Camera JPEG engines

On 20/11/2012 12:14, Rob wrote:
[]
Yes - getting them right in the first place to eliminates post
processing. Taking heaps of happy snaps and scabbing a shot is far from
ideal.

Having an understanding of what you are doing. Evaluating the scene and
thinking what will happen. Difficult situations like wind, extreme
contrast, sports etc - you should know how to maximise to get the shot.

Understand your camera.

Completely agree that you need to know what the limitations of your
equipment are and how to work round them. Quite a lot of that applies
to both RAW and JPEG, though. I do tend to chimp the shots just to be sure.
--
Cheers,
David
Web: http://www.satsignal.eu

On 18/11/2012 23:33, Alfred Molon wrote:
I'd be curious about your opinion/experience with the JPEG output of
today's cameras. Do you only shoot RAW and postprocess everything, or
RAW+JPEG and only postprocess selectively, or do you only shoot JPEG?

My personal experience is that the JPEG output of modern cameras is not
bad, sometimes surprisingly good, and -if the camera is set up properly-
only a certain percentage of images need RAW processing.

There never was much wrong with the JPEG engines in cameras from the
outset. There were often cruder than ideal approximations for in camera
Bayer demosaic to cope with the very limited DSP vs power consumption.

JPEG encoders have always been pretty decent. The problem way back when
was that flash memory was still very expensive and the encoders were set
up to use rather aggressive quantisation tables. Kodaks original "Best"
setting was roughly equal to IJG Q=85 whereas these days the "High
quality" setting is more like IJG Q=95 to 98 depending on brand.

One maker for some models actually uses IJG Q=100 - very wasteful
(ie the quantisation tables are all identically 1)

It is debatable whether pushing Q past 95 gains anything meaningful on
real noisy photographic images - just makes a much larger file.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

In article , Rob
wrote:

I'm going to sit down and have a good think about what direction to
take. Have a portable HDD but 60GB HDD which I used about 10 years ago
too slow to download stuff. Took a laptop once. bulky, battery went
flat, bloody airport security problems, now down to an iPad for
communications.

you're just making excuses. your 60g hd is no slower now than it was
when it was new. many laptops are under 3 pounds and can slip into a
jacket pocket. battery life on laptops is anywhere from 5-10 hours,
depending on the laptop and there's always plugging it into the wall or
car. there is also no problem whatsoever with airport security with
laptops.

On 2012-11-20 02:34:09 -0800, Rob said:

On 20/11/2012 4:59 PM, Savageduck wrote:
On 2012-11-19 21:17:03 -0800, Rob said:

On 20/11/2012 1:08 PM, Savageduck wrote:
On 2012-11-19 14:45:10 -0800, Rob said:

On 19/11/2012 10:33 AM, Alfred Molon wrote:
I'd be curious about your opinion/experience with the JPEG output of
today's cameras. Do you only shoot RAW and postprocess everything, or
RAW+JPEG and only postprocess selectively, or do you only shoot JPEG?

My personal experience is that the JPEG output of modern cameras is
not
bad, sometimes surprisingly good, and -if the camera is set up
properly-
only a certain percentage of images need RAW processing.



I only shoot JPG and only in exceptional circumstances will make a RAW
or HDR file. Can't afford the card/HDD space.

Memory is cheap!
If you could afford the camera you should easily be able to afford one
more 32GB card. 1TB of HDD space is quite affordable.
Your camera has support needs, you should provide them.

I now have 8x 32Gb Sandisk Extreme cards for my trips. $40 each - I
don't carry a laptop, too heavy.

See my suggestion below.

Just bought a 3Tb external HDD today quite cheap at $149.00 that
should see me out for the next 12 months at least

At least. ;-)



I will only get ~1400 fine JPG images on a 32Gb card. NEF 12 bit
lossless make 32mb 14bit lossless make 41MB files and a large tiff
108.2 Mb.

"ONLY ~1400 fine JPEGS"!!

If those are from a single shoot you have management issues far greater
than the cost of card/HDD space

No its not management issues its a finger problem, Fine JPEG file is
on average 20Mb (that is dependent on the content as you are aware.)

Its a Nikon camera.

...and that FF Nikon deserves only the best. :-)


Buy a few extra cards and shoot RAW, and RAW+JPEG more often. If you are
using cards for storage of 1400 JPEGs you have a faulty storage
protocol. I don't know what type of shooting you do, but personally, if
I spend a day at a target rich event I find that I might have shot
750-1200 NEFs, but a more typical figure is 200-350. Then on a local
stroll I might only shoot 20-30 shots.

I always transfer to computer and my triple redundant backup setup. Once
that is done I reformat the card.

As for as I can tell my JPG images have enough information to make
large prints.

They probably do, but I somehow think you might not be printing 1400 of
them from a single shoot.

No but I don't get to go places all the time so I take quite a few
images when I travel - 7000 images last time - I scabbed a few good
ones though Next trip is for 2 weeks.

Since you don't want to travel with a laptop, you should consider a
traveling backup, which fits in your bag without a weight penalty.

My suggestion is a Colorspace UDMA (the first leg of my triple redundant
road backup) with an appropriately sized HDD. A great investment for the
road, and one leg of a backup for those new cards. I would suggest a
500GB-1TB, but you can buy a basic unit and add your own high volume HDD.

I originally bought a 250GB UDMA and upgraded it my self with a 1TB
drive. That cost a lot less than they were/are asking. I have been using
that for 4 years without a problem. It accepts several card types (most
importantly CF & SDHC) and does full and incremental backups without
issue, and handles NEF, TIFF, & JPEG.
http://www.hypershop.com/HyperDrive-...-UDMA-s/64.htm



looked at that, but I am now carrying 256GB plus in cards (also have a
couple of 32GB CF cards from my old camera.

....and not one of those cards constitutes a backup. I upgraded my 250GB
UDMA to 1TB with a 2.5" SATA HDD for $93.99. Bear in mind that the UDMA
is not a permanent backup.

I'm going to sit down and have a good think about what direction to
take. Have a portable HDD but 60GB HDD which I used about 10 years ago
too slow to download stuff. Took a laptop once. bulky, battery went
flat, bloody airport security problems, now down to an iPad for
communications.

With the file sizes the iPad is no backup, and the portable HDD is
useless without a laptop. (My portable HDDs are FW800, not USB). Your
new 3TB HDD is also useless without a computer.

Which ever way the file sizes are getting to be a hand full, storage
wise, archival etc - I have to start the cull on what I now store, but
people always want something different.

With the Colorspace UDMA I take a full or partially full card from any
camera, replace it with a fresh card. The card from the camera goes
into the UDMA. I start an incremental, or full backup of that card and
forget about it. At that point I can put the UDMA back into my bag, or
a pocket, to let it finish the backup unattended. The UDMA powers down
once the backup is complete.




--
Regards,

Savageduck

In article , tony cooper
wrote:

I'm going to sit down and have a good think about what direction to
take. Have a portable HDD but 60GB HDD which I used about 10 years ago
too slow to download stuff. Took a laptop once. bulky, battery went
flat, bloody airport security problems, now down to an iPad for
communications.

you're just making excuses. your 60g hd is no slower now than it was
when it was new. many laptops are under 3 pounds and can slip into a
jacket pocket. battery life on laptops is anywhere from 5-10 hours,
depending on the laptop and there's always plugging it into the wall or
car. there is also no problem whatsoever with airport security with
laptops.

A laptop that fits in a jacket pocket? Paul Bunyan's jacket, perhaps.

ultrabooks easily fit into many jacket pockets. a 13" and even a 15"
laptop can fit into some jacket pockets but that's less common.

looks like you need to go clothes shopping.

nospam writes:

In article , Rob
wrote:

I'm going to sit down and have a good think about what direction to
take. Have a portable HDD but 60GB HDD which I used about 10 years ago
too slow to download stuff. Took a laptop once. bulky, battery went
flat, bloody airport security problems, now down to an iPad for
communications.

you're just making excuses. your 60g hd is no slower now than it was
when it was new.

But the quantity to be transferred today is larger, so the speed matters
more.

many laptops are under 3 pounds and can slip into a
jacket pocket.

Netbooks, maybe, but those aren't useful for photo work.

battery life on laptops is anywhere from 5-10 hours,
depending on the laptop and there's always plugging it into the wall or
car.

I've never achieved that level of battery life in any laptop I've bought
or even looked at on paper. I think you're confusing "netbooks" with
laptops, again.

I do of course plug my laptop in a lot; I don't find using it on battery
to be that important.

there is also no problem whatsoever with airport security with
laptops.

It's an extra step each time, but no big deal.

I can't imagine going on a photo trip without a laptop myself. I also
carry an external drive to back up the photos two (leaving me just two
copies, one on the laptop and one on the external; which always go in
different bags).
--
Googleproofaddress(account:dd-b provider:dd-b domain:net)
Snapshots: http://dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/data/
Photos: http://dd-b.net/photography/gallery/
Dragaera: http://dragaera.info

David Taylor writes:

On 20/11/2012 07:02, Alfred Molon wrote:
In article , Rob says...
No but I don't get to go places all the time so I take quite a few
images when I travel - 7000 images last time

It must take forever to process all these images.

So you try and get them right in the camera, rather than relying on
having to post-process!

No image is ever completely right in the camera. Not to
exhibition-print level. The negative / slide / RAW file is the score,
the print is the performance (Ansel Adams, adapted to include more
capture media).
--
Googleproofaddress(account:dd-b provider:dd-b domain:net)
Snapshots: http://dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/data/
Photos: http://dd-b.net/photography/gallery/
Dragaera: http://dragaera.info

In article , David Dyer-Bennet
wrote:

I'm going to sit down and have a good think about what direction to
take. Have a portable HDD but 60GB HDD which I used about 10 years ago
too slow to download stuff. Took a laptop once. bulky, battery went
flat, bloody airport security problems, now down to an iPad for
communications.

you're just making excuses. your 60g hd is no slower now than it was
when it was new.

But the quantity to be transferred today is larger, so the speed matters
more.

it's going to take longer to transfer a larger file than a smaller file
no matter how fast the medium is.

many laptops are under 3 pounds and can slip into a
jacket pocket.

Netbooks, maybe, but those aren't useful for photo work.

ultrabooks, which are very useful for photo work.

battery life on laptops is anywhere from 5-10 hours,
depending on the laptop and there's always plugging it into the wall or
car.

I've never achieved that level of battery life in any laptop I've bought
or even looked at on paper. I think you're confusing "netbooks" with
laptops, again.

nope. the macbook air gets 5-7 hours, depending on if it's the 11" or
13". macbook pros can do 7-10 hours, depending on which one, but the
15" and certainly the 17" wont fit in a jacket quite as easily as an
air.

http://www.apple.com/macbookair/specs.html
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/tech...macbook-pro.ht
ml

I do of course plug my laptop in a lot; I don't find using it on battery
to be that important.

same here.

there is also no problem whatsoever with airport security with
laptops.

It's an extra step each time, but no big deal.

you mean taking it out of the bag? that's not always required, but when
it is, it's not a big deal.

I can't imagine going on a photo trip without a laptop myself. I also
carry an external drive to back up the photos two (leaving me just two
copies, one on the laptop and one on the external; which always go in
different bags).

depends on the length of the trip. for a day or two, i don't bother
with a laptop.

In article , Rob says...
Took a laptop once. bulky, battery went
flat, bloody airport security problems, now down to an iPad for
communications.

I usually travel with a small notebook (Lenovo X200 with a 12" screen)
with a large HDD (1TB) and a couple of 2.5" USB 1TB drives for backup
(in case the HDD of the notebook should crash while travelling - same
thing could happen to the Colorspace UDMA). No airport security issues,
light, good battery life.

With this setup I can review the images while travelling, can do all my
Internet stuff and write a travelogue.
--

Alfred Molon
------------------------------
Olympus E-series DSLRs and micro 4/3 forum at
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/MyOlympus/
http://myolympus.org/ photo sharing site

On Tue, 20 Nov 2012 13:00:29 -0800, nospam
wrote:

In article , David Dyer-Bennet
wrote:

I'm going to sit down and have a good think about what direction to
take. Have a portable HDD but 60GB HDD which I used about 10 years ago
too slow to download stuff. Took a laptop once. bulky, battery went
flat, bloody airport security problems, now down to an iPad for
communications.

you're just making excuses. your 60g hd is no slower now than it was
when it was new.

But the quantity to be transferred today is larger, so the speed matters
more.

it's going to take longer to transfer a larger file than a smaller file
no matter how fast the medium is.

many laptops are under 3 pounds and can slip into a
jacket pocket.

Netbooks, maybe, but those aren't useful for photo work.

ultrabooks, which are very useful for photo work.

battery life on laptops is anywhere from 5-10 hours,
depending on the laptop and there's always plugging it into the wall or
car.

I've never achieved that level of battery life in any laptop I've bought
or even looked at on paper. I think you're confusing "netbooks" with
laptops, again.

nope. the macbook air gets 5-7 hours, depending on if it's the 11" or
13". macbook pros can do 7-10 hours, depending on which one, but the
15" and certainly the 17" wont fit in a jacket quite as easily as an
air.

http://www.apple.com/macbookair/specs.html
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/tech...macbook-pro.ht
ml

I do of course plug my laptop in a lot; I don't find using it on battery
to be that important.

same here.

there is also no problem whatsoever with airport security with
laptops.

It's an extra step each time, but no big deal.

you mean taking it out of the bag? that's not always required, but when
it is, it's not a big deal.

A laptop is a PITA.

If I could I would leave it in my main bag where it would go straight
through without any further involvement on my part. As it is, I have
to carry it on for a security check and, at the best, it is a further
complication to my hand baggage.

I can't imagine going on a photo trip without a laptop myself. I also
carry an external drive to back up the photos two (leaving me just two
copies, one on the laptop and one on the external; which always go in
different bags).

depends on the length of the trip. for a day or two, i don't bother
with a laptop.
--

Regards,

Eric Stevens