File types used - specific situation

[DM-CO]

Folks:

For 25-years I have been doing the following:

1) shooting mostly in RAW for each “shoot”

2) selecting a few of those raw images from a set to edit and editing them (PS at first and then, beginning with LR v1.0 in LR).

3) once edited, I like to “tombstone” my “final” image and I would export the image as a TIF. It is now a completed image.

4) the raw is stored with the TIF on various disks/backups etc.

over the years I have “switched” to and from various editors (LR, Capture One, this, that). I never really cared that in switching from LR to something else and back again that my “non-destructive edits” would be lost or whatever….. because I had the “final TIF” image.

i like my process and will continue making a “final tombstoned” image.

thats the background. Now the question:

when I started this back in 2000, TIF’s seemed like the best option to ‘tombstone” with. Are they still? I’m not especially worried about the large file size. Is there something “better though? HEIF? Something else? I want a file type that will be around in another 25 years (I won’t be but the files should be). Should I consider something other than TIF’s in your opinion?

thanks in advance for any thoughts.

 

[Erik Baumgartner]

Folks:

For 25-years I have been doing the following:

1) shooting mostly in RAW for each “shoot”

2) selecting a few of those raw images from a set to edit and editing them (PS at first and then, beginning with LR v1.0 in LR).

3) once edited, I like to “tombstone” my “final” image and I would export the image as a TIF. It is now a completed image.

4) the raw is stored with the TIF on various disks/backups etc.

over the years I have “switched” to and from various editors (LR, Capture One, this, that). I never really cared that in switching from LR to something else and back again that my “non-destructive edits” would be lost or whatever….. because I had the “final TIF” image.

i like my process and will continue making a “final tombstoned” image.

thats the background. Now the question:

when I started this back in 2000, TIF’s seemed like the best option to ‘tombstone” with. Are they still? I’m not especially worried about the large file size. Is there something “better though? HEIF? Something else? I want a file type that will be around in another 25 years (I won’t be but the files should be). Should I consider something other than TIF’s in your opinion?

thanks in advance for any thoughts.

I would just save the original RAW files with their associated XMP files that contain all the Lightroom development settings. This requires WAY less storage space and you can reconstitute your final edited image at any time. Down the line, you are going to be inclined to mske dome changes anyway. If you want your original edits for all time, a high quality jpeg is fine, it’ll look the same then as it does now and will still retain some adjustment latitude. If you want to make major changes, you still have the RAW. TIFFs are enormous, I would just make sure to keep the (smaller) RAWs.

 

[Kaj E]

I save my final edits as tif. They are 16bit and suitable for further edits if you want to make changes. These master tiffs are also used to make a copy to be soft proofed and resized for any particular use, for instance printing or the web.

I use PS including ACR. Most of my final edits can not be saved as raws as they also require PS.

--
Kind regards
Kaj
http://www.pbase.com/kaj_e
WSSA member #13
It's about time we started to take photography seriously and treat it as a hobby.- Elliott Erwitt

 

[ishwanu]

I would just save the original RAW files with their associated XMP files that contain all the Lightroom development settings. This requires WAY less storage space and you can reconstitute your final edited image at any time.

Any time? Does that presuppose that you have an active subscription to Lightroom, or will it work with a version for which the subscription has expired?

 

[DM-CO]

I would just save the original RAW files with their associated XMP files that contain all the Lightroom development settings. This requires WAY less storage space and you can reconstitute your final edited image at any time.

Any time? Does that presuppose that you have an active subscription to Lightroom, or will it work with a version for which the subscription has expired?

For me specifically, the XMP files won’t work UNLESS I stay with the software that created them. And….. I don’t (as I said in my OP). I have tried using XMP’s created in Lightroom with other software and they didn’t work. Perhaps something has changed?

 

[DM-CO]

I save my final edits as tif. They are 16bit and suitable for further edits if you want to make changes. These master tiffs are also used to make a copy to be soft proofed and resized for any particular use, for instance printing or the web.

I use PS including ACR. Most of my final edits can not be saved as raws as they also require PS.

Thank you for your reply. This is exactly why I elected to do it this way 25-years ago and have been doing it ever since. Maybe it remains the best way?

 

[Erik Baumgartner]

I would just save the original RAW files with their associated XMP files that contain all the Lightroom development settings. This requires WAY less storage space and you can reconstitute your final edited image at any time.

Any time? Does that presuppose that you have an active subscription to Lightroom, or will it work with a version for which the subscription has expired?

For me specifically, the XMP files won’t work UNLESS I stay with the software that created them. And….. I don’t (as I said in my OP). I have tried using XMP’s created in Lightroom with other software and they didn’t work. Perhaps something has changed?

No, it would have to be Lightroom, but If you don’t want to change anything, you’ve still got a perfectly decent jpeg to use. If you want to change anything significant and you aren’t using Lightroom anymore, just use the RAW and do it over. I don’t know about you, but I can do a WAY better job editing now than I did ten years ago. In the future, I’d want to re-edit them anyway.

 

[ishwanu]

I would just save the original RAW files with their associated XMP files that contain all the Lightroom development settings. This requires WAY less storage space and you can reconstitute your final edited image at any time.

Any time? Does that presuppose that you have an active subscription to Lightroom, or will it work with a version for which the subscription has expired?

For me specifically, the XMP files won’t work UNLESS I stay with the software that created them. And….. I don’t (as I said in my OP). I have tried using XMP’s created in Lightroom with other software and they didn’t work. Perhaps something has changed?

I wouldn't expect them to cross over to other apps (although some other apps like ON1 Photo RAW will make an effort to 'translate' some Adobe XMP edits into their own 'language' and apply them).

My question was if those edits can be recovered within expired Lightroom subscriptions and used in some way. Some things within Lightroom reportedly continue to work after expiration.

 

[Gato Amarillo]

I think you are on the right track.

It's hard to predict, but it when you talk about more than 5 or 10 years in the future it seems TIF and JPG are the photo formats most likely to survive. If any of today's formats are readable 25 years from now TIF will likely be one of them.

I like the idea of saving the RAW files, but I wonder if future software will be able to access or edit them. As to proprietary systems like Lightroom, will LR even be around 25 years from now? If it is, will it still read 30 year old files, or interpret them the same way it did when they were first processed?

Personally, I save the camera original, the final PSD, and a very high quality JPEG at original resolution. I consider the PSD a short term format, but handy if I want to make minor changes to the edit -- I can recover the hand retouch but discard adjustment layers, for example. The JPG is the archive file. A TIF would save slightly more information and I have considered a change. Maybe in the future.

Gato

 

[ajscullard]

That's almost exactly what I do (and also have done for the past 25 years).

I've now found that I am going back through selected old images to re-process the raw files with the latest versions of software because the difference in quality is astonishing.

The previous "tombstoned" tiff images are then replaced with the improved version.

I sometimes consider using jpeg for my "final" images but I still stick with 16-bit tiffs.

 

[DM-CO]

That's almost exactly what I do (and also have done for the past 25 years).

I've now found that I am going back through selected old images to re-process the raw files with the latest versions of software because the difference in quality is astonishing.

The previous "tombstoned" tiff images are then replaced with the improved version.

I sometimes consider using jpeg for my "final" images but I still stick with 16-bit tiffs.

Are you my “Brother from another mother?”

I too sometimes process the old raw with new software. I like to see the differences when the whim strikes me. Often I will just keep an ‘old tombstone” and a ‘new tombstone’. I’ll also occasionally just use the original TIF tombstone and reprocess it.

 

[DM-CO]

I think you are on the right track.

It's hard to predict, but it when you talk about more than 5 or 10 years in the future it seems TIF and JPG are the photo formats most likely to survive. If any of today's formats are readable 25 years from now TIF will likely be one of them.

I like the idea of saving the RAW files, but I wonder if future software will be able to access or edit them. As to proprietary systems like Lightroom, will LR even be around 25 years from now? If it is, will it still read 30 year old files, or interpret them the same way it did when they were first processed?

Personally, I save the camera original, the final PSD, and a very high quality JPEG at original resolution. I consider the PSD a short term format, but handy if I want to make minor changes to the edit -- I can recover the hand retouch but discard adjustment layers, for example. The JPG is the archive file. A TIF would save slightly more information and I have considered a change. Maybe in the future.

Gato

As mentioned, I too keep the raws. As for readability, I remember that this was a big discussion 25 years ago: “will proprietary RAW files be able to be read in 25 years?”. Some may not be, I don’t know. But every old RAW that I have can be read by even recent “start-up” software companies.

it still a valid concern though - and one I share.

 

[ajscullard]

That's almost exactly what I do (and also have done for the past 25 years).

I've now found that I am going back through selected old images to re-process the raw files with the latest versions of software because the difference in quality is astonishing.

The previous "tombstoned" tiff images are then replaced with the improved version.

I sometimes consider using jpeg for my "final" images but I still stick with 16-bit tiffs.

Are you my “Brother from another mother?”

Ummm, don't know. But if you're about 76 years old.....? :-D

I too sometimes process the old raw with new software. I like to see the differences when the whim strikes me. Often I will just keep an ‘old tombstone” and a ‘new tombstone’. I’ll also occasionally just use the original TIF tombstone and reprocess it.

 

[Zeee]

Folks:

For 25-years I have been doing the following:

1) shooting mostly in RAW for each “shoot”

2) selecting a few of those raw images from a set to edit and editing them (PS at first and then, beginning with LR v1.0 in LR).

LR v1.0 ? is that one that was released in 2007 or are you talking about Lr which is the desktop app and RAW file cloud storage that was released in 2018?

3) once edited, I like to “tombstone” my “final” image and I would export the image as a TIF. It is now a completed image.

4) the raw is stored with the TIF on various disks/backups etc.

over the years I have “switched” to and from various editors (LR, Capture One, this, that). I never really cared that in switching from LR to something else and back again that my “non-destructive edits” would be lost or whatever….. because I had the “final TIF” image.

i like my process and will continue making a “final tombstoned” image.

thats the background. Now the question:

when I started this back in 2000, TIF’s seemed like the best option to ‘tombstone” with. Are they still? I’m not especially worried about the large file size. Is there something “better though? HEIF? Something else? I want a file type that will be around in another 25 years (I won’t be but the files should be). Should I consider something other than TIF’s in your opinion?

thanks in advance for any thoughts.

 

[DM-CO]

The US Library of Congress prefers images in JPG or TIFs too. Interestingly, they also call out “heavily patented” files structures (like HEIC) as a negative for “sustainability”

Recommended Formats Statement – introduction | Resources (Preservation, Library of Congress)

History and purpose of Recommended Formats Statement, along with the desired benefits to internal and external stakeholders in identifying analog and digital formats which maximize the preservation and accessibility of creative content into the future.

www.loc.gov

 

[DM-CO]

2) selecting a few of those raw images from a set to edit and editing them (PS at first and then, beginning with LR v1.0 in LR).

LR v1.0 ? is that one that was released in 2007 or are you talking about Lr which is the desktop app and RAW file cloud storage that was released in 2018?

The original (now called LRc) way back when. Indeed, I was one of the masses that used the BETA version of LR v1. It kept crashing on my underpowered laptop. Thankfully they fixed that before the first commercial release.

 

[Zeee]

2) selecting a few of those raw images from a set to edit and editing them (PS at first and then, beginning with LR v1.0 in LR).

LR v1.0 ? is that one that was released in 2007 or are you talking about Lr which is the desktop app and RAW file cloud storage that was released in 2018?

The original (now called LRc) way back when. Indeed, I was one of the masses that used the BETA version of LR v1. It kept crashing on my underpowered laptop. Thankfully they fixed that before the first commercial release.

That's pretty old. For event shooting at one time I started with Canon DPP and then exported TIFF's to PS for finishing. An editing nightmare so in 2011, I switched to Lightroom. I still sent occasional files to PS. It was not easy because I was a die hard DPP user.

These days I'm using LrC v14. It has become so advanced I have not sent a file to PS since LrC v11. I have never saved any exported files from event shooting. I just keep the original RAW and the edits will be there forever. I can export them in any format. Even if I stopped using LrC I'd still have access to all my edited files. Made my life much easier.

--
I roll with pleasing colour

 

[DM-CO]

These days I'm using LrC v14. It has become so advanced I have not sent a file to PS since LrC v11. I have never saved any exported files from event shooting. I just keep the original RAW and the edits will be there forever. I can export them in any format. Even if I stopped using LrC I'd still have access to all my edited files. Made my life much easier.

This is central to what I’m asking. I do not want to be tied to one editor/defeloper (like Lightroom or anything else). So, in my first move away from Lightroom, it was simple …. I already had the TIFs.

if you were, hypothetically, wanting to move away from LRC right now (or at some point in the future), you would export all of your edited RAWs …. My question is: ‘what would you export them to? TIFs? JPGs? PNG?, HEIC? Something else? And, why would you pick the file structure?”

 

[Zeee]

These days I'm using LrC v14. It has become so advanced I have not sent a file to PS since LrC v11. I have never saved any exported files from event shooting. I just keep the original RAW and the edits will be there forever. I can export them in any format. Even if I stopped using LrC I'd still have access to all my edited files. Made my life much easier.

This is central to what I’m asking. I do not want to be tied to one editor/defeloper (like Lightroom or anything else). So, in my first move away from Lightroom, it was simple …. I already had the TIFs.

if you were, hypothetically, wanting to move away from LRC right now (or at some point in the future), you would export all of your edited RAWs …. My question is: ‘what would you export them to? TIFs? JPGs? PNG?, HEIC? Something else? And, why would you pick the file structure?”

If I did move away from Adobe I wouldn't need to. The catalogue and all the years of edits will be maintained forever. I could export which ever files I wanted for the rest of my life. In fact I could still continue to use the catalogue system as a DAM. I could import developed files after using a different developer.



--
I roll with pleasing colour

 

[gscotten]

These days I'm using LrC v14. It has become so advanced I have not sent a file to PS since LrC v11. I have never saved any exported files from event shooting. I just keep the original RAW and the edits will be there forever. I can export them in any format. Even if I stopped using LrC I'd still have access to all my edited files. Made my life much easier.

This is central to what I’m asking. I do not want to be tied to one editor/defeloper (like Lightroom or anything else). So, in my first move away from Lightroom, it was simple …. I already had the TIFs.

if you were, hypothetically, wanting to move away from LRC right now (or at some point in the future), you would export all of your edited RAWs …. My question is: ‘what would you export them to? TIFs? JPGs? PNG?, HEIC? Something else? And, why would you pick the file structure?”

I see no reason to do a mass export.

If I were to decide to use another editor, my plan would be to keep the expired version of Lightroom to export/view my existing library as needed and use the new editor on my new files going forward. The only important thing that stops working when your Lightroom subscription ends is the Develop module.

I do not see any compelling reason to switch in the near future. LrC has become almost magical.