ABSTRACT
Camera Raw or Photoshop? When Adobe launched Camera Raw it was designed as a raw fi le format import plug-in that allowed Photoshop to access raw digital captures. It can now be argued that Camera Raw has been turned into its own editing domain called ‘ parametric editing’ and, in some ways, challenges Photoshop for image editing of digital photographs. But don’t lose sight of the fact that Camera Raw’s main role is still to open images into Photoshop. Inevitably, there will be a degree of confusion about what to do to images in which domain: parametric or pixel editing. The answer is really rather simple – use the best tool for the task at hand. Using Camera Raw is optimal for raw capture tone curve adjustments because you are working with the entire linear tone range of the raw capture. Waiting to do that in Photoshop would mean leaving image quality on the table. The same holds true for adjusting the
white balance of a raw capture. Nothing in Photoshop can rival the accuracy and effi ciency of Camera Raw’s white balance tool. If your camera sensor has a dust spot, you can use the spot removal tool in Camera Raw to remove a spot on one or one hundred captures. Therefore, doing these tasks in Camera Raw is more effi cient than in Photoshop. Yet for all of its strengths, Camera Raw is not a pixel editor (the adjustment brush and gradient fi lter notwithstanding). When you need pixel-accurate masks or image composites, you need Photoshop. The best approach is to devise a strategy and employ the correct tactics to achieve it. The strategy we like to use is the 80-20 rule (also called the Pareto principle) where the majority of the work can be done with the least amount of effort. So, Camera Raw is tactically employed to make mass adjustments accurately, quickly and effi ciently while Photoshop is tactically employed on only a few select images that are truly worthy of the extra effort.
