Comments on: News sweep

By: Keith

Keith — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 23:37:38 +0000

I was interested in the Nikon P6000, but I am also seriously annoyed by the NRW proprietary RAW file format. I returned the unit, I won’t buy any camera unless it supports a standard file format!

By: Doug

Doug — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 05:32:11 +0000

Adobe has put ACR 4.6 into beta availability, with support for the P6000′s NRW files. So contrary to my speculation above, you don’t need CS4 to process them. Early reports indicate that ACR’s NRW processing works fine, even on the Mac.

I haven’t confirmed it myself, but at least one person claims that dcraw processes NRW files using the NEF logic, which would suggest that NRW files are merely NEF files with a different file extension. If this turns out to be so, that brings up the obvious question of “Why?”

By: Ted Leung

Ted Leung — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 16:10:18 +0000

I know that RAW formats are proprietary. The issue is support in the processing programs that I actually use.

As you say, there are potentially other issues with the P6000, so we are going to have to wait until it ships to find out if it’s a good camera in those respects.

I am looking at the G9, and would have bought one were Photokina not around the corner. If I’m going to lay out $500 for a P&S, I’m going to wait till I see what this year’s lineup is like. And if I pay that much for a camera that claims to shoot in RAW, then I want it to work.

By: Doug

Doug — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:57:46 +0000

All manufacturer Raw formats are proprietary, including Nikon’s NEF. NRW is no different in that regard. The only non-proprietary Raw format is Adobe’s DNG, and the only DSLRs that can produce DNG are Pentax (or their Samsung brethren).

A second Raw format is nothing new. Canon is currently on their third Raw format (not counting the Kodak/Canon formats).

The open question is whether NRW is a format that Nikon will stick with, or just a temporary aberration. To some extent I suspect that will depend on why Nikon went to the trouble to come up with the NRW format. My personal speculation is that it is somehow quicker to process and/or write to SDHC than NEF is. Most digicam Raw (Canon G9 being the notable exception) is so S-L-O-O-O-W as to be unusable, with write times on the order of five to ten seconds per shot.

I have little doubt that NRW will be supported by all of the active third-party Raw software products. Given Adobe’s history, I suspect that you’ll need CS4 to process it, though. Dave Coffin will probably have it in dcraw pretty quickly.

That said, I feel that Raw on a digicam is like a tachometer on a bicycle: a gewgaw with little real value. It’s a digicam, not a DSLR. Anyone can take fine JPEGs with a digicam, even experienced photographers.

If I were a conspiracy theorist, I might suspect that Nikon intentionally created the NRW flap to distract people from the responsiveness and movie issues that made the P6000′s predecessors suitable mainly for taking photos of scenery and other stuff that doesn’t move. (Unknown if the P6000 fixes those, but almost nobody is even asking.)

Anyway, I’m curious why you’re looking at the P6000 rather than the Canon line? The G9 has Raw built-in, and many of the A series cameras can shoot Raw via CHDK.