Shooting in .ARW (RAW)

So, I've been shooting in Camera Raw now for a little while and there a a few things, most of them very important, that I have learned. Let me tell you this first.....I never stop for directions (points at himself- GUY), I never read manuals, and I am to impatient to wait for someone to teach me something once I hear about it. So, my wife told me about this thing she heard from a photographer, called shooting in raw, or something crazy like that, and she said it was supposed to be awesome. So I figured, hey, sounds cool. Her friend said when she had time, she would tell her about it.  Well durn, my impatience alarm is starting to faintly sound. We go to walmart, to grocery shop and the like, and as I am walking to the dog food isle, I am constantly wondering what this raw thing is. So my impatience alarm went to code red and I whipped out my trusty  Droid Eris, went on Dolphin and searched for shooting in raw. By the time we left walmart, I knew what it was, but now I had to find out if my camera could even do it. I have a Sony A350 (love it) btw. Well, I looked around online for about 30 minutes and could find nothing, so I headed straight for the manual. WHATEVER, remember, me-GUY, so no manual, right for the camera and started hitting buttons. After about 20 minutes and some frustrated monkey actions, I FOUND IT! IT COULD DO IT! I WIN!!! Wait, what the heck did I win? I won MORE IMPATIENCE! I still have no idea how to actually use it. So, here is the skinny on the shooting in Camera RAW. First, camera raw is not just for professionals. Anyone can, and should, use it if they are serious about some quality photos. So, what is camera raw. Camera Raw is a .ARW file, like the .jep or .psd files that we normally see. .ARW stands for Alpha Raw. What does that mean, who knows, it's one of those things that just is. In other words, I haven't figured that out yet. Anyway, there are pro's and con's when shooting in camera raw, but wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. On your camera, IF it supports camera raw, go to your camera's menu and find your QUALITY tab. Mine is in there, and I think it is in something close to that on my wife's Nikon D60. That being said, pro's and con's. The pro's are.....in order for a camera to produce a photo, it takes in information from the outside world. This image is turned into data. The average digital camera takes in data, in RGB (red, blue, green) format, with somewheres on 12 bits per channel. The average photographer has his/her camera set capture data in the 8 bit jpg format. With 12 bits there are more colors and shades in each channel. So right there you are throwing a lot of information, making your pictures less than what they could be. So, the answer is, shooting in RAW allows the camera to save ALL the data that comes across it's sensors. So, the pro's are, there are more colors, more shading, more color detail and you don't destroy your photo. Raw files are opened with a raw conversion program. Edits done to a raw file are done as an overlay, allowing you to revert back to the original file that you started with, so in the end, you have lost nothing. And you can save the images as a .psd or a .jpg when you are through. The cons, and yes, there are con's unfortunately. The first is, raw conversion programs can get a bit pricey. I would recommend Adobe Lightroom 3 unless you have a Photoshop program with a Camera Raw program. I use PS5 myself, but that is for other things besides camera raw. Another con is file size. This is a big hit. Taking in more information means a bigger file. I have a 4GB Sandisk compact flash card. In jpg, I can get around 1000 pictures if not more, depending of the creative qualtiy I have it set to. Shooting in raw drops me down to 185 pictures.....period.  You can also shoot in raw - jpg mode, where the camera stores both types. I can only take 154 pictures with that. So either keep more that on card if you have small ones, invest in a large one, for me a 64GB card is around 4- 600 bucks, or plan on taking a whole lot less photos. Next con is speed. Don't expect to shoot in burst (continuous) mode while in raw. It CAN do it, but the results will be lacking. Again, remeber the file size. It will take the camera a longer load and recover time, so you can forget it. I would say that if my camera could take 20 frames 10 seconds....I have no idea btw....then in raw I will get maybe 6 or 7. Another con is that a raw file needs to be edited. THAT IS A MUST! A jpg or a tiff file can be seen as is, a raw file cannot. unless you have a converter program, you, nor anyone else, can see it. Again, it HAS to be edited. That is about it in a nutshell. I personally will only shoot in raw now, unless I want something in burst. The quality and clarity of pictures is so much better. Just think of it like this, when you take a picture in jpg, what you see is what you get. you can edit the picture, but from the beginning, that is what it is. A raw file is different. Think of editing a raw file as if you were an old time photographer from the good old days, editing in a dark room. THAT is what editing a raw file is like, no joke. Almost done with this blog so if you're still with me, hang on a bit longer. This is a few things I have learned through trial and error. First, shooting in raw is just that, so what the camera "sees" is what you get. You can't take a B/W or any other effect in raw. It may show it on your view, but when you get home and think your B/W session was awesome, you will find that it never was a B/W session until you make it so. TRUST ME! Wink Wink. Something else, be careful of you iso setting when you are shooting in raw. I would say that as a general rule of thumb, on a nice day, go no higher than 400. you might even need to drop down to 100 in bright light. If you hit the higher iso's, like 800, 1600 or 3200, your picture will come out grainy and it is a test of your skills to clear it up. you won't get it completely cleared, so if you want to save it, go B/W and add noise to make it look like it was supposed to be that way. So, that's it for today. I hope that gave you something to chew on and try. TTYL!