But JPEG images have problems. The most egregious is that every time you edit a JPEG image and resave the file, it's recompressed, so you lose data again. It's possible to literally degrade the quality of JPEG images over time—a scary proposition. One way to avoid this problem is to make backups of the original photos each time you copy them to your PC. But for an emerging generation of digital-photography power users, there's an even better solution: It's called Raw image format.

Raw Power
Today, many high-end cameras support some sort of Raw image format, and we're starting to see the feature move down toward the middle segment of the market, as well. Sometimes referred to as a "digital negative," Raw images represent the exact image that your camera captured, in full uncompressed glory.

However, you don't have to be a mathematician to understand the most obvious problem with Raw images: size. Raw images are many times larger than even the highest-quality JPEG images because none of the information in the file has been removed (or compressed). But even if file size doesn't scare you off—and it shouldn't, given the processing power and hard-disk capacities of today's PCs—Raw images present a few other problems.

First, there's no such thing as a standard Raw image format. Each camera maker has its own Raw image format, and many vendors institute new versions with each new model release. Second, no OS natively supports Raw images, so you typically need to buy or download special tools to work with them. That latter point is important because you're going to want to edit most Raw images—for example, adjust the white balance or color—and then save an edited version in JPEG, PNG, or TIFF format for archival purposes. You never make changes to the original Raw image. Remember, it's like a digital negative.

So what's an aspiring photographer to do? First, know your options. Here are some solutions for dealing with Raw images today.

Adobe PhotoShop and PhotoShop Elements
Most professional digital photographers use Adobe's powerful and expensive PhotoShop application to manage and edit Raw images. That's a fine option, but the budget-oriented PhotoShop Elements 3.0 ($99 or less at retail) works just as well and won't require a second mortgage. The problem with PhotoShop/PhotoShop Elements' support of Raw images is that Adobe is basically reverse-engineering each Raw image format as it comes out. Therefore, you'll be able to download filters for new cameras from Adobe's Web site, but those filters will often trail the release of the cameras by several months, thereby stranding early adopters.

When you import a supported Raw image into PhotoShop, you can make numerous changes to such image features as white balance, temperature, exposure, and brightness. After you preview your changes, PhotoShop imports the file. However, you can't resave the original. Instead, you can output the image as a more common file type, such as JPEG, then print it or share it as usual.

It's worth noting that Adobe has offered a file format called Adobe Digital NeGative (DNG) as a standard, of sorts, for Raw image files. To date, few camera makers have shown any interest in this format, however. Modern PhotoShop/PhotoShop Elements versions support it.

Apple Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger"
With the release of Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger," Apple has added basic support for Raw images to its OS and to the iPhoto digital photo management application. Sadly, Apple, like Adobe, has decided to go its own route with Raw image support: The company is manually reverse-engineering each Raw image format so that photos in those formats will work properly in iPhoto. Therefore, iPhoto will also lag behind as new Raw image formats appear in new cameras.

Raw image support in iPhoto has other problems. In its bid to keep things simple, Apple maintains two copies of each Raw image you import into iPhoto. One copy is the original Raw image. The other is a lower-quality JPEG image that the application displays to avoid a performance lag. However, when you edit a Raw image in iPhoto, you're actually just editing the JPEG version—not the original. Thus, each edit you make will likely impact the overall quality of the finished product.

In short, Apple's support of Raw images is half-baked at best, but it's better than nothing. I advise photographers who use the Macintosh to skip iPhoto and instead use third-party tools such as Adobe PhotoShop or PhotoShop Elements to manage and edit Raw images.

Raw Image Viewer PowerToy for Windows XP
Microsoft's support of Raw images takes a different tact than that of Adobe and Apple. Instead of reverse-engineering the Raw image formats, Microsoft contacted all the camera companies and offered to create an industry-standard way to handle Raw images. Under this scheme, each camera maker is free to extend the format as it sees fit, but it will publish information about the changes so that others can access the new formats in a more timely manner. So far, two of the four major camera vendors that make products using Raw formats—Canon and Nikon—have agreed to this scheme, and even Adobe is on board, offering up its DNG format as well. Microsoft is in talks with the other camera makers.

The first product to take advantage of this work is a recently released and free PowerToy for Windows XP that lets XP users natively work with various Raw image formats directly from the Windows shell. Therefore, you can view and organize these types of images directly from within Windows, in much the same way that you can manipulate JPEG and GIF images. You can also use the PowerToy to print, but not edit, supported Raw image files. You'll still need an external editor to edit such images.

The PowerToy comes with other less obvious caveats. First, the performance is somewhat miserable, especially if you work with a lot of image files in one folder. Thumbnail generation is slow, and launching the image viewer is likewise poky. However, users of Raw image files understand that these images are humongous, so the performance concerns shouldn't be surprising.

Second, because Microsoft has partnered with only a limited number of camera makers, the PowerToy doesn't support all digital-camera Raw image formats. For example, it doesn't work with images that Fuji or Sony cameras generate, although such support could certainly appear in a future update. You can find the XP Raw Image Viewer PowerToy on the Microsoft Web site.

Microsoft Digital Image Suite 2006
This week, Microsoft shipped a new version of Digital Image Suite, its low-cost and easy-to-use image-editing-and-management suite of applications. Digital Image Suite 2006 includes many new features, but one of them—Raw image support—will be of interest to high-end digital camera users. Digital Image Suite 2006 supports Raw images in two ways. The Microsoft Digital Image Suite 2006 Library natively organizes Raw images and displays accurate thumbnails. And the Microsoft Digital Image Suite 2006 Editor can actually edit Raw images, making it the first inexpensive and mainstream application outside of PhotoShop Elements to do so.

Here's how it works. You drag Raw images into Digital Image Suite 2006 Editor as you would any other image file. Unlike PhotoShop, this software displays the image natively in the editor and doesn't prompt you with an Import dialog box. You can make changes to the file as usual. For example, you can apply the various Auto Fix filters (e.g., Color Auto Fix, Exposure Auto Fix), or use the more complex Touchup tools to perform operations in a task-based way. As with PhotoShop, you can't resave the edited image in its original Raw image format. So, when you select File and Save, you get a dialog box in which to choose the format to use (the default is JPEG).

Looking Ahead to Longhorn
In the next major Windows version, code-named Longhorn, Microsoft will support Raw image viewing, management, and editing directly in the Windows shell. Because that OS is still over a year away, I won't get into too much detail here. But I'll be publishing a lengthy article about Raw image support in Longhorn for the SuperSite for Windows within the week. Check back soon.

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Reader Comments
Certainly if you are a professional photographer, you already know about the value of using raw format and can justify the cost of buying lots of huge memory cards or microdrives. My 5 mp Olympus 5050, considered to be a "pro-sumer" level camera when it first came out, takes great pictures that can be enlarged to 11/17 quite successfully even with jpg compression. For me, and in my opinion for almost everyone else outside of professional photographers, the small improvement gained by using raw format is difficult to discern and not worth the huge memory and processing speed drawbacks. Even the TIFF format that my camera supports is a memory hog. Maybe in the near future when memory cost is no longer a consideration and all laptops and home computers can handle these huge files effortlessly, then it will be a moot point. Until then, I think that the minimum compression jpg setting should be fine for everything short of publication quality photos. John -June 22, 2005 RAW support will be fine IF your camera actually outputs in RAW. As far as I know there are still a great deal of cameras at the lower end that do not do this (mine doesn't). I can't see the average joe consumer adding that as "must-have" when buying a camera. The only hope is that now MS are trying to support it, they may end up in helping to build a common, dare I say "standard" RAW format Mike -June 22, 2005 If you are serious about photography you know that JPEG and other "loosey" formats are unacceptable if you want to edit, enlarge and print photo quality prints on a photo quality printer. I use a Canon SLR and a Canon i9900 printer for that very reason. If you are a snapshot printer, whose primary interest is to share photos on-line, then investing thousands of dollars in equipment does not make sense. I shoot everything "raw" and use Photoshop for conversion but everyone has to decide what they want. Only serious photographers paid for high end cameras when film or slides were all that was available, while others, (most)used snapshot point and shoot cameras. Why should it be any different with digital. If you have tried to scan and enlarge a print photo taken with a cheap camera with a lens with poor reolution, what you got was not even as good as a high quality JPEG, from even cheap digitals. For the snapshot shooter digital and JPEG's are a big improvement. Paul Commerford -June 22, 2005 Mr. Thurrott, I know you hate Apple. Everyone knows you hate Apple. You and Walt Mossberg are like two sides of the same coin. One of you loves Apple to death, the other is a stooge for Microsoft. It makes both of you wholly apocryphal. At times it's funny. Sometimes it's just plain irritating. On this RAW image thing, your main assertions are less than accurate (as usual). I'm a computer consultant and a pro-photographer. I own high end Canon equipment. EOS 1D Mark II, and an EOS 1Ds Mark II, and thousands of dollars worth of Canon glass. In your article you state, "...Most professional digital photographers use Adobe's powerful and expensive PhotoShop application to manage and edit Raw images... " A photographer never, ever, ever edits the original RAW image. Think of RAW as a digital negative. A RAW file is a fundamentally a record of the raw sensor data from the camera along with additional metadata supplied by the camera (name of the photographer, date, shutter speed, aperture, white balance, etc.) You don't edit this file. This file always remains untouched. Always, even and especially in Photoshop. Go ahead, try to edit one. RAW files are powerful because you can make adjustments based on the raw sensor data. If your shot was a little under exposed, you can adjust exposure. You can adjust white balance. You can adjust black levels, color temperature, etc. You can do all this, and afterwards your adjusted image is converted to something else and your RAW image REMAINS untouched. Apple did not "go it's own way like Adobe," either. Camera manufactures REFUSE to settle on a single RAW format. Each time Canon or Nikon comes out with a new camera, there's another new RAW format. Then EVERYONE, not just Apple and Adobe has to scramble to update their software to deal with the new RAW format. Adobe is trying like crazy to create a single RAW format that everyone uses, but the Camera vendords have so far decided to thwart these efforts. NIKON has even created a new RAW format, ENCRYPTED, that can only be edited by NIKON's software. No one knows what Nikons goal is except to force people to have to buy their software. In fact as a photographer, I feel that Apple has done a splended job of building RAW support into the OS and making it almost invisible. I had no idea Tiger was going to natively support RAW images. It wasn't until after upgrading to Tiger that I noticed my RAW images had visible icons. I double-clicked on one and was blown away when Preview was able to open it, REALLY FAST, and let me see inside. Now, when I dump a bunch of RAW images down from the camera into a folder on OS X, I can use Preview to browse them, before even going into Photoshop. In fact THE FREAKING FINDER allows me to browse them without having to open any additional software. This is a far, far superior experience to the kludge that Windows offers. I download the images, browse them using the Finder, select one I like, and drag it on top of Photoshop, and it opens. As far as iPhoto, 99% of Photographers don't shoot in RAW anyway. Most low end digital cameras don't provide RAW image formats. Most digital photographers want to snap some pics, plug the camera in, and e-mail those pics to family and friends. Some want to put them on websites. This will remain true for some time. Even pros don't automatically generate prints from everything they shoot. I often e-mail a client selections back within hours of taking photographs and iPhoto handles this beautifully. iPhoto imports all of my RAW images and places them nice and safe in a folder. I like this. I can go in and back them up, which I do immediately. When I open one or more images in iPhoto I can have them sent to the client in e-mail right then and there. It takes minutes to do what used to take me an hour or more. I'd have to open the Adobe Photoshop Browser. I'd have to select the RAW images I want, convert them down to JPEGs, reduce the image sizes, then e-mail them. A much slower process even when automated. To suggest that Microsoft's PowerToy is somehow better is misleading. MS had to do the same thing as Apple and Adobe, and will have to scramble to keep the PowerToy updated as well. When Canon or Nikon releases a new format, they GIVE THE INFORMATION TO EVERYONE, not just Microsoft. There is nothing special here. For you to twist it like it is, I mean, is Microsoft paying you directly for this kind of spin? First of all it's a 50MB download of an afterthought. It's nowhere near as full featured as Adobe's Camera Raw in Photoshop (which handles more than Adobe Photoshop Elements - you were wrong again). Not to mention that MS uses it as another way to slip .NET crap in on you. Why don't they just give that up? It's version 1 and like any software from Microsoft, it's "good enough." It freezes on me opening one out of every 5 images, and I have to use the task manager to regain control. While I'm happy Microsoft has finally noticed RAW images, dealing with them on the Mac is a comparative breeze. My next door neighbor is a model. She had a Windows XP machine. I installed the RAW PowerToy for her. I thought this is great, I can give her the RAW images I shoot of her and she can handle what she wants to do with them. No need for her to try and master Photoshop. It didn't work out so well. She constantly called about the computer being hung up, etc. We finally replaced her Windows XP machine with an iMac G5. Strangely enough, no more problems. She bops into iPhoto, does what she likes, and I never hear from her. When we start getting into color matching and colorsync, there is no doubt which computer a photographer should be working on. The Mac is the better of the two. If however a photographer already has a good Windows XP machine, there's no need to go out and buy a Mac, the PowerToy for RAW is basically fine. (I look forward to version 1.1). If a brand new photographer is wondering which direction to take, I'd go with the Mac. _________________________________________________________________________ Marvin Price Marvin Price -June 23, 2005 Way to go, Marvin!!! You beat me to the punch on correcting (as usual) Paul Thorrott and his half-baked "Windoze is better" assertions about the Macintosh platform, and you did this with much more data than I ever could have. Kudos to you! Rob Watterson -June 23, 2005 "The most egregious is that every time you edit a JPEG image and resave the file, it's recompressed, so you lose data again. It's possible to literally degrade the quality of JPEG images over time—a scary proposition. One way to avoid this problem is to make backups of the original photos each time you copy them to your PC. But for an emerging generation of digital-photography power users, there's an even better solution: It's called Raw image format. " "That latter point is important because you're going to want to edit most Raw images—for example, adjust the white balance or color—and then save an edited version in JPEG, PNG, or TIFF format for archival purposes. You never make changes to the original Raw image." So your solution to degrading jpegs, instead of saving the original and editing copies, is to save the orginial as RAW and edit copies as jpegs? Your right!!! That's a much better solution: it's the exact same thing!!! Only with added complexitity and huge files!!! Yay!! "The problem with PhotoShop/PhotoShop Elements' support of Raw images is that Adobe is basically reverse-engineering each Raw image format as it comes out. Therefore, you'll be able to download filters for new cameras from Adobe's Web site, but those filters will often trail the release of the cameras by several months, thereby stranding early adopters." But it'll also mean that they'll have access to the features specific to each RAW format. "Microsoft's support of Raw images takes a different tact than that of Adobe and Apple. Instead of reverse-engineering the Raw image formats, Microsoft contacted all the camera companies and offered to create an industry-standard way to handle Raw images. Under this scheme, each camera maker is free to extend the format as it sees fit, but it will publish information about the changes so that others can access the new formats in a more timely manner. So far, two of the four major camera vendors that make products using Raw formats—Canon and Nikon—have agreed to this scheme, and even Adobe is on board, offering up its DNG format as well. Microsoft is in talks with the other camera makers." Which actually is in no way an improvement: there is still lag between the developers introducing new features and support of those features. The companies can publish the data; they can not. It's not as if Adobe and Apple 100% reverse engineer these formats. Much of the specs are available publicly. "You can also use the PowerToy to print, but not edit, supported Raw image files. You'll still need an external editor to edit such images." So.... I'm still not able to edit. SO this is just a viewer. Therefore, it is in no way a solution for editing RAW images and saving them as jpeg without loss. Nice... I mean pathetic... attempt at making an insignificant announcement something substantial. I Make No Sense -June 24, 2005 Damn anyone that speaks ill of Apple! Microsoft is Evil? How sad. If Marvin would have taken the time to read and not react to Pauls article he would have had more time to enjoy the thousands of dollars of wonderful equipment he owns than to be sitting and typing a response longer than the original article. If you don't like what an author says stop reading his articles, simple as that. Write your own version of connectedhomewithmac.com. I guarantee you'll have bunches of readers that will agree with what you say and save you tons on heart meds. Cheers. Raw Raw Raw -June 27, 2005 This is realy good artical, is their any way to edit or read these raw images. what is actual diff. that raw file format from other.Is this file can be compressed?or not. Narendra -July 4, 2005 i want to attached a dat file in movie maker. i cannot know how can i do it. Please tell me easy process. khagendra patra -July 6, 2005 Raw Raw Raw: You really don't see the point of dicssuion do you? If someone is stating things incorrectly don't just walk way - tell them and let them know. Thank you to Marvin I am now completely informed. With people like you wonder the nazis get to power. Speak and be heard you gaylord. dumb dumb dumber -July 12, 2005 Marvin, interesting points you made. However lets compare apples and apples. The G5 was probably better than what XP machine? Probably the model's 333 Mhz computer was overloaded with XP upgrade and had no room left for any type of photo manipulation. I have tested MAC vs Intel XEON and P$ with HT and there is no speed advantage gained by purchasing one computer over the other. The pros are XP has many cheaper and numerous programs for purchase. It is 95% plug-and-play. MAC pros, harder to get viruses from emails. MAC's are basically like the half running car that mechanics buy so they can work on them every weekend to get them trhu to next Friday. If you call yourself a "professional" then why do you use Photoshop CS for RAW file manipulation? If you only have 50 files a day to convert it's OK but people who actually make a living at it have far more than that. And for the other guys comment to save your JPEGS as a RAW after manipulation is as baffling as it gets. If I go buy a VW Jetta and put a Ferrari hood emblem on it-- does that mean I own a Ferrrari? Remeber you can go downstream in digital but not upstream---upstream will give you the blues or is that 18% gray? amateur abuser -July 18, 2005 I am a graphic designer and i m looking out for work in Image retouching or cad solutions . Thank YOu . Murtaza.S.Bagasrawala -July 26, 2005 Assuming that Marvin's retort was accurate I would agree, but being able write a lot of words does not a discussion make. And if Marvin completely informed you then I'll have to pass along my hip boots since you are obviously more a member of the master race, and less gay, than I. Cheers, Marvin. dumb dumb dumberer -August 3, 2005 RAW Support in Microsoft Digital Image Suite 2006 is flawed: the software does not support RAW images from the hugely popular Canon Rebel XT (aka as Canon 350D) camera. (BTW, the Powertoy does support the format.) I have contacted Microsoft on the issue, but they do not want to either understand or discuss it, apparently. All my mails mails come back with non-answers. Alex van Hulsenbeek -August 16, 2005 Thanking all the writers for this valuable information. It has helped me tremendously. I am fully on board with the sharing of information. The objectionable tones, however, can take something away from the experience. Nonetheless, I am no longer in the dark. Cheers. No longer in the dark -September 6, 2005 Hello all, I have a powerbook G4 and use a NikonD70s. However, when I tried to download RAW (or NEF format for the D70s) images I took, iPhoto did not recognize the format and an error saying the images/data was lost or corrupt? However, Nikon Picture Project had no problem downloading them. I would prefer to download them in iPhoto...any solultions?? Thank you Mark -September 18, 2005 Why do so many folks go off half-cocked on so many subjects? Working with raw files is almost always a better way to deal with any important image that shooting in Jpeg or even tiff mode. I am a recent addition to the ranks of professionals combining film and digital in their work. I work with two pro level digital slrs in addition to film cameras. When working digital, the nature of the shoot determines whether I will shoot raw or jpeg - both have their uses. If the shhot is one where the best possible quality is desired, i.e., portraits, products or other publishable images or where large images will be made, then I shoot raw. If I am shooting an event where images need to be printed very quickly and extreme high quality is not an issue, the jpegs are the way to go. Marvin is right about one thing, and Scott Kelby, a well-known auther on Photoshop, has said it as well as anyone: (to paraphrase) whateer is on your card becomes your negatives. The very first thing to be done is to burn a CD or DVD of everything on that card: these are your "NEGATIVES," and need to put into safe keeping immediately. Raw files are a sort-of ultimate negative. When you call one up in Photoshop (the program I am most familiar with) your are given immediate options for manipulation that involve every scrap of information recorded when you originally made the image. It then can be saved to either a Photoshop file, or as a Jpeg or Tiff. The Photoshop file gives you the most room to work, and when you have done all you want or can do, that file can be saved in any other format you choose (allowing for compatibility issues). For me, the fact that raw files are complete, uncompressed and fully maleable allows me to use my MAC (or you to use your PC with Photoshop) as my newest form of darkroom, and do it with all the lights on! The fact that I prefer Apple's OS and computers is my thing. If you prefer Microsoft's OS and PCs - well, that can be your thing. Whatever camera you have, if it is capable of producing raw files, then try shooting a few things that way and go play with them- you may find it to be more fun than anything you'e done before with pictures... or you may not. For many of us, shooting raw is the means to having as much control as is possible over what the final images look like. So - stop squabbling and go make pictures and enjoy them. Michael Michael D. McGuire -September 28, 2005 please, do send me some sites so that i could download some *.raw files ganesh -July 19, 2006 I'm shooting in RAW but can't open any RAW files in Photoshop or Preview or iPhoto. What am i doing wrong or what should i be doing right? rookie raw man -April 7, 2007 I bought a Canon XSi and with it comes Digital Photo Professional on a CD. It a RAW processor that seems to be working quite nicely; a very simple (on the surface)program doing all the basic changes. This is my first entry in to RAW and this article was the first one I read on the subject. I produce large images and need every pixel I can save. I am quite happy so far and I would like to know if anyone else tried it. Yash yash -November 17, 2008 READER COMMENTS: We want to hear what you have to say about this article!     Acceptable Use Policy Your Comments (required): Your email is only used if our editors need to contact you. 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