Shooting Raw

This journey to see the Cherry Blossoms did provide me with an opportunity to try something that I had long avoided doing- shooting with Camera Raw. The advantages are many, but the disadvantages were enough for me to avoid doing it.

First, the files take 16MB each, so 60 pretty much takes a GB of hard drive space. I needed to install my new external hard drive when I loaded these photos on to the computer.

Second, it is an extra step in order to see the photo. I set my camera to make the conversion for me to eliminate this step, but this led to each photo taking 16Mb+2Mb for the jeg.

The upside is that there is more data to work with in each file. When files are converted to .jpg from the original RAW photo, data is lost, and sometimes highlights are clipped. Additionally, the exposure and shadow detail can be adjust before the conversion to jpeg. Once the conversion is made, and data lost is no longer recoverable.

The two photos above are the same photo. The first photo is processed using the RAW data. I was able to recover the data from the shadows. In this case I simply made the conversion to jpg twice at different exposures, then selected the areas from the lighter photo to restore the shadow detail. In newer versions of Photoshop, you can selectively make that conversion in one step instead of two layers. In theory I could have made adjustments in the highlight/shadow adjustment in photoshop, or numerous other methods to selectively lighten the area in shadow, but using the raw data allows for the greatest level of detail to be preserved.