Raw quality versus JPEG

[fisher]

Hi Everyone

When taking photos in RAW is it a better quaility than JPEG straight out of the camera. I am pretty new to this side of digital photography.

Cheers
Fisher

[Kym]

Raw is either 12 or 14 bits of colour depth depending on camera model.
JPG is 8 bits.
Therefore you have 4 or 6 more bits of dynamic range.
There is a good write up in NTP.
http://www.ausphotography.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=25432

[Miaow]

This post has a lot of info in it that should help you also :)

http://www.ausphotography.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=47708

[Analog6]

It's not about out of camera quality. Raw has many, many times the information of a jpeg. Jpegs are lossy files, when the camera compresses compresses the file into a jpeg it throws away the unused data. RAW retains everything, but must have post camera processing to bring out the best in the image.

There are lots of articles on the topic, including some on here. Have a hunt around.

[latino]

As everyone has said Raw contained more information and great when you need to recover a photo and also post production. Personally find too much mucking around with the RAW file if you don't know what your doing can create unwanted noise and photo will not be as sharp.

Personally I try and get the photo right in camera and shoot Jpeg.