Why can't I get a RAW with PSP to be as good as in-camera JP

[Bruce in Philly]

Hi! I am new to this board.

I am using PSPXI and am having trouble getting my pics to look as good as the JPG created in the camera. I have allways understood, that if you want the best picture, you shoot a RAW, then manipulate it in s'ware such as PSP. What am I doing wrong? Any tips?

Challenge: Below are links to a single exposure. Make the RAW look as sharp and pop like the in-camera JPG. Then tell me how the heck you did it.

This is one exposure. My Canon XTi was set for RAW+JPG (it makes 2 files with one click) and style to Standard w/ sharpness up 2 clicks from default. The cropped "E" JPG is after I tweaked the RAW in PSP (not that great). I used a Canon 70-200 IS 2.8 zoom with a 12mm extension tube (if you care about this stuff).

Camera JPG
http://home.comcast.net/~brucedebonis/misc/IMG_1839.JPG
Camera RAW
http://home.comcast.net/~brucedebonis/misc/IMG_1839.CR2
RAW processed in Corel
http://home.comcast.net/~brucedeboni.../IMG_1839E.jpg

Notes 1: I have always found in-camera white balance to be off so not all aspects of in-camera processing is great. But sharpness, contrast etc., the things that make a pic pop, well, I just can't match in the in-camera processing. Oh and the butterfly is a Cabbage White (that is its name!).

Notes 2: While I don't remember the setting in PSP I used for this pic, I can describe my typical process: 1) Crop, 2) adjust color balance, 3) Smart fix but turn everything to 0, tweak shadow/highlights/bright/saturation with black and white usually at 0 and never use the sharpness tool here, then 4) adjust sharpness where I usually use unsharp mask or high-pass depending on how much fine detail is in the pic.

[Bruce in Philly]

Camera JPG
http://home.comcast.net/~brucedebonis/misc/IMG_1839.JPG

Camera RAW
http://home.comcast.net/~brucedebonis/misc/IMG_1839.CR2

RAW processed in Corel
http://home.comcast.net/~brucedebonis/m ... _1839E.jpg

[Ron P.]

I've had a quick look at you're images, not yet had a chance to play with the RAW (CR2) file yet. In fact I had just downloaded and opened it in PSP X2.

One thing that I did notice is the different image sizes. The one from the camera has the dimensions of 3888px x 2592px, while the one processed in PSP only has the size of 1464px x 976px. This could account for blurring that happens with some compression algorithms. I would say this is not an "apples to apples" comparison for quality. You need to keep the same dimensions for comparing them.

I'll run your CR2 file through PSP X2, and keep the image size the same and see if it still produces a similar loss in quality..

[Bruce in Philly]

Thanx for taking a stab at it. I did not change the size, but it is a crop from the RAW with additional sharpness/etc. processing. While I didn't post a link for it, if you crop the camera JPG, you get similar.

[Ron P.]

So far I've found that PSP changes the pixel dimensions just saving a copy as a JPEG, using the standard format, and 10% compression. I've tried this a couple of times and got the same reduction.

Not that familiar with your camera, however appears to be a nice one. My el-cheapo Kodak P880 has various other formats along with the RAW file. I tend to use TIFF, as an alternative to the RAW..

[mitchell65]

When I started in photography I was always told to imagine that the next photo you shoot could be the one that turns you into a milionaire so shoot it at the best quality your camera can manage. With my Olympus DSLR that means shooting in RAW. If you record in the camera in a jpeg format the image will be "edited" by the cameras's software and compressed by varying percentages depending on your choice of "Standard" "Good" Best" or similar.Also everytime you edit the image and save it , the image will be further compressed with a subsequent loss of quality.
RAW is what it says, it is an image exactly as seen by the camera. It is not digitally enhanced in any way and in not compressed. This means you have complete control over the editing from adjusting the white balance right the way through to the final sharpening. You also keep the original completely untouched.
Now decide what your final use of the image is likely to be. Are you going to print it on a home printer. Is it going to be published in a glossy magazine or perhaps only viewed on a PC monitor. All of these choices mean different methods of editing. An image to be professionally printed needs to be at high resolution whereas that same high resolution would be wasted on a PC monitor as that will only show a picture at the screen's best resolution so an image at a much higher resolution will be a waste of storage space as it wont display any better.
You can save your RAW files as "Tiff" this is a non-compressed format or I find it better to use the program's generic format, in this case PSP. That's basically the same as TIFF. If when you have finished your editing you save the PSP file for the final time you can then save it as a jpeg and take the file size and or image size down to suit where you are going to use the image.
If then you find this is the image to bring you untold wealth you will still have it in all its original glory.
So to answer your original question, "Why does the JPEG look better than the original?"
Answer: The JPEG has been automatically edited and the RAW is still RAW (Not edited)
In the right hands the RAW file can be made to look 50 times better than the JPEG. Remember the auto editing software in the camera is written by highly paid professionals so it should look good. Give one of these professionals your RAW file and just marvel at what they can do with it. We can only aspire to that standard of expertise!

[Ron P.]

What John posted is right on the mark..! My previous statement about using TIFF is not a format used in the camera. That is what I save any photos that I have done some editing to on my PC.

Recently I've not had much time to go out "playing" with my camera. So just for the sake of playing around, I'll use the highest JPEG setting on my camera. Again these images are of family get together nothing that I would want to try and make money on. However the JPEG setting is high-enough I can print decent photos. Anything that I really want to count are shot in RAW, and saved as such. Once edited I then save those as TIFF, or as Mitchell stated just use the program's proprietary format. From there I can choose to reduce them to JPEG, PNG, BMP, or whatever for PC/Internet, or DVDs. In fact I've gotten into such a habit, that no matter what image I open in an editor like PSP or PI, or PP, the very first thing I do is duplicate it, then close the original. That way I'm working with the proprietary file. If I mess up, something happens, I've not destroyed my original image. I still have that to fall back on..