokina lens fell from my lap to the floor. I saw it going down, grabbed at the neck strap, but didn't break the fall. It landed lens first and I immediately thought, "Well, there's $522 down the drain". Turns out the lens was fine, but the D5100 was dead - mirror was stuck because the pin was knocked out of it's socket.

I appreciate reviews and forum discussions, but find the best way to judge a lens and cameras is to search directly on Flickr (or Google Photos/WebAlbums.)

Please see photo at http://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-296470-3.html#4997541 for my initial reaction to your question.

Chuck clearly stated he purposely started with problem exposures for purposes of his tests. Most of the discussion has focused on the many advantages of working with RAW files in general. If you bothered to read any of the article links or even glanced at the pie chart at the top of page 11 of this thread you could see the advantages of RAW.

Working with RAW files and Chuck's thread has been far, far more than "...about the advantages of PP in sorting out a bad exposure."



ABSOLUTELY NOT!!

Chuck - very glad to see a SOOC JPGer actually diving in and seeing the benefits first hand. You are well on your way down the slippery slope :) .

Your next step is to get your head around the fact that "correct exposure" for a RAW file may be quite different and at times counter-intuitive (based on film experience) from "correct exposure" for a .jpg.

To dive into this you can search UHH for "expose to the right" and find the usual mix of sound advice and ignorant bloviation. However, before you do that I suggest you read this https://luminous-landscape.com/optimizing-exposure and pay particular attention to the black and white cats.

If you can get your head around the information in that article it will make your transition to the RAW-side easier and lead to even better photos than you are getting a peek at now.

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

Dave - regardless of whether OP Jim Bob is a troll or just likes stirring things up, I must thank him for provoking you to share your spectacular hummingbird photo. They just don't get much better (and certainly not if you'd only had a jpg to start with. :lol: )

There's no way to get the same detail because of all the missing data points, but here's what a few minutes in PS can do with the dark jpg.

(BTW - I'm fully in the RAW+jpg camp too ;>)

(Download)

Robert - After wading through this muck you beat me to a good analogy. I was thinking more along the lines of people walking down the street - two people in a doorway having a normal, rational discussion - nobody gives them a second glance. However, if that same discussion is a debate with raised voices and a few cast aspersions, suddenly passersby begin to huddle around, start taking sides, throwing in their own remarks... and on to your mini-riot.

Actually, I've been amazed by civilized responses to the chum thrown out by the OP.

Don - your question seems a little off-topic in this RAW vs jpg brouhaha and is a bit vague. The important feature about Picasa is that it doesn't do destructive editing. The changes and edits you make in Picasa don't change the original photo and are only visible in Picasa. If you want to "lock in" the edits you have to either export the photo - which creates a new photo in the folder of your choice, or you have to save the photo within Picasa which actually creates a new photo containing the edits in the photo's home folder AND moves the original, unedited folder into a hidden folder named .picasaoriginals.

What is relevant to this thread regarding Picasa is that it is pretty useless to compare jpg vs RAW in Picasa because Picasa reads the camera settings out of the file and uses those settings to process and display the RAW data and is nowhere near as good as the in-camera processing of the jpg. RAW files in Picasa never look as good as the jpgs.

Picasa is NOT software that "you can use online". It is installed on your local computer just like Lightroom, Photoshop, GIMP or any other software. It is used to catalog, edit and manage photos stored on your local machine and is in no way impaired if you have no internet connection. In addition to these features it also allows you to easily upload to and manage photos in your Google Web Albums galleries.

No - "Save target as" saves the target the link points to, not the link.