What do you shoot?

Having seen a topic where a new member has gone from a P&S to a DSLR and was used to the Jpeg output of a P&S camera I was just wondering what people on the forum shoot .. Raw, Jpeg or a combination of both.

Personally I use Raw, have never done Jpeg as I have always found Pentax a bit lacking in that department .. besides, I quite like doing the work myself in Lightroom anyway.

Secondly .. I have always wanted to do a poll

When I got my K10D (my first DSLR) I shot jpeg for the first month or so. Then for another month or so - until I got fed up with rapidly disappearing space on my sd cards - Raw+jpeg. I never used the the jpegs, preferring the greater control with the Raw files - and the ability to reverse some of the many mistakes I made.

Not making (quite) so many mistakes these days, but it's been Raw all the way ever since. I even reverted to Raw with my LX3 after initially opting for jpegs with that (and the jpeg conversion in the LX3 is excellent - I just prefer the greater flexibility of Raw even if it is more time consuming).

Raw always. I've tried comparing the end results and it is invariably better. Also, I'm the sort of person who will always fiddle with pics so using Lightroom is just natural now.

Tony

To take this thread totally off topic already (a record?)
How do you find the LX3 .. have been thinking of getting one for a while now.

RAW for us. we have sufficient computer power and storage. Aperture makes working with RAW files as easy as jpeg.
It is nice to get it right in camera, speeds things along, but when things inevitably do go wrong, it is good to have more lee-way when fixing....

Well - I'll admit to shooting in JPEG still .

I've had a steep learning curve this year - plus quite a lot of time I've not been able to get out and about with the K-x .

Now I'm happier 'doing things my way' with the K-x [ ie changing white balance , ISO and doing some manual shooting ] the next hurdle is going to RAW.

Why haven't I done it before ? Simple I knew that shooting RAW would involve using pp more and iPhoto couldn't really do that. I struggled with PSE for some time but I just didn't make sense of it . Finally installed Aperture3 and I'm actually getting on reasonably well with it so far - soooooo I'll be going to RAW well before the summer

little secret....
there are tutorials on aperture on apples website.

also :
link
link

To switch to RAW right away, all you gotta do is set the camera to RAW and keep doing what you are doing for Jpeg.
You won't notice a difference until you need to fix something that is really wrong......

JPEG for me. Although I sometimes do both with the idea that I may get around to doing something with the raw file.....later.

I haven't really got the hang of photo-shop and usually just tweek a bit in Faststone. I keep telling myself that I must try but it is all a bit confusing and I never seem to find the time! Probably need to sign up for an evening class or somthing, that way the time will be reserved.

Excellent. It's not nearly as good as my K20D of course (particularly dynamic range & resolution wise). And the small sensor restricts useable ISO. But the images it produces have a certain something (I guess largely because of the lens) and are amazing considering the size of the camera producing them. I've printed images shot inside (so in pretty low light) up to around 20ins with good results.

The choice of aspect ratios is good too - as is the macro ability (not that I use it much).

I also haven't been at all bothered by the limited focal range, which I thought might be a problem before I bought it - I just adjust (though the new LX5 has a slightly better range).

Don

I know - actually I'm getting lessons in Apple Glasgow on Aperture - I posted that piccie of my Tutor last week

I don't learn well from books - and I find the Apple trainers are very very good - they make you do the work but they also 'hold your hand' as you do it and make sure that you are happy with things - the teaching is done to suit you - it doesn't follow a strict , laid down syllabus - you can divert if necessary and then come back to where you were.

I just need the confidence to switch the setting - but I'm very short of confidence in myself , 50 years of being told that you are thick and stupid [ not by my husband I must add ] doesn't help anyone to be confident.

Try being too stoopid to understand the people calling you stupid, works for me.
I have learning disabilities.
Dyslexia and dyscalculia... (reading and numbers)..
I have short term memory problems.. (forget something you said five minutes ago... but then my long term memory is phenomenal... I will remember it next month and ten years from now.. I don't lose the information, I lose track of it for the short term).
I had grade 8 education and failed every class.
I also went to college as an adult, and got straight 'A' s
I failed basic introductory to computers in gr 8.
I build robots and run a network with 4 macs today.

I was always too dumb to understand them when they told me I was stoopid!
Highly recommend trying that when people put you down!

anyways try a few shots today with raw open them in aperture and I'm sure you will not see any difference from what you'd expect shooting jpegs.
It only matters when you screw up the shot and need to fix it afterwards.

Raw all the way for me & pp in Lightroom 3

I started shooting RAW as soon as I had a DSLR, no point messing with in camera jpeg compression when software can do it so much better...

JPG, unless it's a one-off event in which case I shoot RAW. For day to day stuff JPGs are perfectly acceptable and much easier to deal with (I tend to shoot and upload rather than fiddling about), but for something like an airshow or motorsport event RAW gives me the chance to recover well composed but poorly exposed images.

Weirdly I've spent more time in the GIMP recently working with scanned negatives from my Spotmatic than I have with native digital images. A few were slightly pale, so I cranked the brightness down to -60 and turned the contrast up to 50 giving them a very crisp, sharp look.

Raw, I agree with what Don says, there is no noticeable difference shooting with jpg or raw with current software (I use Aperture), but you have more control when you make mistakes.

Giorgio

I have only ever used Jpeg. Never felt the need to use the RAW setting. I don't like to mess around with images too much and Picasa is quite capable of improving the occasional iffy exposure. My D also has a TIFF setting. Never used that, either... In fact, I don't even know what it is!

I suppose all this makes me a frightful amateur, that doesen't deserve to have a Dslr.