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Newbie question here. I shot an image in low light in jpeg format and it's crisp, but when I shoot raw in plain day at 1/125, my image looks blurry most of the time. Unless I max out the sharpness gain, and even so they're not as crisp as when shot directly in jpeg or using a phone.

Below I have two images for comparison. The first image was shot with the settings to save as JPEG. I shot the second image of the flower in RAW, then saved as JPEG in Adobe Camera Raw without making any edits. The image was shot at 1/125 f25 at 55mm (plus crop factor) with VR enabled. - I don't think at this focal length and speed the movement provoked by pressing the shutter would be an issue, would it?

Both were shot with the same Nikon D5500 DSLR with the basic 18-55 3.5 lens.

I like the flexibility shooting in RAW format gives, but I hate finding all my pictures a bit blurry. What settings do the camera applies when it saves as JPEG and how can I edit my pictures in Camera RAW to achieve the same baseline sharpness ? Is there a good read about the RAW format vs saving in JPEG to get me started ?

crisp example saved as jpeg Although the DOF is short, the ball that is in the front is very crisp. We can see the dust on the glass bowl. flower blurry Image shot in RAW, not as crisp. I am not seeing the details on the petals as much as I would like.

PS. I am aware the two images are hard to compare, but I am using them just to express my question. It's not meant to be a scientific analysis but a means to communicate my question. I have many other images which were shot in RAW and present the same issue. My question is : am I missing something obvious that could explain this ?

Thanks!!!

Emile Papillon-Corbeil
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    Hey Emile, welcome to the site! I'd recommend setting up an easy scenario where you capture the same image in both RAW and JPEG and compare. Something like a studio setting (your first image) would be ideal for this comparison. The two images you posted are so different that they are not really fair to compare. The lack of sharpness in the 2nd image doesn't have to do with RAW. Check out posts here such as this one - Why do RAW images look worse than JPEGs in editing programs? – dpollitt Nov 17 '19 at 13:41
  • See also: Good examples of RAW's advantages over JPEG? – scottbb Nov 17 '19 at 14:49
  • How much wind was there when you shot the outdoor flower? The difference may not be due to raw vs. jpeg. – Michael C Nov 17 '19 at 19:02
  • @dpollitt I'd also suggest using a stable camera mount so that camera movement due to handholding may also be eliminated. – Michael C Nov 17 '19 at 19:04
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    The idea that you can view raw image files "without applying any editing" is a myth. Anytime you open a raw image file using an application to view it as an image on a monitor, there are development settings applied to the raw data. If you don't specify particular development settings, ACR will use it own default settings. The result is only one of a near countless number of legitimate interpretations of the raw image data. There's no such thing as a "straight out of camera" raw file that looks anything like we would expect it to look. – Michael C Nov 17 '19 at 19:14
  • @MichaelC, You can't view any kind of image file without opening it in some kind of application that interprets the bits in the file, and controls the brightness of sub-pixels on a monitor. And, for many formats (e.g., any format that does not explicitly specify a color space) there's more than one legitimate way to interpret those bits. RAW is special because (a) There are far fewer applications that can open RAW files, and (b) a typical RAW file contains far more information than a monitor is physically capable of displaying and therefore, A much broader range of possible interpretations. – Solomon Slow Nov 18 '19 at 17:51
  • No, raw is different because it looks nothing like what we want to see when we open a raw file. It's a set of linear monochromatic luminance values. Period. No gamma curves. No demosaicing. No white balance. On a properly calibrated and color managed display system, there is only ONE way to properly interpret and display most raster formats, such as JPEG, PNG, etc. That is not the case with raw files. The possibilities are near infinite in comparison to other image formats.. – Michael C Nov 18 '19 at 17:55
  • @MichaelC, There's no "demosaicing," "white balance," etc. in a JPEG either. Those are processing steps that are performed on an image on its way from being captured to being displayed. As for there being only ONE WAY to interpret the contents of any file, I think that's somewhat of an authoritarian point of view. I prefer to say that different file formats were designed to serve different purposes. RAW was designed for storing an image at the very start of that journey from capture to display. JPEG and PNG were designed with traits that are more useful at the display end of the pipe. – Solomon Slow Nov 21 '19 at 21:20
  • @SolomonSlow A JPEG tells whatever application is rendering it exactly what R,G, and B value to display for each pixel. There is only one correct way to properly display a properly encoded JPEG. At the most fundamental level, the information contained in a raw file and the information contained in a JPEG are very different. – Michael C Nov 21 '19 at 22:48
  • Re, "Exactly what R, G, and B value to display." Just like how a RAW file tells exactly what value was recorded from each element in the camera's sensor. How those values from the camera sensor get turned into R, G, and B values in a different image file format is entirely controlled by the software that does the conversion---usually with creative feedback from the photographer or other artist. How those R, G, and B values from the final file get translated into sub-pixel brightness levels on a screen is entirely controlled by the software and hardware that display it. – Solomon Slow Nov 22 '19 at 14:00
  • Also, I routinely open JPEG files from my camera, and edit them (adjust colors, levels, etc.) in GIMP to produce images for display. I know that there's less information for me to work with in the JPEG than there would have been if I had chosen to let the camera save in RAW format, but GIMP is an easy tool to work with, and most of the time, it works well enough for me. I didn't realize that I was breaking some kind of law by sending values to the display hardware that are different from what was in the JPEG file. – Solomon Slow Nov 22 '19 at 14:05

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There are some rather unnatural halos that hint that the camera's internal sharpening goes up to the secret "11" mark:

enter image description here

There is no real purpose shooting "raw" if you don't intend to spend significant time on the picture later...

xenoid
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  • You could do the same with a high pass filter from the RAW if you really wanted. On the example posted it's a bit painful as it's too small - https://i.stack.imgur.com/pBXDD.jpg - but from the original, I'm sure you could get some subtle results. I do agree, though - if you're never going to want to tweak to the nth degree, RAW might not be what you need. With Nikon, though, I'd always advocate using RAW & ViewNX-i to get the best out of it, even if you go through Photoshop & end up saving as jpg. – Tetsujin Nov 17 '19 at 14:52