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To DNG, or not to DNG ...
Ever since its arrival, my team and I have become big fans of Adobe’s Digital Negative (DNG) file format. Unlike proprietary formats (Nikon NEF, Canon CR2/CRW, etc.), we prefer a format that is openly documented, and supported by Adobe. We’ll walk through some best practices on how our team converts and prepares DNG files for use in our workflow - both in the standalone converter and within Lightroom. Should you wish to retain your original RAW files along with the DNG format we will cover that option as well.
Before we dig into the details, allow me to state our reasoning for using DNG’s. I do this in recognition of the fact that the debate regarding DNG vs. Native RAW formats is a heated one:
I remember the early days of the Photoshop (PSD) format and the debate on how we couldn’t leave the legacy digital formats for fear of non-support for PSD from either Adobe or outside vendors. Well, here we are 10+ years later and not only can I open my original Photoshop 4.0 files without a hitch, Adobe has steadfastly supported and improved this format.
I expect nothing but the same from Adobe with regard to DNG.
While there is much debate over this format, we have settled on DNG, and continue to consult with our clients regarding leveraging this format for long term digital archiving. Not only is this a great format for archiving, its perfectly suited for your workflow within in Adobe Bridge, Photoshop, and Lightroom. - again … should you PREFER to use DNG’s.
Adobe offers two ways to prepare and convert files to DNG:
1. The free Adobe DNG Standalone Converter
2. Within Adobe Lightroom via the Import Photos dialog
Free Adobe DNG Standalone Converter
We’ll start with the standalone converter. We use this a lot in our studio because it is a rock solid workhorse batch processing engine ... no need to load all images into Lightroom just to convert to DNG.
The converter has an easy 4 step process.
1. Simply select the folder or card where the images reside as native RAW format. Or, convert another file format such as TIFF to DNG if you prefer.
2. Next, select the destination location for your DNG files. This can be a shared drive, network file server, anything that is visible in the Finder (OSX) or File Manager (Windows).
3. The file naming controls are very powerful and easy to use so that you can rename cryptic filenames like “dsc_2398.NEF” to something more informative such as “10312007_halloween_001.dng
4. The final setting of the output preferences have a big effect on the final size of the DNG file. We prefer the following settings:
Note the last selection Embed Original Raw File. We do not normally set this option but for those photographers that MUST maintain their original proprietary RAW file this allows them to do just that. The same converter we are using in these examples can be used to extract the original RAW files from the DNG as needed.
Once you are finished select OK and then Convert. The DNG Converter will process all selected images and alert you when finished.
Adobe Lightroom
Accessing the DNG conversion preferences prior to import is not as apparent as in the standalone converter:
1. Within Lightroom select Edit>>Preferences
2. Select the Import tab to access the preferences for DNG conversion.
3. We prefer to set the preferences as shown above, unselecting the Embed Original Raw File setting.
Importing your images for conversion to DNG within Lightroom is exceptionally easy:
1. Within Lightroom select the Import Photos From Disk command or drag-and-drop your selected RAW files onto the Lightroom window.
2. Select to Copy photos as Digital Negative (DNG) and import
3. Next, select the destination location for your DNG files. This can be a shared drive, network file server, anything that is visible in the Finder (OSX) or File Manager (Windows).
4. Lightroom takes things a bit further by allowing you to not only convert and copy images, you can also select Backup to: to backup the converted images to a secondary drive. This is a great secondary archival storage feature.
5. The file naming controls are very powerful and easy to use so that you can rename cryptic filenames like “dsc_2398.NEF” to something more informative such as “10312007_halloween_001.dng
6. Unlike the standalone converter, Lightroom allows you to tag additional metadata and keywords during the import process. This is a serious one-stop-shop dialog and an important one for properly setting up your file naming conventions and metadata strategy.
7. Lastly, we prefer to set Initial Previews to 1:1
We couldn’t be more happier with this streamlined solution as we process and archive images for our clients and our own studio work.
How do DNG’s fit into … or NOT … fit into your existing workflow?
Until next time … happy shooting!
|Brandon Oelling
Comments (17)
let's say i have 10000 photos, each 10mo from a 5d (cr2 files)
for one reason my email changes from john@aol.cxx to john@yahoo.cxx, so i fire lightroom and changes the metadata
if i have dng files the files change themselves and i have 100go to sync via a vpn to keep them in a safe place
if i have cr2 files with xmp sidecars, let's say 10ko each, i have 100mo to sync
that's one reason why i don't use dng
Anybody suggesting "10312007_halloween_001.dng" as an archival name for photographs is not someone I can take seriously on such an important issue as converting to DNG. The datecode in the filename makes file sort themselves after month, then day, then year, which is plain confusing when searching for files on a computer. This would, if files by mistake ended up in the same folder, make a photograph taken october 30, 2006 reside next to the photograph from october 31, 2007!
A much more useful name would be 20071031_etc.dng, which automatically lists files after year, month, day - which is a logical way to sort files. Placing all files from within the same year next to eachother, then files from the same month withn that year next to eachother and finally files chronologically within the month.
This may seem like a minor issue, but the article is based on chossing DNG because of a hypothetical chance that fileformats would become obsolete! The same hypothetical chance could be that files got misplaced, not recognized by searchprograms, etc.
I'll switch to DNG the day Canon officially announces they´re leaving the CR2-format behind. Until then, I'm in no hurry.
I have a problem with the xmp sidecars, the odds are that you will eventually get at least one out of sync with its parent file. I prefer a single file for everything.
Although I also use the year-mo-day ordering for file name generation, the most important thing is to generate unique file names. Keeping track of photos manually is an order of magnitude more difficult in the digital age which is why programs like lightroom exist so the actual filename may not be as important in the future.
DNG allows me to keep a single open raw format with lossless compression and all the metadata embedded.
It wont be Canon leaving CR2 that worries me, it would be Adobe or Apple!!
Tore you have got be kidding us all!
Sorting by month or by year is hardly a valid premise to discount this discussion. You could sort by humidity or barometer for all we care! Not everyone is working your way, and the topic is so OFF TOPIC I wonder if you have read this piece at all.
This piece is about leveraging DNG in your workflow. Nothing more, and nothing less. I use the format, and it works for me. 99% of the time the filesizes are smaller and more portable than a multi-file sidecar setup. If you or others want to keep your native RAW files than so be it.
John said it best:
"It wont be Canon leaving CR2 that worries me, it would be Adobe or Apple!!"
I hate sidecar files and switched to DNG at the start of this year. I find it works far better for me in Lightroom and iView Media Pro to work with DNGs.
As for changing email addresses being one reason not to use DNG, please, how much does a domain of your own cost these days so you can have your own email address for as long as you want?
I was horribly disappointed in this article, solely based on the title "To DNG, or not to DNG". There was not word one as to why the author would "not choose DNG". In the fifth paragraph, the author states "While there is much debate over this format, we have settled on DNG..." I have to ask myself: what is the debate? What are the pros/cons of either decision? What concerns does the author see in the choice he so quickly made.
Also, the author states "we prefer a format that is openly documented, and supported by Adobe..." that is great, but a combination of "non-proprietary" definitions and single-vendor support does not a standard make, especially when the single vendor is the company that created the definitions.
I would really like to read an article with this same title that discusses the pros and cons of using DNG that is based on the professionals at this web site.
Lane,
Single vendor support? Are you joking?
iView Media Pro supports it. Compupic supports it. That's not single vendor support!
And let's not forget there are lots of examples of a single vendor creating and supporting an open standard in the beginning - only to gain wide acceptance later on.
Have you ever heard of Java?
I use DNG's as well like Mike Cain described with iView Media Pro and it is the question: How can I best leverage the creating of those DNG's for my own use that seems to be the topic here. In that context I find this to be a great resource.
what is more disappointing is that despite your comments, you describe no con's ... what are they in your opinion?
Let's see some 'constructive' points to your criticism ... hmmmm
Great comments everyone. If you want to delve deeper into this discussion you may also use the forums: http://forums.oreilly.com/category/5/Photography-Community/
|B
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As for changing email addresses being one reason not to use DNG, please, how much does a domain of your own cost these days so you can have your own email address for as long as you want?
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irrelevant
dng will change if i add a copyright, or a keyword, or a touch of blue here and there
as soon as i change metadata the file itself changes, by a small amount i recognize, but for syncing small or big changes make no differences
I may have exaggerated the filename-issue a bit too much.
My point was that most people choose DNG for three reasons: the hypothetical chance that your current RAW-file will become obsolete, DNG is openly documented and it saves space.
For me, the first argument is too loosely based to be an issue. And if Canon chooses to drop the CR2-format, I'll still be using Lightroom and be able to do the conversion at that point! It'll take some time to go through all the images, but at least I've waited out to see if DNG is still around. What if Adobe drops DNG before Canon drops CR2? My point here is that DNG is still an infant fileformat and I am in no rush to convert my photos.
On the second issue of DNG being openly documented, I have read several discussions on this on the net, and I'm not sure it's as open as everyone would like.
Thirdly, hard drive space is so cheap that I hardly see this as a valid point. Especially for Canon files, where the winning is a meager 10%.
I'm not a great opponent of DNG, I'm not just convinced quite yet. If it's still around in a couple of years I'll consider implementing it.
The issue of proprietary raw format's support disappearing is nothing but hyperbole created by adobe. There are so many raw workflow software which all support these raw formats that I can't imagine ALL of them suddenly disappearing from the planet.
These formats are proprietary but are very well supported by multiple vendors, there is no vendor lock, no reason to worry.
For those complaining about resyncing large file, look at a tool like rsync. It's fully capable of syncing the differences in files rather than the whole file - the speedup would be tremendous in a case like this.
I went DNG, and would have to say I've regretted the move.
I shoot Canon RAW (CR2), and have accumulated about 15,000 archival images. I weighed up the pros and cons, and decided I'd convert the lot to DNG, mostly in an effort to future-proof my archive.
I'm an early adopter of Vista - been using it for 12 months. And that's the problem. Along with many others, I've been waiting a year now for Adobe to publish a plugin that will allow Vista users the same functionality they enjoyed with their RAWs (and under XP) in terms of an image thumbnail rendition and basic metadata. Still waiting.
This seems pretty "core" to me, and it worries me that after 12 months Adobe haven't responded to the pleas of many of its users - is support wavering?
""I went DNG, and would have to say I've regretted the move.""
You mean you moved to VISTA and you regret the move?
Don't blame a file format for the misgivings of your OS.
Whose job is it to support their own formats on a new OS? Not to mention that that same plugin is needed for support on XP too. I would blame Adobe here.
Canon, Nikon and all others have been a lot more responsive than Adobe (which is playing dead on this issue, surprising given their quick updates on lightroom).
Alan, if you didn't know this, you are definitely not a photographer or a user, just someone who either hates microsoft or is getting paid by adobe. Get a life.
Although Adobe claims their dng is an open standard, I am yet to see a graphics editor that can read Lightroom's settings and recreate from a .dng the same output that Lightroom did.
Same thing with a Nikon .nef. No other tool can read Nikon Capture's .nef settings. Software developers can use Nikon's library to get access to the sensor RAW data, but that's it.
As far as I know, every single Nikon camera that was released since I bough my D100 came with a slightly modified version of the .nef format. For software developers, this becomes a nightmare in terms of maintenance, testing and validation. This is what I believe is the real issue.
In my book, the clock is ticking. I cannot picture anyone remembering how to open my son's first birthday D100 .nef pictures when we run on some kind of Windows XP 2015.
Sooner or later, someone will forget about my D100-specific RAW format (converted or not). The question is who will forget about it first.
...Ben...
""Alan, if you didn't know this, you are definitely not a photographer or a user, just someone who either hates microsoft or is getting paid by adobe. Get a life.""
Micky, you should know better. Seriously ... you have got to be a 10-year old learning how to type to speak at this level. Get a grip.
Why don't you add to your list: HP, Lexmark, Epson, Maxtor, Roxio, Adobe, IBM, and any other vendor who doesn't want to support a buggy, unstable, and unaccepted early version of an OS ... or maybe they'll wait before they throw large amounts of money and engineering resources until a commercially viable version of Vista is released ... now THAT ... is a bet anyone would hedge!