Raw Shooting - Adobe Photoshop Elements 11 for Photographers - page 135

locked into the file format. Vari-
ables such as color depth, White
Balance mode, image sharpness
and tonal compensation (con-
trast and brightness) can all be
accessed, edited and enhanced
as part of the conversion process.
Performing this type of editing
on the raw data provides a better
and higher quality result than at-
tempting these changes after the
file has been processed and saved
in a non-raw format such as TIFF
or JPEG.

The raw file is composed of three separate sections:
Camera Data, Image Data and the Image itself. By
keeping these components separate it is possible to
edit variables like white balance and color depth,
which are usually a fixed part of the file format, in
the Raw file editor.

–

So what is in a raw file?
To help consolidate these ideas in your mind try thinking of a raw file as having three distinct
parts:

Camera Data , usually called the EXIF or metadata, including things such as camera
model, shutter speed and aperture details, most of which cannot be changed.

Image Data that, although recorded by the camera, can be changed in the Elements
Raw editor and the settings chosen here directly affect how the picture will be processed.
Changeable options include color depth, white balance, saturation, distribution of image
tones and application of sharpness.

The Image itself. This is the data drawn directly from the sensor in your camera in a non-
interpolated form. For most raw-enabled cameras, this data is supplied with a 16 bits per
channel color depth, providing substantially more colors and tones to play with when edit-
ing and enhancing than found in a standard 8 bits per channel camera file.

Photoshop Elements
employs a Convert then
Edit approach to working
with raw files. The photo
needs to be converted
before it can be worked
on in the Editor. The
conversion can occur
automatically in the
background or via the
Adobe Camera Raw
utility. It is this second
approach that provides
more control over the
final results.

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Manage
/Edit

Output
/Share

Capture Convert

Raw file Converted file (PSD, TIFF)

Adobe
Camera Raw