Digital Home Thoughts: American Photo: JPEG Vs. RAW, The Advantages and Disadvantages Explained

"If you own a digital SLR, you already know that your camera is capable of recording both JPEG and RAW file formats. You might assume that choosing one format over the other is simply a trade-off between convenience and quality. It isn't quite that simple. True, JPEGs take up less space on a memory card and are ready to use straight from your camera, but they sacrifice image quality and processing flexibility to achieve these advantages. RAW files contain significantly more picture information than JPEGs but demand much greater storage capacity, special processing software, and extra work on the computer. While some of the advantages of your camera's RAW format seem obvious, others are less so. Choosing the right format is largely a matter of what you intend to do with your pictures. Either of them may be the right format for the job, but you need enough information to make the right decision."

Another look at JPEG vs. RAW - this was a great article for me to read, because it finally convinced me to start shooting in RAW mode consistently. That, and, uh, the wedding photos I took last weekend (casually, I wasn't the official photographer) that turned out horribly because of bizarre red channel casts that I had a hell of a time correcting. Are you a DSLR owner that's stuck in JPEG shooting like me? What's holding you back from using RAW for your important photos?