K7 DNG vs PEF

GoremanX · 12-09-2009, 06:55 PM

Originally posted by Marc Sabatella

Anyhow, I'd agree that this matters more to some people than others, but I wouldn't assume the distinction is hobbyist versus pro. I'd say it's people who want to do a fair amount of PP but don't want to allocate much time to it, versus people who either *don't* want to do much PP, or who don't mind allocating a lot of time to it.

Don't get me wrong, I still think getting such features into open source projects is important, and I look forward to learning how to take advantage of them in the future!

Originally posted by Marc Sabatella

A quick look at F-spot suggests it's nowhere near as sophisticated as Digikam overall, and their implementation of non-destructive editing appears to be based on versioning - saving intermediate JPEG's - rather than true parametric image editing. Which would mean it actually doesn't provide any of the batch / setting copying advantages.

I find it amazing how much I can do with Digikam! I've been using it for years (since 2002) to organize my photo collections, never realizing all the great things it could do.

As far as parametric image editing, part of the problem is that the proprietary solutions have direct access to hardware in a way that open source solutions can't (yet). For example, Adobe Lightroom and Apple Aperture can talk directly to the GPU of specific video cards, thereby reducing the processing overhead of generating the edits to the image on the fly. Changes happen very quickly, even with lots of cumulative edits. Such features aren't nearly as pleasant on older video cards that aren't directly supported. There's no such reliable mechanism in place on open source platforms yet (although it's in development), which makes on-the-fly processing of images slow and cumbersome unless someone has a super-high-end computing platform. I think that's why F-Spot uses the versioning setup, with interim snapshots to show the current effect of the edits, but as a jpeg rather than a live RAW file. It's an interesting approach, and light years ahead of my old system of doing "Save As" after every edit in Photoshop 4.

ully · 03-16-2010, 07:46 PM

So you see we were told years ago DNG was going to be an open format so all cameras would be supported. Ha, DNG is nothing more than just another plot by Adobe to make more money from you.

GoremanX · 03-16-2010, 08:12 PM

What the heck are you talking about? How far in left field are you, anyways? Pretty far if it took you this long to reply to a long-dead thread.

The DNG format is completely open. It's freely implemented in tons of products, from cameras to image editors. It costs nothing to implement fully. The specification is redistributable without restriction. Lots of open source projects use it too.

Wheatfield · 03-16-2010, 08:17 PM

Originally posted by ully

So you see we were told years ago DNG was going to be an open format so all cameras would be supported. Ha, DNG is nothing more than just another plot by Adobe to make more money from you.

This is patently wrong. Any manufacturer or software vendor can use the DNG format without paying Adobe for the pleasure.
The DNG format can be opened by Adobe products that are 4 generations old.
How, pray tell, when they are giving it away for free, and are not forcing anyone to pay for it through licensing agreements, are they making any money off of me or anyone else?
Enquiring minds want to know?

Jodokast96 · 03-16-2010, 08:38 PM

Originally posted by GoremanX

What the heck are you talking about? How far in left field are you, anyways? Pretty far if it took you this long to reply to a long-dead thread.

The DNG format is completely open. It's freely implemented in tons of products, from cameras to image editors. It costs nothing to implement fully. The specification is redistributable without restriction. Lots of open source projects use it too.

I thought the same thing when this reply to a similar thread of my own was made https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/886095-post36.html. Except it was nearly 2 years later!

GoremanX · 03-16-2010, 08:44 PM

Of course the whole concept is ludicrous. Even Pentax recommends the DNG format now, they don't just include its support as a compatibility crutch.

I often wonder where GordonBGood gets some of his "facts". Sometimes he sounds coherent, and then he throws a weird curveball out of nowhere.

I vote that the search feature be disabled to prevent this kind of ancient thread abuse.

**GingerBeer** · 03-17-2010, 04:16 PM

Originally posted by GoremanX

Even Pentax recommends the DNG format now, they don't just include its support as a compatibility crutch.

Where is Pentax's recommendation of DNG?

GoremanX · 03-17-2010, 06:55 PM

Originally posted by GingerBeer

Where is Pentax's recommendation of DNG?

Right here:

Pentax 645D – Fiest Impressions & Interview

Relevant passage:
One key difference used to be the inability of DNG to handle compression, but this issue has now been solved and we fully support and recommend the usage of DNG.

Marc Sabatella · 03-17-2010, 06:59 PM

Originally posted by GoremanX

I often wonder where GordonBGood gets some of his "facts". Sometimes he sounds coherent, and then he throws a weird curveball out of nowhere.

Gordon has written his own raw processing algorithm and software tools to anayze raw data. I think his information is pretty bulletproof with respect to the actual technical details. But that doesn't mean people don't take his words out of context to twist them into supporting all sorts of nonsense, which is what appears to have happened in the above. There *are* technical differences that Gordon accurately describes, but the person who posted his out-of-context quote of surely was a much longer post has subverted a simple technical discussion of the difference to his own anti-DNG agenda. Note that the final conclusion in that post was *not* a quote from Gordon. In this case, blame the messenger for deliberately misrepresenting the message.

**GingerBeer** · 03-17-2010, 10:11 PM

Originally posted by GoremanX

Right here:

Pentax 645D – Fiest Impressions & Interview

Relevant passage:
One key difference used to be the inability of DNG to handle compression, but this issue has now been solved and we fully support and recommend the usage of DNG.

Cool, thanks. That's pretty interesting. I have changed a couple of times between DNG and PEF - currently on PEF. I don't know enough about the differences to make an informed decision - both seem to work fine.

Arpe · 03-18-2010, 12:42 AM

Originally posted by GingerBeer

Cool, thanks. That's pretty interesting. I have changed a couple of times between DNG and PEF - currently on PEF. I don't know enough about the differences to make an informed decision - both seem to work fine.

Funny - I just changed to DNG for the first time! Just got sick of the XMP files. Noticed the camera says I can now get 166 files on the 4GB card as opposed to 161 PEFs (both of which are way out).

Are the Pentax DNGs as compressed as converting the PEFs to DNG with the Adobe converter? And, just curious, are the lens corrections and highlight and shadow corrections stored in a DNG? (I know PS can't read those corrections)

GoremanX · 03-18-2010, 03:21 AM

Originally posted by Arpe

Funny - I just changed to DNG for the first time! Just got sick of the XMP files. Noticed the camera says I can now get 166 files on the 4GB card as opposed to 161 PEFs (both of which are way out).

Are the Pentax DNGs as compressed as converting the PEFs to DNG with the Adobe converter? And, just curious, are the lens corrections and highlight and shadow corrections stored in a DNG? (I know PS can't read those corrections)

Compressed DNGs are mostly the same size as PEF files now. There's a slight difference between the two, but not much. I think the DNG converter did throw some data out, so it may have created artificially smaller DNG files.

There's really no fundamental difference between the two as far as usability goes, but DNG files are better supported. For example, when the K-7 first came out, it took months for graphics applications to support the new PEF format (it changes slightly with every new camera model). But DNG files were supported right away. Same thing happened when the K-x was released. So for most people, DNG is probably preferable.

Pentaxoid · 05-16-2010, 02:28 PM

My Photoshop 7 cannot open DNG files from my K-m. I think back in those days CameraRaw was a paid plugin.

Ufraw is not very usable.

Wheatfield · 05-16-2010, 09:05 PM

Originally posted by Pentaxoid

My Photoshop 7 cannot open DNG files from my K-m. I think back in those days CameraRaw was a paid plugin.

Ufraw is not very usable.

Umm, that doesn't sound right.
The Photoshop 7 that I have opens all my DNG files (K10, K20 and K7) via Camera Raw, which came resident in the install.

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
PEF or DNG?	Jodokast96	Digital Processing, Software, and Printing	60	03-22-2010 11:34 AM
PEF vs DNG.	sergio_fucchi	Digital Processing, Software, and Printing	2	01-30-2009 07:06 PM
PEF or DNG?	marius	Digital Processing, Software, and Printing	3	08-17-2008 01:34 PM
PEF vs DNG	MikeD	Photographic Technique	3	01-24-2008 05:17 AM
PEF vs DNG	Fireball	Pentax DSLR Discussion	19	07-21-2007 08:01 PM

12-09-2009, 06:55 PM	#16
GoremanX Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: Georgia, VT Photos: Albums Posts: 1,657 Original Poster	Originally posted by Marc Sabatella Anyhow, I'd agree that this matters more to some people than others, but I wouldn't assume the distinction is hobbyist versus pro. I'd say it's people who want to do a fair amount of PP but don't want to allocate much time to it, versus people who either don't want to do much PP, or who don't mind allocating a lot of time to it. Don't get me wrong, I still think getting such features into open source projects is important, and I look forward to learning how to take advantage of them in the future! Originally posted by Marc Sabatella A quick look at F-spot suggests it's nowhere near as sophisticated as Digikam overall, and their implementation of non-destructive editing appears to be based on versioning - saving intermediate JPEG's - rather than true parametric image editing. Which would mean it actually doesn't provide any of the batch / setting copying advantages. I find it amazing how much I can do with Digikam! I've been using it for years (since 2002) to organize my photo collections, never realizing all the great things it could do. As far as parametric image editing, part of the problem is that the proprietary solutions have direct access to hardware in a way that open source solutions can't (yet). For example, Adobe Lightroom and Apple Aperture can talk directly to the GPU of specific video cards, thereby reducing the processing overhead of generating the edits to the image on the fly. Changes happen very quickly, even with lots of cumulative edits. Such features aren't nearly as pleasant on older video cards that aren't directly supported. There's no such reliable mechanism in place on open source platforms yet (although it's in development), which makes on-the-fly processing of images slow and cumbersome unless someone has a super-high-end computing platform. I think that's why F-Spot uses the versioning setup, with interim snapshots to show the current effect of the edits, but as a jpeg rather than a live RAW file. It's an interesting approach, and light years ahead of my old system of doing "Save As" after every edit in Photoshop 4.

03-16-2010, 07:46 PM	#17
ully Forum Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Seattle, Wash. USA Photos: Gallery Posts: 63	So you see we were told years ago DNG was going to be an open format so all cameras would be supported. Ha, DNG is nothing more than just another plot by Adobe to make more money from you.

03-16-2010, 08:12 PM	#18
GoremanX Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: Georgia, VT Photos: Albums Posts: 1,657 Original Poster	What the heck are you talking about? How far in left field are you, anyways? Pretty far if it took you this long to reply to a long-dead thread. The DNG format is completely open. It's freely implemented in tons of products, from cameras to image editors. It costs nothing to implement fully. The specification is redistributable without restriction. Lots of open source projects use it too.

03-16-2010, 08:17 PM	#19
Wheatfield Moderator Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: The wheatfields of Canada Posts: 15,981	Originally posted by ully So you see we were told years ago DNG was going to be an open format so all cameras would be supported. Ha, DNG is nothing more than just another plot by Adobe to make more money from you. This is patently wrong. Any manufacturer or software vendor can use the DNG format without paying Adobe for the pleasure. The DNG format can be opened by Adobe products that are 4 generations old. How, pray tell, when they are giving it away for free, and are not forcing anyone to pay for it through licensing agreements, are they making any money off of me or anyone else? Enquiring minds want to know?

03-16-2010, 08:38 PM	#20
Jodokast96 Veteran Member Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Erial, NJ USA Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 2,134	Originally posted by GoremanX What the heck are you talking about? How far in left field are you, anyways? Pretty far if it took you this long to reply to a long-dead thread. The DNG format is completely open. It's freely implemented in tons of products, from cameras to image editors. It costs nothing to implement fully. The specification is redistributable without restriction. Lots of open source projects use it too. I thought the same thing when this reply to a similar thread of my own was made https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/886095-post36.html. Except it was nearly 2 years later!

03-16-2010, 08:44 PM	#21
GoremanX Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: Georgia, VT Photos: Albums Posts: 1,657 Original Poster	Of course the whole concept is ludicrous. Even Pentax recommends the DNG format now, they don't just include its support as a compatibility crutch. I often wonder where GordonBGood gets some of his "facts". Sometimes he sounds coherent, and then he throws a weird curveball out of nowhere. I vote that the search feature be disabled to prevent this kind of ancient thread abuse.

03-17-2010, 04:16 PM	#22
GingerBeer Site Supporter Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Brisbane Posts: 126	Originally posted by GoremanX Even Pentax recommends the DNG format now, they don't just include its support as a compatibility crutch. Where is Pentax's recommendation of DNG?

03-17-2010, 06:55 PM	#23
GoremanX Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: Georgia, VT Photos: Albums Posts: 1,657 Original Poster	Originally posted by GingerBeer Where is Pentax's recommendation of DNG? Right here: Pentax 645D – Fiest Impressions & Interview Relevant passage: One key difference used to be the inability of DNG to handle compression, but this issue has now been solved and we fully support and recommend the usage of DNG.

03-17-2010, 06:59 PM	#24
Marc Sabatella Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Denver, CO Photos: Gallery Posts: 10,685	Originally posted by GoremanX I often wonder where GordonBGood gets some of his "facts". Sometimes he sounds coherent, and then he throws a weird curveball out of nowhere. Gordon has written his own raw processing algorithm and software tools to anayze raw data. I think his information is pretty bulletproof with respect to the actual technical details. But that doesn't mean people don't take his words out of context to twist them into supporting all sorts of nonsense, which is what appears to have happened in the above. There are technical differences that Gordon accurately describes, but the person who posted his out-of-context quote of surely was a much longer post has subverted a simple technical discussion of the difference to his own anti-DNG agenda. Note that the final conclusion in that post was not a quote from Gordon. In this case, blame the messenger for deliberately misrepresenting the message.

03-17-2010, 10:11 PM	#25
GingerBeer Site Supporter Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Brisbane Posts: 126	Originally posted by GoremanX Right here: Pentax 645D – Fiest Impressions & Interview Relevant passage: One key difference used to be the inability of DNG to handle compression, but this issue has now been solved and we fully support and recommend the usage of DNG. Cool, thanks. That's pretty interesting. I have changed a couple of times between DNG and PEF - currently on PEF. I don't know enough about the differences to make an informed decision - both seem to work fine.

03-18-2010, 12:42 AM	#26
Arpe Pentaxian Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: New Zealand Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 4,452	Originally posted by GingerBeer Cool, thanks. That's pretty interesting. I have changed a couple of times between DNG and PEF - currently on PEF. I don't know enough about the differences to make an informed decision - both seem to work fine. Funny - I just changed to DNG for the first time! Just got sick of the XMP files. Noticed the camera says I can now get 166 files on the 4GB card as opposed to 161 PEFs (both of which are way out). Are the Pentax DNGs as compressed as converting the PEFs to DNG with the Adobe converter? And, just curious, are the lens corrections and highlight and shadow corrections stored in a DNG? (I know PS can't read those corrections)

03-18-2010, 03:21 AM	#27
GoremanX Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: Georgia, VT Photos: Albums Posts: 1,657 Original Poster	Originally posted by Arpe Funny - I just changed to DNG for the first time! Just got sick of the XMP files. Noticed the camera says I can now get 166 files on the 4GB card as opposed to 161 PEFs (both of which are way out). Are the Pentax DNGs as compressed as converting the PEFs to DNG with the Adobe converter? And, just curious, are the lens corrections and highlight and shadow corrections stored in a DNG? (I know PS can't read those corrections) Compressed DNGs are mostly the same size as PEF files now. There's a slight difference between the two, but not much. I think the DNG converter did throw some data out, so it may have created artificially smaller DNG files. There's really no fundamental difference between the two as far as usability goes, but DNG files are better supported. For example, when the K-7 first came out, it took months for graphics applications to support the new PEF format (it changes slightly with every new camera model). But DNG files were supported right away. Same thing happened when the K-x was released. So for most people, DNG is probably preferable.

05-16-2010, 02:28 PM	#28
Pentaxoid Junior Member Join Date: Nov 2009 Posts: 48	My Photoshop 7 cannot open DNG files from my K-m. I think back in those days CameraRaw was a paid plugin. Ufraw is not very usable.

05-16-2010, 09:05 PM	#29
Wheatfield Moderator Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: The wheatfields of Canada Posts: 15,981	Originally posted by Pentaxoid My Photoshop 7 cannot open DNG files from my K-m. I think back in those days CameraRaw was a paid plugin. Ufraw is not very usable. Umm, that doesn't sound right. The Photoshop 7 that I have opens all my DNG files (K10, K20 and K7) via Camera Raw, which came resident in the install.