Jpg?????????

[brusby]

. . . And with negative or positive film, you had to be super careful to not blow out the hightlights. And bringing back details from the shadows was much more difficult with film than it is with a jpeg file (remember bleaching prints?). I'm sure that there were expert printers that could eke out details in a film-based print that most of us couldn't, . . . .

Regarding highlights blowing out, it's been my experience that film handles highlights in a much more natural and forgiving way than digital. In fact I'd rate that as the number one advantage over digital -- the natural compression of highlights.

And regarding shadow detail lost in printing, one of the best ways to know whether you've got detail in your negative that you're losing in the print, is to hold your print up with a bright light shining from behind. If you see details in the shadows that are not visible in normal viewing, you've printed the shadows too dark.

 

[agentlossing]

Yes, while I know that modern digital has more dynamic range than 35mm film, it's the relatively gentle transition past optimal exposure values that makes film more pleasant when its range is exceeded. Digital pixels react more dramatically, with either noise drowning out underexposed parts or completely blown highlights with a harsh gradient between what's inside and what's outside of the range.

Of course, underexposure does look bad, especially with color negative film, but that's where you just know your shooting envelope. I think 75% of the time you see people chimping after shooting on a DSLR, it's to check that the image isn't blown out.

 

[Stuart John]

Yes, while I know that modern digital has more dynamic range than 35mm film, it's the relatively gentle transition past optimal exposure values that makes film more pleasant when its range is exceeded. Digital pixels react more dramatically, with either noise drowning out underexposed parts or completely blown highlights with a harsh gradient between what's inside and what's outside of the range.

Of course, underexposure does look bad, especially with color negative film, but that's where you just know your shooting envelope. I think 75% of the time you see people chimping after shooting on a DSLR, it's to check that the image isn't blown out.

Yes I found that at least B&W negative films had lots of latitude in the highlights. I don't thing I've ever produce a negative where I could not burn in the highlights and still have detail.
I've had enough digital images in the early days (D1H) with highlights that could not be recovered and shadows that were lost in noise.
I do feel though that once I got the D800 I never had any problems with digital dynamic range with that camera.

 

[jsrockit]

I'm still using RAW and I can't see that changing. My processing tastes change over the years and I want to be able to re-process my files to that taste in the future. I'm very comfortable with post-processing and enjoy it. JPEGs are clearly usable, but for me, they feel a little limited for what I want to do.

 

[Yokosuka Mike]

I am exclusively a jpeg shooter. Why is this? Well, it’s because I spend all my energy taking pictures and don’t have much mojo leftover for processing them.

More explanation: I’m a retiree, my goal is to walk 10,000 steps or more a day for my health. Without a camera in my hand to motivate me to walk It’s an impossible task. I leave the house around 9:30 in the morning and go out to walk and shoot. Around 1130 ~ 1230 I find a place to eat lunch; often a cheap place, usually picking up something from a bakery… it’s enjoyable. I take about 50 pictures a day. When I get home, there’s no energy to process each image in RAW as if it’s some sort of masterpiece. My editing consists of which pictures to keep and which to delete. The keepers I may tweak the exposure and level the horizon (I always level the horizon). Then it’s time to prepare dinner and drink wine. Life is good.

All the best,
Mike

 

[Rayt]

I am no artist just a hobbyist. If some of my stuff turn out ok then it’s a bonus. After 20 years of photography maybe I have 100 photos I am not too embarrassed to show off. As a novice digital shooter I set the menu to DNG + jpg. I view the jpeg files to delete the bad shots and use the good ones, and then only keep the DNG files of the good ones. Usually the jpgs are good enough for my purposes. If I need to I have the DNG.

 

[David Hughes]

A good strategy is to use Save As after every file adjustment and change the file name with a modifying number. This way the original JPEG is unchanged and hence doesn’t suffer degradation.

Exactly what I do only I don't change the number but add B, C and so on to the original number. When I get to D I remember it means desperate...


Regards, David

 

[mapgraphs]

I am exclusively a jpeg shooter. Why is this? Well, it’s because I spend all my energy taking pictures and don’t have much mojo leftover for processing them.

...

All the best,
Mike

+1, mostly. There are times when the lighting is challenging and global WB editing is helpful.

 

[Dogman]

Somewhere back in the beginning of my interest in digital a vocal group of posters to online forums and self-proclaimed expert websites pooh-pooh'd* JPEGs as beginner snap shooting and pushed Raw as what real photographers used. I guess it stuck because that's all I ever shot until recently when I decided to give the lowly JPEG a try. Ya know, those expert guys were pretty full of it.

You can explain the technical superiority of Raw in depth but it's what you can see in the pictures that is important to me. If you do it right, IMO JPEGs are great. Now I can't/won't shoot SOOC images. Everything I do is post processed. I don't use the film cookbooks from the cameras, I don't set the cameras to process the images any special way. I turn off all sharpening and noise reduction and zero out all the tone adjustments. If I'm shooting color, I lower the saturation and use auto WB. I end up with a pretty much neutral file to take into Lightroom as a starting point.

As for losing information and all the other limitations of JPEGs, that was likely a big deal back in 1999 when digital cameras were only 2-4 megapixels, processors were rudimentary and the jaggies were a Thing. Today we have more information in our JPEG files and the tossed out bits and pieces have less effect. I can pull out shadows and reduce the highlights very effectively and make all the other adjustments I used to make when I shot Raw. Sure, the files may not have the fixability of a Raw when the light is wrong or the exposure is off but for most of my photography it's plenty enough.

*Interesting aside: leaving the "h" off of "pooh" gets censored. I guess the pooh bear is okay but the crap reference is not.

 

[Corran]

Seriously though there is literally NO reason not to shoot RAW and store them for future use, even if you primarily use JPEGs. A 4TB hard drive, about $100 these days, can store 50,000+ RAW images from my D800E at no compression. Just the fact that you can change WB and drastically bring up shadows or down highlights in imperfect conditions is enough.

You can delete them later if you decide to or only save the best shots, though later on you may decide you like something else, so why not keep it all? I built a cheap server years ago and have in excess of 175,000 digital files and 25,000 film scans (12TB of space).

Anyone who shot film and got 1-hour process and prints then threw away the negatives would be called insane, and justifiably so. That's JPEG. And yes, I ALWAYS shoot JPEGs along with RAW so I can easily look at the images quickly without resorting to specialized software or as a quick "proof sheet" of what I shot, since they take up almost no room.

 

[jsrockit]

Anyone who shot film and got 1-hour process and prints then threw away the negatives would be called insane, and justifiably so.

Yet many consumers and amateurs did that. I've never seen a negative in my family historical photos, but I've seen the drug store prints.

That's JPEG.

Not really... the jpeg still can be manipulated and you can make as many prints as you like. JPEG is way more like a negative than a print.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Originally Posted by Yokosuka_Mike
I am exclusively a jpeg shooter. Why is this? Well, it’s because I spend all my energy taking pictures and don’t have much mojo leftover for processing them.

...

All the best,
Mike

+1.5 🙂.

I remember how local politician was inviting me to post on his FB group. He liked to take photos in the past, but spend too much time on PP. While I often posted images from events which are still on. It is done by mobile phones most, but I'm not this good with phones 🙂.
Once covid is totaled, I'll post instantly via camera wi-fi and quick edit of small JPEG1 on the phone.

Taking lousy pictures with blown highlights and dinking in PP was never smart option to me with local events where I have to provide hundreds of pictures on the next day.

 

[willie_901]

Remember - I shoot jpeg and raw; so, that raw file is always available when needed - and that's quite often.

Simultaneously saving JPEG and raw data makes the issue moot. This strategy avoids compromise. Data storage is cheap (compared to other photographic costs) and data write times are fast with newer cameras so data buffering delays are not an issue. An exception would be serious sports photography gigs - where people just shoot JPEGs.

Some wedding photographers shoot raw and JPEG so they can use JPEGs for real-time slide shows at weddings receptions.

I still just save raw files because I have access to Lightroom FUJIFILM film simulation presets. These can't be strictly identical to FUJIFILM SOOC JPEG renderings, but they are close enough for me.

 

[agentlossing]

I'd recommend all those whose cameras have the ability to edit and create JPEGs from a RAW file in-camera to give it a try. If you give it some time you may find it to be much handier than you expected.

 

[Darthfeeble]

Bill, if you're going to fiddle the picture anyway why bother with the .jpg?? I have certain adjustments that I make all the time set up as a preset and then fine tune from there. Easy peasy.

 

[jsrockit]

I'd recommend all those whose cameras have the ability to edit and create JPEGs from a RAW file in-camera to give it a try. If you give it some time you may find it to be much handier than you expected.

Handier than what?

 

[agentlossing]

Handier than either making all your finished exposure choices at time of exposure (JPEG only), or than developing RAWs on a computer. Again, if your camera has decent RAW development capability.

 

[Stuart John]

Shooting JPEGS is great if you get it right in the camera. If your going to post process then why not shoot RAW. If your going to use Lightroom or Capture One then definitely shoot RAW. If you want to start with a low contrast image then set Lightroom to open with different defaults so you start with an image with less contrast and shoot RAW.
If you don't want to do PP then set the camera up to give the look that you like and use the JPEGS.

I did the low contrast JPEG thing when I got my first digital camera. It was an Olympus C220 that didn't shoot RAW. It worked OK for that 2mp point and shoot. I also did the same when I got my D70 because my then 5 year old 433 Celeron based PC could not open a RAW file in any sensible time and exporting for output took even longer.
The day I bought a new PC that worked I left the low contrast JPEG thing alone.

 

[kbb]

It's the sharpening that aways kills my interest in camera JPEGs. I've got Nikon and Fuji, and, while I can turn the sharpening down, I cannot turn it off.

 

[jsrockit]

Handier than either making all your finished exposure choices at time of exposure (JPEG only), or than developing RAWs on a computer. Again, if your camera has decent RAW development capability.

I'd have to disagree... I find my normal size screen and more powerful editing software on my computer to be a lot more comfortable. Additionally, I would imagine doing PP on the camera defeats the purpose of jpegs for many.