Digital cameras have been a game changer for photographers at all levels. It’s easier than ever to pick up a camera, push the shutter button, and create a beautiful photo. When you push that button, however, there are thousands of pieces of information that are being ingested, formatted, and displayed by your camera. In the same way that there are many data formats that music and movies can be enjoyed in, there are several different data formats that photographs can be captured and displayed in. One of the first things a photographer should do when they are learning to shoot with a digital camera is how to control the quality of the images you are taking and the different formats you can shoot in.

The primary way that a photographer can control this is by deciding to capture their images in a JPEG data format or a RAW data format. We will dive into what both of these terms mean, but first, we need to understand how a digital camera captures and records an image.

How Cameras Record Data

Before digital cameras became ubiquitous, film photography was the chosen medium for all photographers. The reason I mention film photography is because it can be easier to make the transition from understanding how photos are captured on film to understanding how a digital camera captures an image.

When a film camera’s shutter clicks, it is opening up for a split second (or longer) and the light is recorded onto the light sensitive film as a negative image. The film is developed, and the image as we see it is produced.

Digital cameras work in much the same way, except that the film is replaced with an electronic sensor, and the development process is done in an instant in camera. Instead of light sensitive points on a piece of film, the sensor is filled with extremely small electronic components called megapixels. When a the shutter button is pressed on a digital camera, these megapixels record the wavelengths of light that are in the frame of the camera and amalgamate them into an image that we can see and interpret in a manner that is similar to the way our eyes interpret the world. After that process is completed, the wavelength data is then stored on the memory card in the camera and displayed for your review on the camera’s display screen.

One takeaway of this is to understand the change that the photographic process underwent with the advent of digital photography. Before digital photography the film had to be exposed, developed, scanned, and printed before you were able to produce a consumable image. Now, we can jump straight from exposure to printing in minutes.

The other takeaway that directly relates to the topic of this article is the fact that with the simplification of this process came multiple formats of saving photograph data. Just like the advent of digital music brought the MP3, the WAV, the M3U, the FLAC (ugh) files, digital photography gave birth to many different formats of saving photo data. JPEG and RAW are the two main types that cameras now use today.

When your camera shoots a photo, it always captures the data in RAW format - it has to in order to process what it is “seeing”. What we are choosing then is not the capture method, but actually the data format in which the camera saves the image file. If you’re saving the photo as a RAW file, the camera is just snapping the scene and saving it to your memory card without making any changes at all to the original scene you capture. When you save the files as JPEG, the camera still captures the image in a RAW format. Before saving the image to your memory card, the camera makes standard adjustments to exposure, saturation, highlights, shadows, and more. It then compresses the file into a much smaller size before saving it.

Each method works to capture your shots, but there are key differences in the two. It’s important to understand the fundamentals behind each file type, the differences between the two, and when you would want to use one over the other.

JPEG & RAW Defined, Compared, Contrasted

So, now that we know how your digital files are generated, we will get down to what the two primary file types you’ll be working with are. Cameras can shoot in both, so it’s critical to know what the differences between the two file types are, and when you should use them.

JPEG: Compressed Image Data

JPEG means “Joint Photographic Experts Group”. JPEG is a photo file format that is extremely compressed from the original file format. What do we mean by compressed? Well, naturally, the file size is much smaller. The file size is smaller because there is less data contained in the image. We will get more into what this means later in the article, but at a high level it means less detail and more importantly, less editing capabilities.

When you shoot in JPEG with your digital camera, the system of the camera is still capturing the RAW file. However, rather than saving the file with all of the available image data, the camera’s processor compresses that file and saves it in a much smaller and easier to store format - JPEG. It also performs several editing processes for you during the steps from photo capture to saving.

RAW: Full Image Data

We’re going to jump back to our music analogy. Picture a four piece band recording a track in the studio. Generally you have at least four mics on the drumset, a mic on all three guitars, and a mic for each singer. That’s as many as 11 high quality sound files being recorded and combined into one sound file to create the final composition. When songs are uploaded to streaming services or saved to our hard drives (rare nowadays - am I aging myself?) all of those files are compressed - like a JPEG file - into a smaller MP3 file that allows you to enjoy great sound without waiting for the file to load over the data connection. Think about the studio file that contains the recordings from all 11 mics used - that file would be much larger than the finished MP3 version, but with the right headphones or stereo system, you could easily pick out the quality differences.

That unfinished, massive, super high quality studio file is exactly what the RAW file of a photograph is. It’s uncompressed, lossless, and contains all of the possible data that the camera’s systems are able to capture. It’s much larger, but each pixel contains more information and detail from the original scene.

Each camera manufacturer has it’s own proprietary “RAW” datatype - Nikon’s is NEF, Canon’s is CRW, and Sony’s is ARW, for example - but if you use a photo processing software like Lightroom, you’ll be able to work with all of these filetypes within your digital workstation.

Important Differences Between JPEG and RAW & When to Use Each

Now we know the basis of the technical differences between JPEG files and RAW files. That’s all well and good, but without understanding why we might want to shoot in one format vs. another, we can’t make a sound decision on which format to use, when. That’s what we’re going to cover next, starting with my (and most photographer’s) recommendation.

Fantasium’s Recommendation: Shoot in RAW

Because RAW has to be processed after shooting, you’ll want to nail down your photography workflow in whatever editing software you choose to utilize.

If I were to flat out recommend that you use one file type over another, RAW is the clear winner. JPEG does have its pros, but they are far outweighed by the benefits of shooting in RAW.

However - almost all of the benefits of shooting in RAW are based on the assumption that the photo will undergo some amount of post processing work. RAW images require post processing work in Lightroom or another image editing program. If you won’t be post processing your images, shoot in JPEG!

Why we recommend shooting in RAW:

More detail. We went over this above - a JPEG file is a compressed version of the RAW file that your camera initially captured. When the file is compressed, it loses lots of data, and in turn, detail.
Higher dynamic range. The dynamic range of a photo is basically how far you can push a setting like brightness, exposure, or highlights, in one direction or another. Each step in either direction is measured in a stop, which is a doubling or a halving of light. Most JPEG images can only be adjusted in 2 - 4 stops brighter or darker; RAW files can be adjusted as much as 14 stops in either direction. This allows for much more forgiveness when exposing your images and much more flexibility when editing your photos.
Easily adjust white balance. Because of the way a RAW file is saved, you can easily adjust the white balance as needed in post processing. In fact, I generally recommend to most photographers that they always set their white balance to auto in camera and make any necessary adjustment in post processing. In the same way that you have more flexibility with dynamic range in a RAW photo, you have much more flexibility when editing the white balance of a RAW photo - you have just as much control as the camera does when the image is captured.
Non destructive editing. When you edit a RAW file in Lightroom or other photo processing software, the changes you make to the photo during the process are not actually applied to the original file itself. They are stored in what is called a sidecar file and applied to the image via the photo processing software. This means that the changes you make aren’t actually applied to the original image itself, only to the preview and to any copies you make of the file. This is incredibly important for preserving the historical integrity of your work. I frequently go back and work on old photos, using new skills and new points of view to improve upon my past work. With a JPEG image this wouldn’t be possible. Changes to JPEG images are applied directly to the photo, which means when you edit a photo, it is irreversibly changed.
Improved print quality. This relates back to the the fact that a RAW file has more data contained in it - after you edit a photo and export it, your photo processing software will inevitably compress the file. When you’re printing your images, it’s important to compress the file down to a specific size. Many printers require at least a certain size and detail in the file. Working with a RAW file provides you with as much room as you need to export the file to the appropriate size and format - with a JPEG image, you’re stuck with the detail level that the JPEG is able to provide.

File Sizes: RAW Requires More Storage

The biggest caveat to shooting in RAW is the fact that a RAW image is much larger than its JPEG counterpart. To put it into perspective, a JPEG image from the Sony A7R IV camera is around 20MB in size. A RAW file is around 120MB - 6x larger. You gather all of the benefits we listed previously, but at a cost. The good news is that storage space for photos can be purchased for cheaper than ever these days, and you’ll have to invest in it eventually as a photographer.

More storage isn’t just required for the large raw files. You also have a few more files to manage. Rather than one JPEG photo to share, you’ll now likely have three separate files to manage - the original file, the edits to the file (in a sidecar file), and the final JPEG or other format image you’ll share with the world. A well formulated photography workflow can help you easily manage these.

Why You Might Want to Shoot in JPEG

Despite the strong argument for always shooting in RAW, there still might be reasons to utilize a JPEG file format from time to time.

Skip post processing. If for whatever reason you can not, or choose not to, edit your files after shooting them you can set your camera to JPEG and fire away. This saves lots of time and is especially valuable if you need to share the files immediately.
Preserve memory space. In the unfortunate event that you’re running low on space, you can shoot in JPEG to save some of that precious cargo room.

Shoot Both!

Of course in today’s modern age someone finally had the bright idea to create cameras with two card slots. With many of these models you can have your camera write RAW to one memory card and JPEG to the other. You get the best of both worlds!

Regardless of which format you choose to shoot in, don’t forget that the purpose of photography is to enjoy yourself and to spend more time taking in our world. We all are constantly rushing from task to task, constantly distracted by email, text messages, phone calls. Photography is an escape from our connected world. Whatever format you like to shoot in that helps you delve into that sacred mental space, shoot it.