Shoot in RAW format to get Incredible images

Nowadays, the majority of photographers record photographs in RAW format. Taking photos in RAW format provides advantages over taking photos in JPEG format. Most DSLRs and powerful compact cameras have the ability to take photographs in RAW format (.NEF format in Nikon, CRII format in Canon, etc). RAW images are frequently referred to as digital negatives.

Importance of capturing in RAW format

When photographs are recorded in JPEG format, the color information is compressed by the camera's built-in software (permanent loss of color information in an image). The JPEG image has around 250 odd color information, but the RAW image contains several thousand color information.

The photographer then downloads the RAW photographs from the memory card. The image is then tweaked to get the desired white balance, contrast, exposure, saturation, color, sharpness, lens correction, and so on. One of the most recent additions is the 'Dehaze' option in Lightroom when editing, which is quite handy. The ultimate output of a picture is determined not only by the image that is acquired but also by the editing abilities of the user.

It is worth noting that the size of a RAW format image is significantly larger, nearly double that of a high-quality JPEG image. The size of the JPEG image is determined by the type of JPEG format used while capturing the image.

When do I capture images in RAW format and in JPEG?

• Whenever I am on a photo assignment, project, paid photo shoot, photos that I plan to sell; I make sure that the images are always captured in RAW format.
• The not so important, casual shots of known and unknown friends, unpaid work is something that I prefer to capture in JPEG.
• My memory card was almost full. It happened to me during one of my Himalayan treks and I will not be traveling to that place again (as I have many more places to cover). My memory card was almost full and If I were to capture images in RAW format, it would almost double the space. I had two options - either to continue capturing images in RAW format and ignore the important shots later in the trekking trail or capture in JPEG (which takes half the space) and capture all the photos. I opted for the second.
• If you are lazy and fine with JPEG quality and with what your camera has captured, then go ahead with JPEG.
• Go for JPEG if you don't want to edit an image.
• I have seen some of the photojournalists/war photographers capturing images in JPEG, where one of the conditions is not to edit images and the images are to be delivered in no time.

Surathkal NITK Beach, Copyright: Ravindra Joisa

Here's an example: in the above image, the foreground seemed dark and was subsequently modified by raising the shadows to be in details. The same is true for the backdrop sky, which was blown out in the original photograph. However, because it was captured in RAW format, I was able to retrieve the information from the sky region by reducing the shadows. You may do the same with JPEG photos, but the image quality suffers as a result. It will also be unsuitable for professional use. Note that the above image was captured after the sunset and the actual image appeared dark.

How to edit RAW format images?

The RAW format image always appears dull and is an incomplete image. It has to be processed using a photo editing software like Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop or other image editing software. Note that the RAW format images are not supported by the websites and has to be converted to JPEG or PNG format. I would highly recommend to super compress if it is for websites so that the image can load fast. By the way, you can go through my courses to know more on how to edit using Lightroom.

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Dehaze in Lightroom - with just 1 click turn an ordinary image into extraordinary

Have a photo that was captured early in the morning full of fog and poor visibility or a landscape shot with a lot of haze that makes the image appear dull and dehaze it to make it appear sharp and clear? I had many photos of this kind and had rejected uploading them on social media or sharing them with my friends. Not anymore as Adobe has now introduced the 'Dehaze' slider in the latest versions, Lightroom CC and Camera Raw 9.1 for Photoshop CC.

Early morning view from Anthargange Caves, Kolar, Karnataka, India. This is the view after Dehaze.

What does dehaze do to a photo?

With this new option, you can either add more haze to the image by moving the slider to the left or remove most of the haze and make the image look more interesting and eye-catching. Thanks to Adobe for coming up with this new slider which is really helpful and this brings many of my old images back to life which I had archived earlier because of too much haze in it.

When you dehaze a picture, you're essentially immediately boosting contrast and saturation to the image, which causes the foggy areas to clear out. The problem is that if you don't utilize it correctly, it's one of those tools that may make a picture appear overdone.

Below is an old JPEG image that I captured using my first camera - point and shoot - Canon Powershot SX 100 IS. I did not have a full-frame DSLR at that time. This was early in the morning at around 6 AM (golden hours) at Antargange caves, Kolar where I had to trek overnight and stay overnight in the open ground with my camera and a sleeping bag. Did cave exploration at night for a few hours after which had slept for 1 hour and then the beautiful view of sunrise.

Note that the above image was in JPEG and not RAW format. Hence there is very less color information. I always recommend you all capture images in RAW format. In the above case, my point-and-shoot camera did not have the option to capture in RAW format.

How do I use the dehaze brush in Lightroom?

The dehaze option in the current version of Lightroom as of this writing is in the 'Basic' section. You can either move the slider to the left or right to increase haze or dehaze. In the above image, you can see how it was before and how it has turned the image from dull to an interesting image. Note that the Dehaze option that we have applied to the entire image and currently you don't have an option to dehaze to s small region.

In RAW images the noise introduced may not be visible, but in images like the above where I have used JPEG, which is a compressed image and has already lost most of the color information, a dehaze option would still work very well but may add little noise. The best practice is to edit a RAW image, set its white balance, and then adjust the Dehaze slider to remove or add haze. If you want to move to the extreme ends of the slider then you might have to consider adjusting the basic panel as well.

Adobe has done a good job by adding the dehaze slider. I hope Adobe will consider these in the next release of adding the dehaze slider to the brush and graduation filter so that it gives more control while editing images and dehaze a specific region instead of the tire image.

How does dehaze work in Lightroom?

The Dehaze slider increases the contrast in bigger areas of tone or color on a larger scale (i.e. low-frequency areas). Color casts are also given more saturation. The Clarity slider adds or subtracts contrast to the light and shadow areas that lie in the mid-tones on a medium scale. Play about with the slider until you obtain the desired result, but don't overdo this feature. If you overdo it, you can end up with an HDR image.

Free Lightroom Tutorial

You may consider watching my free lightroom tutorial on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpHCXX52jwM&list=PLBtUUJUvar6r6XM5uBktG7OJt-dAUs2cR

Lightroom Tutorial by Ravindra Joisa

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