DNG vs PEF

How do these two systems differ?

Pros, cons, compatibility with other software, who holds the reins for future development and its compatibility, risk, image quality, Adobe Camera Raw differences, and so on.

I have a K10D coming, but need to decide beforehand which format to shoot.

It's coming...

It's coming...

Must focus!

It'll certainly get you better pictures Michael..

From my limited knowledge of DNG, the main advantage appears to be its universality, which makes it a better format for long-term image storage than a camera's specific RAW format, which may be unsupported in the future.

Unfortunately, there does appear to be one disadvantage for K10D users. A typical DNG file is 50% larger than a PEF. I would like to find a simple and quick DNG compressor which would still allow the compressed file to be read by any image-processing software.

When I find one, I will switch to DNG.

G

If you're asking what I think you are, there are two current advantages to DNG besides future compatibility:

ACR will read DNG right out of the camera, no conversion necessary. Same for most RAW processors

Adobe DNG converter (free) compresses the K10D DNG files. This saves space if you're concerned about filling up your HDD (not an unreasonable concern).

Thanks, Arthur.

I should have said that I don't use Photoshop. Does the convertor work on its own, or does it have to have PS?

G

George,

the converter is a stand-a-lone program, you don't need photoshop.

Thanks, Tim, I'll give it a go.

G

Here's the link. I don't see a separate download for the DNG converter, but you can just ignore the Camera Raw plugin and install the DNG converter by itself.

http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=106&platform=Windows

Having just received my new K10D I have been playing with the DNG and RAW files. At present it's best to use DNG as nobody seems to support the RAW file except Pentax Photo Lab.
The DNG opens fine in Photoshop CS (RAW won't open) and in the new Adobe Lightroom Beta but again RAW wont open.
The K10D give a RAW file size of 9.78Mb and DNG of 16.1Mb but I can't see any real difference on screen.
What's perhaps is just as important is when you save the file export it as a 16bit TIFF and not JPG as all the good work you have done in keeping quality will be lost if you convert to JPEG.

The Golden Rule is, as you say, convert to TIFF. Never save anything as a JPEG unless it is for Web, and then it has to be JPEG and sRGB.

Or you can archive all your important work as DNG, like saving negatives so you can make different prints in the future!

Many thanks - good to know I'm doing it right.
I normally archive in RAW but with that option out (because of lack of converters) I'll stick with DNG and TIFF for now

There's always Silkypix Developer Studio 3 - it handles both PEF and DNG from the K10D

PEF is compressed at between 8 and 14Mb per shot.
DNG is uncompressed.

(I'm using PEF & SP-DS3)

Matt

The thing that still concerns me about RAW is the lack of consistency and the possibility of poor future support for the files I archive. I am much more confident that I will be able to read JPEG and TIFF formats in 20 years time (if I care by then) than obsolete RAW formats.

Whether any of the files will be worth anything by then is, of course, a different issue!

The DNG converter appears to work fine. Thanks chaps.

So my workflow will be:

1 Shoot DNG.
2 Download to PC.
3 Compress.
4 Backup by copying compressed files to an external disk drive.
5 Delete original DNG files
6 Open Silkypix and edit images.
7 Copy Silkypix files to backup location.
8 Archive when appropriate.

For those who still haven't tried it, Silkypix is a superb RAW converter with the additional ability to crop, rotate (not necessary with K10D), and print. It allows you to process PEFs (inc K10D), DNGs, JPEGs, and TIFFS.

The advantage of the JPG processor is that, as with RAW files, it doesn't overwrite the original JPEG, so you can edit to your heart's content.

G