Hey guys! This is Janine from Pangolin and welcome back to my Lightroom course for wildlife photographers .
If you're just getting set up, you might wonder what you should do? Shoot raw, or shoot jpeg?
We want to discuss that question today and see what might work better for you.
Raw vs jpeg is a never-ending question, and there are a lot of different opinions out there.
I want to explain to you the basic difference and use an example
that you can download on our homepage when signing up for our Lightroom course.
Before we get started, I would like to explain to you the basic difference using a metaphor. Have you
ever baked a cake for one of your loved ones. Nope? Have you bought a cake for any of your loved ones?
That is now the fundamental difference...you can either go to the supermarket and buy a beautifully
baked cake that looks impeccable, and bring it home for a birthday, or wedding...whatever the occasion is...
or, you can now go and bake it yourself. It might not look just as impeccable, but you know the
person might have a nut allergy and cannot have almonds...or, they don't like too much sugar.
They would rather replace sugar with stevia, or they're just insane chocolate lovers, and you put so much
chocolate into this cake. That is the difference between jpeg (the finished product) and raw (the
ingredients) that you still have to put together. So, now it depends on how much time you want to spend
with your photographs. Because you are watching a Lightroom course, I assume that you have an
interest in looking at your pictures after you've shot them. When you shoot a raw file, you cannot
simply make use of that file. You cannot post it on social media, or print it right away, because
it is not finished baking. You will have to put it together...do a quick edit, and then export it first.
While with a jpeg, you can take it off your memory card and put it straight onto social media.That might
sound a lot easier, but maybe the finished product isn't quite what you liked Also remember
that you will go through your photographs anyways, looking at what is best. If you would like help on
how to choose the best photograph, there's other modules in this Lightroom course that you can have
a look at...and if you want to know how to quickly edit a photograph - just the basics - so that you
can export it as a jpeg...there's also a module for that. Check out the links just down below...
To make this more clear to you, I would like you to look at the example that you
can download from our home page. I provided you with a fish eagle that was busy eating a fish...
both as a raw file, as well as a jpeg file. My raw files are called CR2 files. There's
only one raw file that is sort of a global raw file. It's called a DNG file...however, it hasn't
really pushed it's way through to all the different camera brands. Coming back to my example...
raw files tend to be a bit blonde, but in general the light was gorgeous that night,
and it is quite a beautiful picture. I just lost a little bit of the detail on the neck of the
fish eagle. It's a crooked horizon, and I find the temperature is a little bit too warm. Let's go
through the basic editing steps. If you would need some help with that, please check out the other
Lightroom module, and you'll be able to follow me. First i would like to straighten out
this horizon. I would like this fish eagle to sit a little bit more towards the left, because I feel
he is turning his body...opening his body towards the right...and there we go. Maybe a tiny bit more.
I feel there's too much grass. The grass is a lot more destructive
than what the background is, so that is quite nice. We open our basic panel.
We're going to adjust our whites and our blacks. You'll see it becomes more and more yellow. Not
necessarily nice, but this is in theory a perfect exposure. Now we can quickly adjust the
temperature to make sure this looks a little bit more natural. I love that it was shot in the late
evening light, however we don't want it too yellow. Ce can increase our clarity a little bit...
make sure the image is sharp...
and that is pretty much all we need to do to this image. If we have a look on one on one,
you can see it is mostly focused on the fish. Actually more than the fish eagle, but in general
I am quite happy with it. Now i would like to implement the exact same editing changes
to our jpeg file.
There is a trick...we can simply press copy on the bottom left corner in our development mode. We can
choose which settings to copy. Normally the local adjustments and the crop are taken out. Make sure
that crop is specifically ticked, so that you don't have to re-crop it...and it looks exactly the same.
That way you can copy. You go over to your jpeg, and you paste these settings on your jpeg image.
I am now going to go to the library panel, because in the library panel we can compare
images parallel to each other...and if we compare these two images - zoomed in - side by side, we can see
that when editing our basic settings, the image is pretty much identical. There isn't a drastic
difference in the two images. You could say that the jpeg file is a bit sharper - because it has
been sharpened - as it was created already...and we've resharpened it. I also find that the yellow tone in
the chest is a little bit more obvious. This side looks a little bit more natural, but it isn't a
large difference between the two. Looking at more detail, you can also see that the pixelation
in our jpeg is a lot stronger. Masking our image worked a lot better on the raw file,
however, let's go back into our development mode and edit this image a little bit further.
We have chosen the temperature panel in order to adjust our temperature, however
that is not always the most accurate panel. A lot of times people would like to work with the HSL
color panel, and just simply adjust the yellows a little bit, as they need to by changing the
luminance...making sure the yellow is not too overbearing, but still existent. The same
with the orange and red tones in this image...you will make sure it just looks a bit more natural.
I will take the overall exposure down a bit, so that the white is back.
By playing with the individual colors in the image, you can make the image a lot more contrasty,
and take the yellow out completely...without losing the saturation
in the red wing feathers, the green of the grass, or that beautiful orange in the background.
Let's copy these settings right back on to our jpeg file,
and compare the difference once again.
If we compare the two images, the difference between the yellow - the dirty look
in the chest - between the jpeg and the co2 file - has gotten stronger. At the same time, I don't feel that
we lost any saturation in the blues or the reds of the wings. When it comes to fine tuning the
colors, our raw file have a lot more data to work with, in order to get what we initially wanted.
Our jpeg files - when it comes to changing the exposure by several stops - when it comes to
trying to get the highlights out of the whites back - when it comes to fine tuning the colors -
this will not be be refined. Is that important to you? Do you print large formats?
Do you make coffee table books? Would you like your image to be perfect - the way you want it - or ,are
you happy with what the image is proposing to look like? That depends on you really. If you're a
wildlife photographer that just wants to take some happy snappies, and take some memory shots home...
jpeg is perfect for you. Why waste time on fine tuning every single image that you enjoy.
However, if you want to learn more about your own photography, a raw file can teach you a lot about
color, color space, the dynamic range, your exposure... you have a lot more range to work in especially
when we come to more advanced techniques. When it comes to pushing our exposure limits,
the jpeg files will start struggling. A lot of photographers shoot raw and jpeg on the card.
Either on one card, or they have two cards in their camera body, and shoot parallel. Why do you do that?
In my opinion it's a waste of space. If you shoot raw anyway, and you end up going
into your favorite image and editing it, then the jpeg was redundant. Some people do it so
they can quickly look through the images...let's say on an iPad...and then choose what they like.
That could work, but in general I find it's a fear that people are too worried to shoot raw,
and that they won't be able to handle raw, and
deal with the raw file afterwards...so, they shoot the jpeg as a back-up.
After watching this Lightroom course you will be able to handle raw files just fine, so I suggest
you try it. Maybe it's a slow transition, because you can create true artwork with it. I hope this
module clarified the difference between raw and jpeg for you? You might have something to think
about now. Sit down. Relax. Let it run through your head...and I will see you for the next module.
Bye, bye!