Public arring . . . and further thoughts on RAW

[Sutton Warrior]

Being a Canon man, I cant comment on the Nikon softwares. I use Photoshop - camera RAW to open my Photos straight into Photoshop for Processing. I could spend hours tweaking this 'n that in Camera RAW, but I still work on the adage of "less is more" and post process my shots very little. I still prefer to get shots right in camera, so I dont have to adjust exposure or crop in post processing. So I open the RAW in Adobe camera RAW, then open into Photoshop as a 16 bit file RGB 300ppi (saved preset) then I make any post processing from there in Photoshop which normally includes just adding a frame. Then I convert to 8 bit mode, save and I'm done..Post processing time..around 30 seconds...simples!

 

Dont overcomplicate RAW and it wont control you, its there to use if you have a shot that for whatever reason went slightly wrong for example a cloud covering the sun so your exposure on that important shot was wrong or similar cicumstances.

 

Steve...

 

Good advise, which I try to work to, colour, I'm usualy OK on, but I do like my 'croping' . . . Mmmm, need to get better at spoting the shot and allowing a bit more time . . . time, never enough 'time' I will try harder

 

SW

Edited January 31, 2009 by Sutton Warrior

[Steve Randles]

Couldn't agree more Steve. When I first got into digital photography I was fiddling with every photo, often to end up making them look worse!

 

But that fiddling teaches you much, you learn the boundaries of the software when applied to your photo, you gain a better relationship with your camera and what it and your software can do together or seperately. For example if I am out and about with my camera I might pass up a photo oppurtunity because the scene is too high a contrast, too much highlight and too much shadows, the camera would struggle to capture this on its own. But if I bracket 3 shots to capture highlights, shadows and midtones I know my software can combine all three to give me a photo of what I actually saw that day...but the camera could not capture...the method is HDR.

 

Incidently, a film camera would be much better in the above scenario and would make a much better job of the initial capture, needing only one shot to capture the scene as you saw it. Therefore to my mind HDR is a technique for digital that makes up the shortfall between film and digital. HDR technology will eventually becom incorporated into digital camera sensers, shrinking that gap between film and digital.

 

Unfortunately many people overuse HDR or dont apply it correctly and make strong looking arty shots from it...they are not the scene they viewed that day...thats plain to see. But if thats what you want then good luck with it, the same effect can be achieved in pretty much most softwares anyway.

 

Steve...