Surprised Jpegs

Iv'e recedntly by accident took a few pics using Jpeg (premium) instead of Raw and i must say that i am very impressed with the results. Normally i shoot in Raw and then tidy up in Elements. This time i opened the Jpeg file as Raw and done the same tweaks as normal and the results i think are brilliant they seem to have a lot more punch. I think i will start using Jpeg a lot more.
They are the last four images added to my portfolio.
Has anyone had similar results or is it just me.

No it's not just you. We use Premium JPEG almost all the time. Less messing, top quality results.

I'm interested as to what settings you use John.
Mine are set for default at the moment.

Apart from Premium JPEG and the largest possible pixel count, sRGB, Natural, +1 sharpness is where I have settled. Every other quality setting I have left untouched.

As regards handling: Centre-weighted metering, linking AE and AF points, centre point AF.

Thanks John I'll give ot a go

Hi Richard, I never use raw, it's to time consuming takes up to much space and you end up with same thing anyway and John has said the rest

As i found when tweaking a Raw file in Elements or Photoshop i never new when to stop, but as i've found with Jpeg all i have needed to do is adjust Clarity, Contrast, Saturation Levels,.

Do i get a prize for reaching 300 posts

How big is a Premium JPEG?
Just download a K7 RAW file and converted it to DNG and went from 21.5MB to 16.6MB so curious if you would gain much using lossless JPGS.

A typical Premium JPEG is around 10MB, in itself quite a large file. There's not much compression there, but all the immediate advantages of faster workflow and better general compatibility.

Thank you John.
Workflow for me is pretty fast with RAW, i use LR2 and have some presets and since I use manual shooting mode a lot of shots can be batch process so workflow is not a major concern for me.
I wouldn't gain much shooting in JPG I believe.

Why not try it anyway just to see what it's like?

The major limitation for me using JPG is the limited WB adjusting you can do in PP since that's one thing I adjust most of the time.
If Jpg would save the WB information like RAW did then I would probable have used it more and saved RAW for the difficult shots that probable needs a lot of PP.

So basically Jpg isn't adjustable enough for my likings so will use DNG and hope for a better format between the two in the future.

interesting thread, i spent 3 hours today tidying images and i am not even a third through them yet, will try jpeg with the above formentioned settings

JR is too modest to say this, but he is an "old" transparency shooter, which means that he has learned the hard way to get the exposure exactly right when he presses the shutter.

I am far less disciplined, and shoot RAW primarily because it gives me some latitude to make (and correct) mistakes.

Using Silkypix, I find I can go through a couple of hundred shots and correct them in half an hour or so. I am using the paid version which has an invaluable batch mode. Once you have corrected one picture, all similar ones can be dealt with the same way in seconds.

G

I used to shoot transparencies too (in fact still do, I have about 20 rolls of K64 to finish before the end of the year) and my film and digital styles of shooting are very different. Film: look around the image, pick something of about the right tone, meter from it, check for particularly dark/light patches etc. etc.; digital: frame, shoot, check histogram, adjust if necessary, reframe, reshoot, delete first photo. This, of course, works for me because few of my subjects move!

I have no way of proving it, but my gut feeling is the LX light meter seems more accurate than my K10D, and I used the ME Super for so many years I learnt the quirks of its meter.

Back to the OP. (a) using lightroom I am essentially unaware I am using RAW and not jpegs EXCEPT that I can correct imperfect exposure and white balance with fewer problems and (b) I can save presets and apply them or just copy and paste settings to multiple images. In fact, when editing older jpegs I go down the develop module's list of adjustments in exactly the same way so there is no extra steps or extra fiddling, my workflow (to use that horrible word) is identifical for both. If I learnt the quirks of the meter in the K10D as well as I know the ME Super, I would probably be less of a RAW convert like John.

Just MHO. K.