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The Raw Truth: The Price is Not Right!
Yes, I am sure this plug-in for Photoshop is wonderful, and useful, but there is a problem... it should be a free plug-in, or at least reduced in price. Other applications handle the JPEG 2000 format, including PhotoImpact 8. Photoshop is a critical tool for me, and other artists, it is a shame that such a plug-in has to cost this much. For more information on free tools for your digital camera, go to: http://gphoto.sourceforge.net/
-Mitch Featherston
Digital Raw
Thanks for the article. Need some type of critical 'testing' type of article. My experience is that the red region of the spectrum does not work identically between the Canon and Adobe software.
Pat
RAW Workflow Improved at a Cost?
Article accurately portrays benefits of improved image workflow via Photoshop RAW Plug-In. Rather than opening RAW image files in another program, you can tweak images easily now in Photoshop and save as TIFF files. Like another respondent, I felt that the $99.00 cost for a feature that will surely be included in future releases of Photoshop was a little steep. The ability to easily amend white balance and color saturation made the Plug-In useful, but I did have the nagging feeling that Adobe could be doing more to assist its loyal users, than holding them over the barrel of high prices for specialized functionality.
But what about image quality?
I have a Canon D60 and I'd _love_ a smoother workflow for working with RAW (all I shoot). However, my concern with Adobe's plug in is image quality. Some Nikon D100 users were documenting significant differences (not good ones). This review didn't address the quality issue (vs. the manufacturer's conversions) at all.
RAW plug in
Photoshop's plug in does more than the programs that come with your camera. I mostly use the Raw setting so I can get twice the images and faster on a memory card than TIFFs. I have also been able to pull out more range since I shot RAW files. Perhaps it would be nice if they gave the plug in as a free download but they don't. If you are more graphic designer than photographer you may not need it, but if you are more photographer using photoshop it's only $100 and silly to quibble about. I found the plug in made conflicts with other programs. I had a very hard time to get the plug in to work properly (on a PC). Hopefully the next version of photoshop will have an even better version of the plug in built in avoiding conflicts. The new one should have an easy batch process feature, Pehaps have "Zone system" functions. perhaps have an "Area select" function for selectively setting color temp and exposure settings for various areas. Best case scenario would be if you could just work on raw files in a regular photoshop window with an extra set of controls (like Color Temp)