is RAW worth it?

[SailNaked]

I have out grown my sealife reefmaster. time to buy a real camera.

I am considering the Cannon G11/Ikelite or the sealife 1000. (if I should look at another option please say so).

seems the cannon has a better lens and takes photos in RAW but the combo is over $1k the sealife does not take RAW only jpeg but only costs about $500 and does not need a separate housing.

I think I like the ikelite flashes better also, so can they be attached to a sealife 1000?

 

[Nemrod]

The G11 or the one you left out, S90, are more akin to the DX-2G Sea and Sea. All of these have full manual authority, advanced capabilities and RAW as an option.

Yes, RAW can help with your image processing if you are into playing with Photoshop etc.

N

 

[vondo]

RAW is absolutely worth it in my opinion as it lets you correct the white balance after the fact. No need for Photoshop. Lightroom or Aperture or even DPP which comes free with Canon's cameras will let you do almost all the modifications you would want to.

 

[Peter Guy]

I must confess I'm still waiting for someone to convince me that RAW is actually helpful when shooting with a strobe?

 

[nwdiver2]

If you plan to work on your photos ever then use RAW, every time you save a jpg it is degraded, so if you resize it once and do some minor cleanup then save it you have lost pixel information, with RAW it is all there most people convert RAW to tif so as to not lose quality when they work on the photo in any editing software. Jpg is a lossy compression form tiff and RAW are lossless forms plus as pointed out above it make them easier to change white balance and make other changes.

 

[Onewolf]

Shooting RAW will allow you to recover some blown highlights that would not be possible with a JPG. And blown highlights are definitely a possibility when firing a strobe.

 

[herman]

For the average phototog, I don't think so. I played with it for a while but between the slow write times, hug amount of space taken on my card and the extra processing work needed I really did not see a huge advantage. As for degrading jegs, first off, keep the master copy unaltered then it will alway be as good as it originally was and do all your processing work on a copy. If you intend to work on it over several days, you can always save the file as a lossless format until you are done processing it. Off hand I forget the format in PS but seems like it was a .dgn or something like that. For the pro, RAW is likely a good idea but for the rest of us, I don't think so, just not worth the trouble IMO.

 

[bladephotog]

RAW is your friend, especially underwater. Play with a RAW image in Lightroom for a few minutes and you'll understand how vital it is IMO. If you're going to upgrade you might as well get a camera that can shoot RAW. You don't have to shoot in RAW all the time but it will be there when you need it.

And IMO, the image quality of the G11 or S90 is tough, if not impossible, to beat right now.

 

[Gilligan]

For the average phototog, I don't think so. I played with it for a while but between the slow write times, hug amount of space taken on my card and the extra processing work needed I really did not see a huge advantage. As for degrading jegs, first off, keep the master copy unaltered then it will alway be as good as it originally was and do all your processing work on a copy. If you intend to work on it over several days, you can always save the file as a lossless format until you are done processing it. Off hand I forget the format in PS but seems like it was a .dgn or something like that. For the pro, RAW is likely a good idea but for the rest of us, I don't think so, just not worth the trouble IMO.

I'll second that.

 

[Jim Ernst]

GO with Canon, And GO With Raw!! J-pegs lose a lot every time you open them for editing, and J-pegs, the camera chooses what color variation to omit or admit, Raw , you choose...

Go with Canon and use Raw, you will be happy you did!!