RAW Conversion and processing

[ScubaGil]

Hello all,
I have been using Adobe Lightroom and before that Adobe Camera RAW for all of my RAW work. However I made the move from Windows to Linux and a question popped into my head:

There are hundreds (slight exaggeration ) of RAW conversion and processing tools out there for Linux. Since we live in a digital world, will they all do the exact same thing? Is the only difference the feature set? (kind of like the reasoning behind not spending more than the bare minimum for HDMI cables).

OR

Is the special relationship that Adobe has with camera manufactures let it process their RAW data in a different way?

Am I better off using a windows virtual machine for photography?


Thanks a bunch,
Gil

 

[akscubainst]

Honestly your best off on a Mac. But that said, I would never give up Lightroom so if I couldn't have that on Linux, I'd stay with Windows.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I use Adobe's FREE Digital Negative Converter (DNG) to download my images from the card reader or camera; so all my "original" files on my computer are .dng's.

Photoshop (and most likely Lightroom) consider .dng's nearly as "native" as .psd's (Photoshop doc?). When bringing the images into Photoshop there is "still" a raw conversion to deal with, but it is "very nice" compared to others I have used.

 

[bvanant]

To answer the original question, NO all raw readers are not the same. Converting a raw file to any type of readable file (DNG, PSD, TIFF, JPEG etc) involves understanding the data in the raw file and translating it to some other language. It is not algorithmic in the sense that there is only one correct answer and is analogous in many ways to translating a book from one language to another. The details matter. Apple and Adobe do have special relationships with Canon/Nikon etc that many smaller companies don't but even Adobe and Apple raw conversions are not identical.

Bill

 

[ScubaGil]

Thanks Bill...I guess I got to stick with Adobe.

Gil

 

[bvanant]

Thanks Bill...I guess I got to stick with Adobe.

Gil

No, I don't think that is what I was suggesting. My point isn't that Adobe is best but that they are all a bit different. You might try the GIMP; it is Linux native and its raw converter is quite nice.
Bill

 

[ChaosHokie]

Honestly your best off on a Mac.

Noob question: What software/tool on a Mac does RAW processing that makes it better?

 

[bvanant]

Noob question: What software/tool on a Mac does RAW processing that makes it better?

I don't think that was the point but rather that a Mac is "better" than a Unix box but even a PC that runs LR is also better than a Unix Box.

Unless he meant Aperture.
Bill