Today i'm going to talk about shooting in jpeg and when it might be better than shooting in raw
now i'm a firm believer in shooting in raw in those files you'll have all of the data the
camera saves from the sensor and your computer will have a much better processing capability to
get the best out of those images but this does make photography a two-stage process
one in getting the image and two in editing the image to get the best out of them but sometimes
this isn't practical and that's where jpegs can help if you're shooting a fast-moving object say a
sports person or something where you're using the burst mode to get a series of shots raw files can
fill up the buffer really quickly and before you know it your camera will be taking photos really
slowly and it'll be way below the maximum burst rate that it offers with jpegs being much smaller
your camera will be able to take a lot more before this buffer does fill up and if you
get the exposure right this is a great way to save space and not fill up your memory cards as quickly
as with raw files however like in my 100 tips for beginners video i do suggest buying a fast memory
card and the fastest that you can afford this will definitely help your camera clear that buffer a
lot quicker and you'll be able to take more photos if you shoot an event or party where you need to
get your images out really quickly like a crazy quick deadline shooting jpegs can help in being
able to get them off the card quicker as they are smaller not filling the sd card so quickly
and also if you have to send them off to a press office upload times will be a lot quicker
jeff cable shoots at the olympics and he has such short deadlines with this he used to shoot jpegs
and i bet he probably still does so his images are quicker to get out to the press now i'm guessing
you probably won't be shooting at the olympics just yet but let's say you're shooting a party or
some friends kite surfing on holiday it's great to be able to quickly get the shots onto an ipad or a
tablet to show everyone at the end of the night or just after they come in from their session
and if you get the settings right jpegs can be the way to speed up this process no end another reason
to shoot jpegs are if you're paparazzi these photographers probably shoot jpegs because again
they'll be competing against other people to get their photos to the press office as quickly as
possible so instead of producing a perfect image they're producing an image that the public would
be able to make out and to see what's happening in that photo and this comes down to money
because to get a paycheck and missing one might be the difference between a five megabyte image
and a 50 megabyte image so with those jpegs being a lot smaller you're more than likely to get your
images to the press office first hence getting a payday now this next point might not be so obvious
at first but shooting jpegs might help you in the learning process itself in getting better
photographs out of your camera when shooting in raw you will have large tolerance levels when it
comes to saving the highlights in the shadows this can be a good thing if you are in a really high
pressured shoot as you can bring back the images afterwards especially if it's about capturing that
moment say at a wedding but if you're not it can really make you a lazy photographer
when it comes to getting those settings spot on or getting them as close to right as possible now i
have to admit i'm like this when it comes to white balance as i shoot in raw all the time i leave
white balance on daylight all the time and then i just adjust it afterwards but with jpegs you can't
do this and expect the same results so if you do shoot jpegs you do need to get a lot more of the
settings like white balance and sharpness right in camera as those editing tolerances will drop so
you can't under or over expose the image as much as you would be able to with a raw file now if you
have to get your settings closer to perfect to get a usable image you'll concentrate more when taking
the photograph when dialing in those settings and if you don't you'll end up with less usable images
now when learning this it can be hard and it might make you think that you'll never be able to get it
and you'll never be any good but it can teach you so much about your camera and the importance of
getting those settings right and if you stick with it it'll make you a much better photographer in
the long run let's say you don't need absolutely massive images and you shoot with a sony camera
unless you go into the crop mode you can't shoot smaller raw files like with the canon cameras
however with the jpeg setting you can there are a few different options and if you are shooting for
a blog post or just getting some images to quickly upload to your website or social media site in
having your camera in jpeg mode you'll be able to choose a smaller sized image to save space on your
sd card as long as you get your settings right in camera now programs like photoshop and lightroom
do take a while to learn properly if you haven't learned the editing software and haven't a clue
how to change your exposure or how to boost the shadows or bring down the highlights in one of the
many editing programs available then jpeg shooting might be better to start with so if you get your
settings right in camera then you'll end up with a good usable image straight out of camera now there
are some things you do need to know about if you are going to shoot jpegs you might have noticed
that at the end of every point that i've just talked about i did say as long as you get your
settings right in camera and this is the really important part that's why i keep mentioning it
and this is the main thing you need to think about it's imperative that you know how to control your
exposure so you do need to know about aperture shutter speed and iso and you need to know how
they work in your camera to get that exposure spot on now all cameras have auto mode but they
also have some semi automatic modes like aperture priority and shutter priority so the camera can
help you get that exposure right also you need to know about exposure compensation because this
will let you as a user control the exposure a bit more so if it's a bit dark you can brighten it up
if it's a bit bright you can darken it down and if you do take advantage of all of these settings
you'll be able to dial in your exposure really quickly you'll learn all about your camera
and it'll actually hone in your photography skills by using jpegs only because you know you've got
those much smaller tolerances now in low pressure places where you're going for a walk or just
heading down to the local park this is where it's worth choosing manual mode to play around with
those three principal settings to make the image look good straight out of the camera again like
i always say you just need to spend time with your camera and you need to just know where those three
principle settings are that's aperture shutter speed and iso once you do know how they work you
can get your settings spot on and you can get a really nice image just as a jpeg knowing your
settings is important regardless of what image file your camera produces but if you're shooting
jpegs it's even more important also you do need to work out how your image is going to look
for this you do need to know how white balance works and also how to set your creative styles
to get the best out of your camera without editing with white balance the presets are
labeled for the conditions you'll be shooting in so if you're out and about in daylight put it in
the daylight setting if it's cloudy put it in that setting now if you're indoors and everything looks
really yellow get your camera on the incandescent setting and this will compensate for all of that
yellow light and if you don't like any of those you can change it manually in the kelvin setting
however all of this does take time it's worth spending this time doing it though so you do learn
about white balance and how it works and again how to get a good image straight out of camera
as these settings will be baked into your jpegs you also should choose a creative style to suit
these are a bit like filters but not as garis as you might find on some mobile apps
so you can go for vivid where the saturation will be boosted maybe autumn where just the browns reds
and oranges will be boosted or black and white where the colors will be completely removed
you can basically use the names to follow the scene but the best bet is to flick through them
all and find one that you like for the conditions that you're in because it might not be a sunset
but you might like the style of that setting best ultimately which setting you shoot in is up to you
jpegs have come a long way and are a lot more versatile nowadays but if you really want to
get into photography and you really want to get the most out of your camera it's worth learning
how to edit your photos properly and then to start learning how to edit raw files this is by far the
best way to get some truly amazing images it might take some time to get there but it's definitely
worth it well in my opinion anyway now if i had any advice to give you if you were thinking about
just shooting jpegs it would be to shoot in both jpeg and raw that is unless you have a slow sd
card and you're shooting in burst mode now if you do shoot in both you have the option of using
the jpegs to start with and then if you get some great images once you learn how to edit properly
you can come back and edit those raw files to get even more out of those photos now what do
you think do you shoot in raw or are you a jpeg shooter or do you set it to both let me know in
the comments below it'll be great to hear your thoughts and if you like this video try this
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