Raw to Jpeg why?

[Tammie]

Hi!

I shoot raw format....But, I have to convert to jpeg to upload my photos to the lab....Am I losing all the extra pixels or whatever that the raw has on the photo? Do you understand what I am asking? Not sure if I know what I am asking?

Thanks!
Tammie

[Russell]

You aren't losing the extra pixels but you do sacrife the color bit depth. A raw file on my camera is 16-bit but when you save to jpeg it is an 8-bit file. The bit depth has to do with the number of colors displayed. In short, you probably won't see any difference in the photo quaility when you convert to JPEG.

Thanks,

Russell

[ndsimm]

I could be wrong, but I don't know of any lab that prints from the RAW image anyway...the RAW is mainly for editing and getting your final image from whether jpeg or tiff. Some labs can print from tiff and that format will hold more of your information without too much image quality loss, but a good jpeg converted from RAW will be ok for most if not all your clients

[Terrancelee]

Are you using an online lab, or simply converting them to take to wally's/walgreen's/costco? If you are doing online, such as http://www.whcc.com/, be sure and follow their directions and save to the quality of jpeg that ask for.