RAW vs. JPEG for print

[danielransom]

Could anyone direct me to a thread that discusses this topic? ( I'm assuming it has been discussed. )

I am shooting a community, charity food event where most pics will end up on the web, but some may

end up in print. I don't know which will be which. The entire shoot may take 1000 of each. I know the

answer to this is more card space or a portable HD. Not an option at this time. I have 4gigs on CF. My

estimation is it would take 12 gigs for CR2+JPEG large/fine with my cam. The question, after all this, is

how well do large/fine JPEGs in a Canon 30D print on a pro level? Would they be good enough quality

for a medium sized picture cookbook, for instance? Thanks much for your help.

[mwaks]

I would think that if you plan to publish a book, then RAW is the way to go. RAW gives you the most control for post production work.

You might also want to discuss the requirements needed with those who would produce the book.

[james_castagno]

I would imagine that Large/Fine JPEG would print fine, the photos in the cookbook will

most likely be smaller than 8X10 so resolution shouldn't be a problem.

[bdp]

Why shoot in RAW+JPG if you're going to use the embedded JPG anyway? Why not just shoot in JPG? JPG is perfectly fine, assuming the image is clear, exposed properly, etc. It should come out of the camera around 180dpi and be fine. I've taken RAW files, converted them to JPG's and upped them wo 20x30 w/o any problems.

[PuppyDigs]

Borrow cards from friends and/or family members. Lots of people have old 256MB to 1GB CF

cards laying around after they "upgraded" to SD or Sony MS.

[steve_dunn2]

<p>You get the same number of pixels out of a RAW file as you do from a large JPEG, and if you set the JPEG quality level to its highest setting, your images will be detailed and free of visible artifacts (heck, even the lowest setting is pretty good, though obviously not quite as good). So in that regard, you can easily get an 8x10" out of a large, top-quality JPEG.</p>

 

<p>The main issue is how much ability you have to make adjustments or to recover images for which you didn't quite nail it in camera. RAW will give you much greater ability to rescue highlights and shadows. As well, if you need to make tonal adjustments (highlights/shadows, levels, curves, saturation, white balance, etc.), the fact that you're working with 12 bits of data in a RAW, as opposed to 8 bits in a JPEG, means you're much less likely to cause posterization.</p>

[dave_powell2]

It might also be a good idea for you (and other folks with this same question) to check the dpreview writeup(s) for your specific camera(s). In a few cases that I've seen, the highest-quality JPEGs are as good as (or less frequently, slightly better than) the RAW file. It doen't happen often, but is worth checking into!

 

Dave

[ted_marcus1]

If the lighting is simple and/or controlled, and you're confident that you can get the exposure, white balance, and picture style (or equivalent) correct every time so you need little or no post-processing, a large/fine JPEG will be indistinguishable from raw. But if the lighting is difficult or unpredictable, the extra data in a raw file may make the difference between a usable shot and the delete button. In general, the more post-processing you need (or you think you need), the more you need raw.

 

Why do you need both JPEG and raw anyway? If you're shooting raw, you may not know that the camera embeds a medium-resolution JPEG in the file. Canon's software (and probably the camera itself) uses this to display previews. It's not intended for printing, but it's good enough for use in selecting the images you want to keep. Shooting only raw (without the extra JPEG) give you about 33% more space.

[steve_dunn2]

<cite>Why do you need both JPEG and raw anyway? If you're shooting raw, you may not know that the camera embeds a medium-resolution JPEG in the file. Canon's software (and probably the camera itself) uses this to display previews. It's not intended for printing, but it's good enough for use in selecting the images you want to keep.</cite>

 

<p>As long as whatever file management software you choose to use can actually fish the embedded JPEG out of the RAW file, that is. Most can't, which would leave you opening each file in a RAW viewer just to see if the JPEG looks like the file is worth using.</p>

[todd_masters]

this has been threaded to death, search "raw vs jpeg" and read until your eyes pop out.

 

If you aren't familiar with working with raw and converting to jpeg then I would either recommend taking a crash course on RAW or just shooting jpeg. Shooting RAW+jpeg is used for some situations but doesn't sound like this is one. You should note that when you say "pro level" you are talking RAW - because you have much more image information available over the compressed jpeg version of the image. With either a RAW or JPEG the 30D will make excellent prints far larger than what any cook book will require. Borrow a laptop to transfer images to or borrow cards. 1000 pics sounds like alot of pics, the most I ever took at a large convention was around 500 and that was overkill.

[pavel_olavich]

If one's printer can handle a color gamut bigger then sRGB, then I would suggest one shoot only in RAW to take advantage of the 12 bits/channel of data...does this make sense? Dont most high end inkjets support aRGB colors or even bigger gamuts?