RAW photo formats

dragnil · Newbie Joined: 02 Dec 2006 Posts: 6

Hi, First post and I like PhotDVD on trial. However, the web site says it's compatible with NEF, DNG, CR2 and other camera raw formats. Try as I may I can't get it to load my raw shots. Can anyone explain please? Thanks, David

Cougar_II · Posted: Sat Dec 02, 2006 7:44 pm Post subject:

Hi there, Here's my suggestion to you ! Contact: claire @ vso-software.fr (No Spaces) Tell were you have pictures, images that PhotoDVD will not support. She will provide you information on how to upload to the FTP site. Provide her 1 or 2 pictures, of EACH formats PhotoDVD doesn't support. This way the developpers will be able to analyze your images. Also let Claire know all the details if they are from a Digital camera. Brand, Model etc... Thank you !

IanG · Junior Member Joined: 26 Mar 2005 Posts: 64

It had never occurred to me to use raw images! Is there any advantage over a processed format? Ian G.

dragnil · Newbie Joined: 02 Dec 2006 Posts: 6

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll do just that. Ian, the answer is YES in spades but it's a huge subject, let me offer an analogy. If you took your film for processing and they lost the negative so all you had was a print to copy or scan that would be roughly analagous to shooting jpg. Shoot raw and YOU develop the film as well as print it. More, and this is the clever bit, if you think you over/under developed the film you can do it again! The raw data is never changed but a set of adjustments is added to the file. If you are serious about your pictures it's worth looking into, the downside is a larger file size... ATB D

IanG · Junior Member Joined: 26 Mar 2005 Posts: 64

David - thanks for that! Yes, I understand the advantages of working with raw formats when I want to get the best out of my pictures, my question was why would including raw files in a slide show be a good thing - you don't have the option to process them? To stick with the analogy, it's a bit like including your negatives in the show. Ian G.

dragnil · Newbie Joined: 02 Dec 2006 Posts: 6

Hi Ian, sorry, I misunderstood your question. At the moment, and still being new to this, I am seeing this as a "quick and dirty" way for the wife to see the latest shoot and, perhaps, for her to show it to family. Once I've worked on the best of the pictures they usually come out of the new Epson 2400. So, for the film show I'm happy simply to include them "as shot" with the camera default settings as that's usually good enough. However, you've got me thinking now and later in the workflow I might well do a "better" slide show using psd format. Thanks for the tip. D

IanG · Junior Member Joined: 26 Mar 2005 Posts: 64

Hi David, yes, point taken - I bought PhotoDVD as a "quick & dirty" too. It's still quick, but it's not that dirty Laughing

dragnil · Newbie Joined: 02 Dec 2006 Posts: 6

Well, I have to say, and this will probably embarrass the company people here, that the support from VSO is second to none. I emailed the questions and there were no brush offs, just a real desire to help and to make it work with raw formats. Latest news is that a day or two should have it working with DNG. I don't know of many who are this responsive to customers - well done, VSO. D

Cougar_II · Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2006 11:48 am Post subject:

Hi, There are not alot of people who deals with the customers directly. And you also have lots of VSO Maniacs like me who loves to help as much as they can in the forums, and pointing them in the right direction. And you are right, VSO has the customer in mind all the time. They listen, but they also deliver. Lots of users ask for something, they usually get it. I have made tons and tons of suggestions on all VSO software, and most of them were implemented, I guess they were good ideas Laughing

When a bug is found, VSO Officials like Claire, or users like me have access to the VSO Bugs site, and we can open and report all the stuff we find in the forum, as I did here. Then we pass it on to the developpers. End results, a software the users like, since lots and lots of features are ideas that came from us, the users. I hope your RAW Images get supported pretty soon in all VSO software. Did you send some samples to VSO yet ? Thanks for reporting the issue, and taking the time to help VSO help you. Too many time we will see, your software sucks, I'm gonna go use something else, bye, and we never heard nothing back from them.

dragnil · Newbie Joined: 02 Dec 2006 Posts: 6

Hi Tabby, The sad thing is that we are surprised when we experience first class service. Customer loyalty follows, as the night follows the day... BTW, Yes I sent a typical file and things started to move straight away!

dragnil · Newbie Joined: 02 Dec 2006 Posts: 6

OK, I've bought PhotoDVD and have been in discussions with the developer. As such, my knowledge has been driven up quite a steep curve and I now have a deeper question regarding the use of Raw formats, and I'd appreciate wider input for the interest of Fabrice and the team. Remember the site says PhotoDVD works with NEF, DNG etc and now my question is, "Do we really need it to?". I've tried a test module, from VSO, with DNGs from a Nikon D2X which are about 10Mb a time and they load in about 20 sec each and this seems to be a function of file size. So, it could be implemented but would we use it? I think the viewer's boredom threshold is lower than 200 images and that would take forever to put together and compile/burn. For Photoshop users it is quicker by far to use the ImageProcessor to create jpgs for input to PhotoDVD and for on-screen use the difference in quality is indiscernible. My own position is that I wanted to see it do what it claimed, now I've seen the problems attendant on file size I'm happy to batch create jpgs and have more time for the important things in life. Any other views please? Happy New Year to all and the good guys at VSO.

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