NX2, any need to convert to Jpg/tiff before printing?

[Geir]

Just out of curiosity, is there a difference between printing from a jpg file, or to print from a raw file which you have deleoped, but just saved the current verion of in nx2?

 

[yamo]

Geir,

Greetings. You can't print from a raw file. When you "develop" a raw file in NX2 the edits are saved as instructions to be applied to the original raw to get a preview (the image that you see on your screen). Recall that raw files are not images per se until they are converted into an image.

In short, yes, you have to convert to some image format (jpeg, tiff, png, bmp, etc.) before you can print.

Cheers,

-Yamo-

 

[Digidave]

I do understand what Yamo is getting at, but you can print directly from CNX2 after making adjustment to a RAW file without having to go through the physical act of "Save as" jpg/tiff. Just click Ctrl+P & it will take you to your printing page of options.

I would imagine you are actually printing from the jpg file that is built into the RAW file, which I guess now that I think about it, brings up another question. Is that the best way to do it? Because, if you were to create a Tiff file & printed that, wouldn't your "source file" be of a higher quality?

I think I just confused myself!!

 

[Mike Buckley]

I would imagine you are actually printing from the jpg file that is built into the RAW file, which I guess now that I think about it, brings up another question. Is that the best way to do it?

I am far from an expert on printing, but I do know that once a NEF is adjusted and saved using NX2, the preview is a full-resolution image. That is true even if the file that was generated by an early-generation camera that did not create a full-resolution preview.

 

[yamo]

I do understand what Yamo is getting at, but you can print directly from CNX2 after making adjustment to a RAW file without having to go through the physical act of "Save as" jpg/tiff. Just click Ctrl+P & it will take you to your printing page of options.

I would imagine you are actually printing from the jpg file that is built into the RAW file, which I guess now that I think about it, brings up another question. Is that the best way to do it? Because, if you were to create a Tiff file & printed that, wouldn't your "source file" be of a higher quality?

I think I just confused myself!!

Dave,

Greetings. If you Ctrl+P to print in NX, and print to a file... eventually you will get a dialog that indicates you are creating a jpeg. If you don't print to a file, I suspect that the jpeg is still created but just as a temporary file to be printed.

Only pretty high end printers and labs (er, the fine art print labs, like Calypso) accept tiffs as input. Tiffs are better quality files (even 8 bit tiffs, 16 bit tiffs are even better) than jpegs. Jpegs are lossy compressed 8 bit files. Recall that your NEFs are either 12 or 14 bits.

Cheers,

-Yamo-

 

[Geir]

So, if I understand correctly. Printing from a raw file creates a jpg file which is then printed.
For 4*6 prints that is ok, but what is the bes tway to print in a4 then?

 

[Mike Buckley]

If you don't print to a file, I suspect that the jpeg is still created but just as a temporary file to be printed.

For the record, I looked through the documentation when this thread began, hoping to find definitive information about that. Silly me. Considering that it's a Nikon product, I should have known better.

 

[yamo]

So, if I understand correctly. Printing from a raw file creates a jpg file which is then printed.
For 4*6 prints that is ok, but what is the bes tway to print in a4 then?

Don't worry... just print high quality jpegs. The thing is, unless you are using a high end lab to print your tiffs or have a very expensive printer of your own, the quality of the printer/paper/ink will mask any quality issues between jpegs and tiffs. What I mean is... the quality differences will be hardly visible in print due to much greater quality issues in the print process.

That said, any post-processing is better done on higher quality files like tiffs.

Cheers,

-Yamo-

 

[miatateer]

Poor Gier...I bet you're really confused now. I would find it hard to believe that while working on a NEF file and asking NX2 to print that image that the program would internally generate a jpeg memory image of the "rendered' NEF data (which is still in memory) and then print the jpeg memory image. Seems like a very wasteful step. Suppose also that if I saved a modified NEF, then later reopened the NEF file (which is rendered based on previous edits) , I would think NX2 would print directly from the rendered image in memory without going thru a jpeg conversion. But hey, who knows for sure with NX2!! The NIK programmers might be just crazy enough to make extra work for the program!