when processing RAW images....

[venchka]

Originally Posted by kenw

'non-destructive edting' sounds like marketing-speak for not letting you save the file over itself. like what Picasa does. (it forces you to Save-As, and none of the extension offerings are RAW....hmmmm....).

Which to geeks is just like (ya think?) opening a read-only file. you can't save any changes to the original file. period. no rocket science here.

Ken,
When it's time to publish the edited file you can print it or Export to various file formats. At no time is the original file changed, regardless of original file format, RAW, TIFF, even JPEG (which I never edit).

[ggeen]

Originally Posted by kenw

'non-destructive edting' sounds like marketing-speak for not letting you save the file over itself. like what Picasa does. (it forces you to Save-As, and none of the extension offerings are RAW....hmmmm....).

Which to geeks is just like (ya think?) opening a read-only file. you can't save any changes to the original file. period. no rocket science here.

No. In CNX2 one does not Change the image but rather save a script of the changes applied. At any time one may change the script. It is possible to edit an image two ways and save both scripts in the same NEF file, though I've never done this. Changes may be applied additively or replace previous edits. Edits may also be saved independent of the image if one wishes to use them for future edits.

It is quite a concept and why I only edit in RAW format anymore.

[kenw]

"In CNX2 one does not Change the image but rather save a script of the changes applied. "

which is in a nutshell how Picasa works as well. go look at the file in another editor and no changes are there. open it in Picasa and all your changes are there. even if you haven't saved/saved as. can be somewhat disconcerting if you aren't expecting that.

obvious Picasa isn't much of an editor, all i'm saying is that the process isn't unique.

[ggeen]

Originally Posted by kenw

"In CNX2 one does not Change the image but rather save a script of the changes applied. "

which is in a nutshell how Picasa works as well. go look at the file in another editor and no changes are there. open it in Picasa and all your changes are there. even if you haven't saved/saved as. can be somewhat disconcerting if you aren't expecting that.

obvious Picasa isn't much of an editor, all i'm saying is that the process isn't unique.

Cool, I did not know that about Picasa. Thanks for the heads up. I did not think it was but I use CNX as my primary post processing tool. I am sure there are a plethora of editors out there that do the same thing.

[Buddha]

I always leave the original as is, no matter what format I have saved it in initially. If it's a negative scan, I save it as a TIF, and add a -1 to the file name when I edit it, or a -2 if it is later significant edit. If I convert a file to black and white, the file name will have -1BW in it. That gives me a sort of path to where I started from if I need it, and sometimes being able to go back to square one is advantageous when I get so carried away with edits that I become lost.
Having originals also means that as I improve editing skills, I can go back to old files to practice on or to learn on and lets me save some images which were previously not acceptable.
I never edit JPGs. Instead I edit the TIF files and re-save them as JPGs.
However, even a TIF gives you much less leeway for editing than RAW, so keep the original as is even if you can save it in revised form.