What is RAW?

[Cali Mae]

I've heard it mentioned a few times and while taking pictures for the '52 weeks of pictures', I noticed that there was an option for RAW processing.. however, it said that I had the wrong settings for it. Clearly, I am not gifted with the camera, although I did try it out on manual and got a few pictures that turned out nicely.

I'm just wondering what exactly it is and how exactly you use it.. because I'm clueless!

[release the hounds]

Someone will come along and explain it much better than I, but it basically is the format that captures everything from the sensor. So everything you capture in the picture is saved in RAW format. It gives you a lot more options when editing.

you can change settings on your camera to record in RAW, JPEG or RAW+JPEG.

Someone had posted a great link to a summary of shooting between the types. Since I've gotten a camera capable of shooting RAW, I'd never shoot another way.

I'll see if I can find the link

[AdrianneIsabel]

This thread will help a lot. http://chazhound.com/forums/showthre...highlight=DSLR

[Cali Mae]

Thanks to both of you!

I'll definitely take a good look through the thread, maybe find some videos as well. I'd like to hopefully do next week's photo manually if I can figure it out by then.

[Cali Mae]

I was happy for the manual focus explanation on page three, I had tried it in manual focus while taking pictures and all the squares were confusing me up until now!

[release the hounds]

and in that thread was this link http://photographyconcentrate.com/10...-shooting-raw/

which is a good read on RAW.

[Cali Mae]

I'll be sure to check it out! There's just so many good photographers on here, that I figured I should try working on my own skills. Luckily for me, my mom has a D3100 that she lets me use.

[Cali Mae]

Question, how do I set it to RAW? Do I change it after I've taken the picture or do I set it from the home screen?

And what sort of photo editing does everyone use? I don't have photoshop or anything, so I'd probably need to download something free. I think I have some sort of editing software but I'm not entirely sure what it's called. I'm pretty sure it's from Adobe though.

[release the hounds]

what kind of camera do you have?

I only ask because someone else will need to know that to help you

You have it set before you take any pictures, but I had to read my manual to do it. It's not hard, I just don't remember what menu it's under to do it.

oh, and I have iphoto on a Mac. I have a ton of questions about editing as well, but for now I'm concentrating on learning my camera, I can learn the editing later.

[Cali Mae]

A Nikon D3100, no sweet clue on the lenses.. just the ones that came with it. (it was my mom's Christmas present to herself a couple years ago)

I'll have to look read the manual a bit more. Auto is so easy, but with all these amazing pictures that everyone is sharing, I've decided I might as well try.