RAW (NEF), Tiff or DNG

Hi,
what is the best to work with in Photoshop?
Raw images straight of the camera or first making a TIFF or DNG of it?
To work with the NEF files, I have to buy a new version of PS, the CC version.
Working with TIFF or DNG I can stick to my CS6.

Ad B said:

Hi,
what is the best to work with in Photoshop?
Raw images straight of the camera or first making a TIFF or DNG of it?
To work with the NEF files, I have to buy a new version of PS, the CC version.
Working with TIFF or DNG I can stick to my CS6.

Click to expand...

I guess in part the answer depends on what you mean, exactly, by "best". Having worked with all three my personal feelings are that .NEF > .TIFF > .DNG but I've quit using .DNG altogether; .NEF and .TIFF formats I still use regularly.

That being said, one could argue from a purely technical perspective, or workflow perspective, there are really no significant differences. The arguments will come down to things like how sustainable you think the .DNG format will be over time, the steps involved in converting from .NEF to to another format, what your particular needs are, such as archiving versus printing, and so forth.

I use LR, which works with NEF, but as soon as you use any add-ins or other external programs to edit with, my LR is set to create/use TIFF... If I export to a file for the web, it goes to JPEG, and if I'm going to print the image with one of my Canon printers, I've found that copying a TIFF file to the printer gives me the best results... I'm in the NEF -- TIFF-- DNG camp...

Hi,

I decided to go for Adobe CC.
I'm used to work with Camera Raw to handle my NEF's.
With the NEF's coming out of my D850, I had to change to the CC version.
The easy way to work with what you're used to work with did it for me.
I don't like the feeling of “renting” a program because I don’t like to rent relative small things…
But there is no choice, if I want to keep using Camera Raw.

Hi Ad, If you still want to use your non-subscription LR/PS, the other option is to convert your pics to DNG, using Adobe's free DNG converter. Camera RAW handles those like any other RAW files, which they are anyway.

Hi Lothar,

I tried that, but I didn't like the extra work in changing the NEF's into DNG's first.
And there has to be a difference somewhere if a 95 Mb NEF transforms to a 55 Mb DNG… Something… somewhere… somehow…
I probably won’t see a difference, but between my ears, in my head…

You can use the Nikon supplied free software -View NX-i to check your images and convert them to tiff(16bit). You can also use Nikon Capture NX-D to perform basic demosaiking and exposure before exporting ti Tiff16.

Dont know about earlier versions but the latest Photo shop Elements is crippled half way through in the sense you have to change to 8 bit for certain edits, i used to take the neff from View NX to camera raw i am now trying a 16 bit Tiff.

I use AP but do the same as when I used PS/LR. I process my NEF into a 16-bit Tiff version and stick to that format while working at my shot. When preparing for print I switch to 8-bit Tiff for practical reasons.

I think you are correct to go ahead and upgrade to Adobe CC. In the long run it is cheaper since you normally would upgrade PS every couple of years to get the new features. Also I like working with the native nef files. The less you mess with a file the better it is to work with in my opinion.

Ad B said:

Hi Lothar,

I tried that, but I didn't like the extra work in changing the NEF's into DNG's first.
And there has to be a difference somewhere if a 95 Mb NEF transforms to a 55 Mb DNG… Something… somewhere… somehow…
I probably won’t see a difference, but between my ears, in my head…

Click to expand...

I was wondering the same thing... where did the extra data go?
I was working with Ps Elements, and it would not open the NEF files from my new D7500. So I used Adobe's free DNG converter. I was not pleased with the extra step, and even less pleased when I looked at the numbers changing when I reformatted the files...
Moral of the story... PsCC new version, yes it's "rented" opens the NEFs just fine. Thats almost worth the cost (to me) right there. One less step in the process to wonder about...
No more DNG conversions for me thank you.

todd7500 said:

I was wondering the same thing... where did the extra data go?

Click to expand...

Compression; which does not need to be a "bad" thing since it can be lossless.

https://petapixel.com/2015/12/08/dng-the-pros-cons-and-myths-of-the-adobe-raw-file-format/

I always used native RAW files so far,
but now, the size of the D850 files is so big that I will try to convert them to DNG to see what happens