It would also be helpful if you posted a 100% crop of the image in question along with the metadata. This way nobody is speculating what the issue may or may not be.

I think it's important before debating the merits of software used, to find out what printer and print settings are used.

Hi,

Hi all, I think vidrazor wants his cake and, well, you know...

You can get there, and it isn't too hard, but you just use layer masks tweaked from Adobe Camera Raw for each part of the image you want. You can use ACR and the gradient filter for some simple work, but for more complicated and detailed work, importing each of the layers for each exposure.

BTW, ACR, assuming that you are using 14-bit processing in the capture, can recover at least one stop either way, and likely a lot more.

Edit - added - and you can also save your settings for each of the edited raw file edits for each NEF raw file tweaks should you want to revisit editing the raw files. That way you can edit the PSD files, to as you wish later.

Adobe Camera Raw is a terrific tool when used in conjunction with Photoshop CS5.

My best,

Mike

>>These are either stored in LR's database, or in those .xmp files. The xmp files make your edits more portable to apps like Photoshop.

At any point in your editing, you can adjust highlight data/etc. without issue.<<

The problem is when you start compositing in Photoshop, you have to render the data you processed. You can't go back to it. You can always go back to your raw file with it's xmp file, but all your edits in Photoshop don't apply. The two are mutually exclusive.

vidrazor said:
>>Isn't this what the xmp sidecar files are doing for you when you edit your images in ACR and then save the edits to them, vidrazor?<<

No, that just preserves the adjustment settings you made in ACR. Once you open a file up from there, it's a new file and must be saved in a given format.

What I'm referring to is a file format (which doesn't exist) which would continuously draw from the raw data as you worked on the image. This way if you needed more highlight or shadow information, you can draw it out of your raw file as you work on your image. Raw files have at least one stop of additional data in the highlight and shadow areas, and on higher-end bodies about two stops of data.

At any point in your editing, you can adjust highlight data/etc. without issue.

I'm not sure what else you could be wanting here. You wouldn't want to re-save this to the raw file, as it would be destructive, or would have to duplicate all data (wasting space). The contents of the raw file are basically a TIFF file, with an embedded jpeg preview and metadata.

-- Dave

Hi lisasweeney,

Might I ask, what printing source are you using? Personal printer at home or a photo printing service (drugstore, megastore, etc...)? I know your initial question dealt with best conversion from RAW to JPG but it seems to me that printing is the issue. My Canon Pixma is supposed to be really good but I don't use it anymore to print pics from my Nikon because the quality is not the best photo quality.

More thoughts...I use Aperture and it will convert RAW to a JPG file size of your desire: straight conversion, 50% of original, e-mail size, etc. Perhaps you could review your settings for how your raw files are converted to jpeg to make sure you're not shrinking them somehow and then trying to print 8x10s from that.

edit...after really reading the first 2 or 3 replies I see that these questions have already been asked... sorry, I'm late to the party. <:^)

>>Isn't this what the xmp sidecar files are doing for you when you edit your images in ACR and then save the edits to them, vidrazor?<<

No, that just preserves the adjustment settings you made in ACR. Once you open a file up from there, it's a new file and must be saved in a given format.

What I'm referring to is a file format (which doesn't exist) which would continuously draw from the raw data as you worked on the image. This way if you needed more highlight or shadow information, you can draw it out of your raw file as you work on your image. Raw files have at least one stop of additional data in the highlight and shadow areas, and on higher-end bodies about two stops of data.

vidrazor said:
I personally wish that Photoshop would have a file format that would continuously work from raw data instead of creating a processed file. This way you can continuously hack the image up if need be and draw from the full data resource of your raw file.

Isn't this what the xmp sidecar files are doing for you when you edit your images in ACR and then save the edits to them, vidrazor? This seems a little redundant if I'm understanding what you're asking. Or maybe you're asking for something like Adobe's DNG format, which is already capable of containing an embedded copy of the raw file.

There are few tools that do the job.

Free tools:
- Nikon ViewNX2
- RawTherapee
- Gimp
Non Free Tools:
- Nikon NX2
- Adobe Lightroom
- Adobe Photoshop

All of them can run batch conversion.

Good luck

lisasweeney said:
would it help if I edited my images in raw before converting them to jpg?

From the start there are certain things that can be edited in RAW that you can't mess with in jpg format. In View you can edit the d-lighting, the white balance, there are a couple more, but I can't think of them off the top of my head. The RAW image is usually defaulted to whatever you had your camera set on. So this is where you get the additional flexibility as you can overwrite what the camera was doing automatically in some cases.

The reason anyone uses RAW is that it gives you some extra room to edit them before converting. Since a jpg is an image that has already had the camera settings applied and basically already been edited by the camera, then you don't have as much leeway to edit the jpg as you would with the unedited RAW picture.

Really it is up to you. I think some edit in RAW then create the jpg and finish the editing. If you are using View then there aren't that many options for editing and Photoshop has additional editing tools you can use.

Did you ever figure out the grainy image problem though? If you haven't edited many images then I would maybe take it easy on how much you do edit the images. Lots of tools while maybe making the image brighter or bringing out a background can really make the picture quality worse by creating pixels or washing out highlight areas.

From experience you have to learn what works for you. When I was trying to convert to black and white in one program it would totally mess the clouds/highlighted areas up. It would make them very grainy and unnatural looking.

>>Have you tried using Lightroom?<<

I don't see the point in Lightroom or Aperture. Everything I need to process raw files is in Camera Raw. As I said, what I'd really love is a file format that continuously draws from the raw data file as you work with it. That unfortunately doesn't exist.

lisasweeney said:
would it help if I edited my images in raw before converting them to jpg?

Definatly, I use Adobe Lightroom 3

vidrazor said:
data.

I personally wish that Photoshop would have a file format that would continuously work from raw data instead of creating a processed file. This way you can continuously hack the image up if need be and draw from the full data resource of your raw file.

vidrazor, Have you tried using Lightroom?

In-camera JPEGS processing also can include noise reduction, so they may look smoother than your raw shots. Have you used any noise reduction in your transforms? Bear in mind that noise reduction can reduce image detail as well.

If you have the a fairly recent version of Photoshop, you should be able to import your raw files directly through Adobe's Camera Raw interface. I find Camera Raw to have a better interface for processing images than Nikon View, so try that route if you haven't yet.

>>would it help if I edited my images in raw before converting them to jpg?<<

If you save them out to TIFF in Nikon View or import them directly into Photoshop from raw you will have the highest image quality available from the raw data. I usually import into Photoshop as 16-bit files, save a 16-bit PSD file, and then make an additional JPEG. This way I always have a high quality processed file if I need to go back and re-process. If I don't need to do any crazy processing then I simply save out to JPEG. Either way I always keep my raw files in case I ever need to have access to full exposure data.

I personally wish that Photoshop would have a file format that would continuously work from raw data instead of creating a processed file. This way you can continuously hack the image up if need be and draw from the full data resource of your raw file.

would it help if I edited my images in raw before converting them to jpg?

There is really nothing to converting them to jpg from RAW especially in View. If they looked OK on the computer I still maybe suspect the ISO being too high or something you might have done while editing them. Really the 3 things I would check are was the JPG converted in the highest quality, second was the ISO higher then about 800, or lastly was it something you did while editing the pictures. If you cropped the picture down a lot that could be another reason.

Yes it is in nikon view. no they didnt look grainy on the computer. No other pictures have had this problem but this is the first pictures from raw and from nikon d5000. It was taken in p mode. maybe I need help knowing how to convert it right?

Are you sure you exported them as the highest quality .jpg? There are tons of factors that could be the problem, printing, image quality when converted, too much sharpening, and any number of other factors in the process. What ISO were the pictures taken at? I have prints larger than 16x20 with my D5000 with no grains...so you are doing something wrong.

I am no expert at printing but more information might be helpful in the process you took. For instance, how did you convert the files. I would assume Nikon View but don't know. Next I would ask what type printer and paper are you using, is your monitor calibrated?

I would ask did the photo look grainy on your monitor after the conversion? Does any picture you print at an 8X10 size have the same problem, you might try printing something that did not come from your camera.

I took some photos in raw on my nikon d5000. I converted them to jpg and then printed one 8x10 size and it was so grainy. what am I doing wrong? How do I get the best quality picture, that I can play with on photoshop, and print big?