Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2005/05/23
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]At 02:06 AM 5/23/2005, you wrote: >Tina: As I understand it, a 16-bit TIFF file contains pretty much the >same information as the RAW file. > >--Peter No. There is a big difference between Tiff and Raw files. The Tiff has been converted and decisions have to be made when the file is converted from RAW. Especially with the newest version of Photoshop, you have the ability to correct chromatic fringing, lens distortion, vignetting, temperature, exposure, sharpness, noise, and a lot more. The Raw file contains every bit of possible information. When it is converted, even to a 16 bit Tiff, bits of information are discarded and cannot be covered in the converted form. If you try to do some of the adjustments that are possible on a Raw file with the Tiff file in Photoshop, you will end up with combed histograms and posterized and banded prints. There are lots of web sites and the Bruce Fraser book that explain all of this, but I didn't just read it all, I tried it with lots of different files, working in Raw and with jpegs and Tiffs. Raw gives you by far the most flexibility. I save Tiffs, too, when I get a photo adjusted just the way I want to print it, but I also save the Raw. My Raw files that I saved before the newest version of Photoshop can still be converted taking advantage of all of the new capabilities of the CS2 software. If I only had saved the Tiffs, I wouldn't be able to do that. Tina Tina Manley, ASMP www.tinamanley.com