Noob RAW and Lightroom question

lordrobs

lordrobs

lordrobs

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Since getting my SLR I've only taken Jpeg shots for fear of not getting RAW files to look even as good as an out of the camera jpeg.

Now I've been having a play with the trial of Lightroom 4 so at least now I can do something with the RAW files should I take some. My question really is, does Lightroom automatically add the missing sharpness and blacks that I'm lead to believe a RAW file lacks?

I've been reading up on the differences and completely confused myself but the general consensus seems to be that you should be taking raw shots unless you have no intention of doing any pp? I've also seen automatic adjustments being done by Lightroom mentioned but I can't find anything conclusive.

Also one of the big advantages of being able to shoot raw is the ability to adjust white balance in pp... But Lightroom let's me do that with my jpegs, I simply don't get the presents like tungsten etc.

I think I may be trying to run before I can walk by taking raw shots now but with 25 days left of a Lightroom trial I guess now is the time to see if it is something I want to invest in (lightroom that is). If Lightroom can get me to a minimum of jpeg standard automatically then I can shoot in raw without any concerns what so ever.

I have done a fair bit of reading on the subject but have just totally confused myself, as I say, probably trying to run before I can walk!

TL/DR- in laymans terms what would I gain from shooting raw when Lightroom seems to let me make changes to wb with my jpegs anyway? Secondly does Lightroom automatically add blacks and sharpness to raw files?
 
lordrobs said:
TL/DR- in laymans terms what would I gain from shooting raw when Lightroom seems to let me make changes to wb with my jpegs anyway? Secondly does Lightroom automatically add blacks and sharpness to raw files?
Click to expand...

As I understand it, whilst the RAW file contains the bare sensor info, it also contains the info (such as WB) that you have configured in your camera, so straight off the bat, LR applies those filters to help you get started.

But for WB, I usually choose "auto" in LR. I believe that this looks at the whitest part of your image and adjusts the whole image so that the WB of this area is correct. It doesn't always do the right thing - sometimes, if you have a scene with a mixture of interior artificial light and external daylight, it can pick the wrong one and make things worse but usually, the result is excellent.

The first advantage of raw is simply that it contains more information about your image:

There is more detail in the light areas. What at first may appear to be a bland, bright sky may actually contain cloud detail. Drag the "Recovery" slider to the right to find out. In the corresponding jpg, this info is simply missing (clipped).

There is more detail in the light areas. What at first may appear to be a dark shadow may actually contain detail. Drag the "fill light" slider to the right to find out. this can also be very useful when you take pictures of people in sharp sunlight, to soften and fill shadows. Works wonders with people wearing brimmed hats or with darker skin tones.

Andrew
 
Yes, you can change white balance on a JPEG, but you are attempting to adjust on the white balance on a tonally compressed image.

If you convert to JPEG then you lose dynamic range, so if someone appears clipped black or white in a JPEG then the data is set to white or black and the rest of the info is discarded by the compression. The same is true of the colour channels - is the colour does not appear to be present in the file according to the JPEG converter then it's discarded. If you then attempt to change it wont be a true representation of the colours at the colour temp.

I used to shoot JPEG when I originally got my DSLR, but I read up about RAW (after getting a copy of LR3 cheap) and now I much prefer to PP my own shots as I can generally do a better job than the camera can, plus if I don't nail the exposure or it does look a little flat I can sort that pretty easily.

Another way to look at it which I heard....

Imagine you had a film camera and you had your negatives printed to 6x4. That's a JPEG. Now assume you wanted a black and white 12x8, you;'d have to get the photo scanned, the colour removed and blown up x2.... the quality will probably not as good as taking the negative, having it printed directly in mono at the right size.

There is a lot of info here that explains some of the difference.
http://photoshoptutorials.ws/other-tutorials/photography-tutorials/raw-vs-jpeg/
 
Out of all the photo apps out there IMO lr is the easiest to get on with.
The sliders are pretty simple enough especially if you watch some YouTube vids of peps going through their images and how they tweak then it's just down to matter of how you want to style your photos. Wb is a bitch, and it really will depend on your subject. Iv shot portraits where the Wb is just never right no matter the tweaks - that's when you just give up and go b&w or head towards a less saturated fashion style.

If your into further progressing your photography raw is the way to go and your soon get used to it especially when most of the photos will still follow a basic slider adjustment (like contrast) before you tweak to suit the subject
 
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Thanks for the advice. So far my pp has only got as far as cropping, spot removal and playing about with some of the presets.

I've been watching some YouTube videos of Lightroom processing tonight and it seems that just playing with the sliders is the way to learn!

I'll rattle off a set of raw files and get stuck in :)
 
OK... so now I get it :o

I went out to a local church that is beautifully lit at night with the intention of taking a set of raw shots to process later. I took a few but on the camera they didn't look great so I tried a few on camera HDR shots which looked pretty good. To take these I had to set the camera back to JPEG Fine... and then forgot to switch it back :o

Anyway I had a few RAW files to play with and all I can say is... wow! I now 'get' what people mean when they say that with a jpeg the detail simply isn't there to recover. The only ones that came close were the HDR shots but they just didn't have the clarity of the pp'd raws.

Unfortunately I really screwed up with my settings (4s shutter at ISO 100 :o ) so while the photo looks great the sky is quite... fuzzy which I assume is due to the excessive shutter time?

I must admit that I started by hitting auto wb to give me a clue what direction to go and then tweaked myself to my taste. I repeated the same for the tone and then had a go with the clarity. Far from the finished product but I plan to go back and shoot the church again next week so I'll have a bit more of a play then.

Anyway...
Before

DSC_0003-2.jpg by Rob Stirling2012, on Flickr

After

DSC_0003.jpg by Rob Stirling2012, on Flickr
 
the thing that i struggle with is knowing what to do when processing RAW i always seem to end up making it worse.

Anybody care to share their basic starting point processing RAW ?
 
If you change something and it makes it look worse then undo it? :p

I always adjust the settings till I'm happy with the way it looks. I crop/rotate it if necessary and cleanup the noise a little if necessary etc. If you happen to have a perfect picture to start with then it won't need much hehe :)
 
MrLOL said:
the thing that i struggle with is knowing what to do when processing RAW i always seem to end up making it worse.

Anybody care to share their basic starting point processing RAW ?
Click to expand...

i go:
wb: find the whitest point see if it looks ok if not tweak.
exposure: is it too dark/light tweak to bring it up a little (never go above +1)
contrast: normally give this a bump +25 at least often more.
clarity: shooting buildings? bump this up. Got people? decrease a little
highlights/shadows: slight tweaks sometimes needed here
sharpness: increase to 60-80 range (watch the grain)
masking: hold alt and increase normally just get outlines or big detailed areas.

sometimes i do more, sometimes i do less, if i'm altering landscape shots i almost always add increased vibrance and saturation to the flow but would never touch them for studio work (for example) .
I rarely touch noise reduction even in night time shots and only apply lens correction if required.

but you have to find your own way of working really and to do that is practice, figure out what you wanna shoot and go from there. personal taste does come into it also.
 
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MrLOL said:
the thing that i struggle with is knowing what to do when processing RAW i always seem to end up making it worse.

Anybody care to share their basic starting point processing RAW ?
Click to expand...

When I import into Lightroom it sets the lens correction, the camera calibration, a tiny bit of sharpening and tiny bit of noise reduction.

then

Set white balance (usually from reference card image)
Adjust exposure if needed
Adjust contrast if needed
Set black level
Set white level
Adjust highlights and shadows if required
 
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