Originally Posted by glasbak 
I have no reason to suspect that PPL does not take advantage of the 4 extra bits of raw.
I can not tell if additional filter functions are done with 8 or 16 bits.
Anyway, every program that shows histograms from 0..255, cant be using 16 bits
George
Not sure where, or what software this was good for but I do remember a discussion that, though the display is 8bit, in effect it is functioning in 16bit for math... As a side note Adobe 16bit is really only 15bit....... w/ one bit used for something else. this is easily proved.
Clarkvision: Raw Converter Shadow Detail Photoshop does 15-bit processing and I believe that is causing some issues with the "16-bit" processed data. I've been experimenting doing more and more processing in ImagesPlus as it does scientifically correct math (64-bit processing, but I don't believe that 64 or even 32 bits are really warranted-it's more the math).
...............Photoshop does 15-bit math to speed operations, and it appears it is limiting the noise and dynamic range of current DSLR cameras. .................
More on this p51
http://books.google.com/books?id=5WN...esult&resnum=8 http://mike.russell-home.net/tmp/DanMargulis16Bit/