NEF & Camera Raw

M

Marc Lucas

Active member
Started shooting more in the Raw format on my D800 when you select 'open in PS' the file opens in Camera Raw first and then you have the ability to edit in Camera Raw or you have the option to then open in PS. Is there any difference in opening and editing in Camera Raw than just editing in PS or doesn't it matter?
 
A nef file is a raw file so you must use ACR first to dial in your initial look or at least choose an output conversion if you are happy with the default look

You would then save that out from ACR as a tiff or jpg and then, if desired, do further work on the image using PS

Of course you could make full use of the the huge DR of the raw file and output two different looks (one exposed for the sky, one for the subject?) from the raw file and then merge them in PS using adjustment layers

S
 
What I have been doing though is opening the RAW file by selecting 'open in PS' from within ACR and the the NEF file is editable directly in PS without having to saves, as you say, as a jpg or tiff. Thats why I was wondering if there is any difference in opening in PS because I was concerned that I might lose the ability to play with the DR as much but if PS opens it as a NEF I would assume that I still have the options as I would in ACR?
 
If you are getting a box with temp slider exposure comp and the like then you are using ACR

if you are not Im not sure what is going on and I guess you are on a different version of PS from me - mine is 5.1

S
 
If the ACR window is open, you are changing metadata related to the RAW file. You can edit in Camera RAW as much as you like. You can then open the file inside of PS and make additional changes - cloning, erasing, layers, text, etc. If you Save the file in Photoshop, the saved version will be PSD (or jpeg, tiff, whatever) and will be a different file than the NEF file. So you'll have two files, the PSD and the NEF file. You can re-open the NEF file and tweak it some more (or even reset it to the original state.) But the changes you made inside of PS (cloning, erasing, layers, text, etc) will not be in the NEF file.

Jim
 
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