Which RAW Plug-in?

[Dominiek]

I will soon be the owner of the Olympus C5050 digital camera.

I have read some information about RAW. It seems to be something which I will want to try out.

Now I have seen 2 different places where I can find a plug-in:

1) from Olympus:
http://www.olympusamerica.com/cpg_s...sp?Category=Digital+Camera&Product=890&OS=Win
2) from Adobe:
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/cameraraw.html

(I do have Photoshop 7.0 and I know I will have to upgrade it to 7.01 in order for the Adobe RAW plug-in to work.)

Which one is best? Are there anyother ones? Any other websites? Any more information about RAW. As you can see, any advice will be helpful.

Thanks,
Dominiek

 

[ReyeR]

The Adobe RAW plugin by far. The Olympus one is free but has very few and basic controls. If you're going to go through the extra step of shooting in RAW then you'll want the finer controls the Adobe plugin provides.

http://www.outbackphoto.com/artofraw/raw_04/essay.html

 

[Scubatooth]

well personally i would go with the one from the cameras manufacture because the one from adobe is more or less designed for canon and nikon dSLRs and not for more consumer level cameras.

one thing about shoot ing in raw is yes that you have the ulitmate control over the photo but that takes up a good amount of space on the memory card and require a lot of post processing to make them look there best

as for the PS7 upgrade its free just download it from adobe , but be warned that there are serial numbers that have been black listed from upgrades (these would be pirated copies, or serial numbers that were posted online, so hopefully that you got your copy of PS 7 for proper channels )


FWIW

 

[ReyeR]

the one from adobe is more or less designed for canon and nikon dSLRs and not for more consumer level cameras.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by that but RAW support is usually only found in DSLR and prosumer cameras like the C5050. The interpolation controls (colour temp; exposure; contrast; sharpening etc) in the Adobe plugin reflects the parameters the camera uses to process the RAW image to TIFF or JPEG, except in this case you decide what they should be and apply them using a computer.

well personally i would go with the one from the cameras manufacture

The problem with the Olympus plugin in is that it gives you 3 options:
- convert to RGB (which is basically useless);
- White Balance and Colour adustment: which lets you select a point on the image as the WB reference so you have to assume you have a neutral grey somewhere on the pic to get a reference from and
- Auto image process: which will apply the interpolation that your camera would have applied in the first place (so someone explain to me why I bothered to take the extra step to shoot in RAW )

Besides it's slooow and the Adobe plugin is integrated into PS7s browser.

 

[Scubatooth]

first let me explain RAW format from the camera. normally when you take a picture with a digital camera the cameras imager captures the image and then processes(image sharpness, color, compresses, change size of the image it and stores it, or about a thousend different things)and then puts it on your memory card.

now if you shoot in raw the image captured directly off the imager is stored on the card in your camera. what this allows you do do is do all of the actions that the camera would have done internally you can do on the computer(ie in photoshop) so you can have the maximum amount of control of the image and its quality.


any other questions ?

 

[ReyeR]

first let me explain RAW format from the camera. normally when you take a picture with a digital camera the cameras imager captures the image and then processes(image sharpness, color, compresses, change size of the image it and stores it, or about a thousend different things)and then puts it on your memory card.

now if you shoot in raw the image captured directly off the imager is stored on the card in your camera. what this allows you do do is do all of the actions that the camera would have done internally you can do on the computer(ie in photoshop) so you can have the maximum amount of control of the image and its quality.

Thanks, but I wasn't asking you to explain what RAW is and what happens when a RAW image is processed. What I didn't understand was your comment about why the Adobe plugin was more suited for DSLRs and not so much for a 'prosumer' level camera like the C5050 (which is what Dominiek is asking about).

 

[Scubatooth]

the adobe plug in was orginally devolped when raw format was only available for Dslrs it wasnt till one of the last beta versions when some of the comsumer cameras started to get it, hence thats what its orgianal form only did (less variables to contain and handle since the dslrs used some of the same image capture standards) now with more consumer level camera having raw the plug in has been changed and improved since it was orginally and improved to give the same controls over image quality.

besides the adobe program there is a program called Capture one that is used alot by pros that does the same thing as the plug in but is alot more sophisicated and allows for PS controls of a image but before its converted into a tiff or Jpg


hope this helps

 

[ReyeR]

besides the adobe program there is a program called Capture one that is used alot by pros

Yes it's very powerful but unfortunately to-date its support is limited to very few cameras, mainly a few DSLRs.

 

[Scubatooth]

i know about the support but more are in devolpment now, its just that the manufactures are slow to releasing the SDK (software devolpment kits) so that they can incorperate it to the program, but also its one expensive program but if your that skilled or doing that many prints or business its a expense well worth it. for most people the adobe program will work great(and it has for me ) and give them control beyond there imagination.