Nikon Files

[CML-1591]

Is it best to use NEF or TIFF/Tif?

sorry if this has come up before or a really stupid question...

[nickt]

NEF, definately.
Nick

[Oldboy]

NEF files range between 12mb to 20mb but saved as a Tiff each would be 35mb on my D3. Raw files like NEF are Tiff files but with a special compression applied, which reduces their size but still contain the same infomation as a full Tiff file, which contains no compression. 

[Jonathan]

Raw files like NEF are Tiff files but with a special compression applied, which reduces their size but still contain the same infomation as a full Tiff file, which contains no compression. 

Well...neff files are only compressed if you choose to compress them.....some people recommend not doing this due to a loss of dynamic range.  http://regex.info/blog/photo-tech/nef-compression

Also, neff files contain more "information" than tiff files.  I.e. they contain everything a tiff file does plus more.  They are smaller when uncompressed because they don't pad the high end bits with zeroes.

Oh and tiff files support 2 different types of lossless compression - zip and lzw.  Neither are used by Nikon.

As long as you have the s/w to decode it properly and believe you always will have then nef is almost always better than tiff.  I can think of a couple of times when you might want tiff but really not many.

[Oldboy]

As long as you have the s/w to decode it properly and believe you always will have then nef is almost always better than tiff.  I can think of a couple of times when you might want tiff but really not many.

Which makes me womder why Nikon included Tiff as a shooting option on a D3. 

[CML-1591]

As long as you have the s/w to decode it properly and believe you always will have then nef is almost always better than tiff.  I can think of a couple of times when you might want tiff but really not many.

Which makes me womder why Nikon included Tiff as a shooting option on a D3. 

Same on a D700

Okay so... NEF it is I think...

Thanks folks!

[Jonathan]

As long as you have the s/w to decode it properly and believe you always will have then nef is almost always better than tiff.  I can think of a couple of times when you might want tiff but really not many.

Which makes me womder why Nikon included Tiff as a shooting option on a D3. 

Because

1. It costs them nothing.  Apart from the increased write time there is no "cost" to producing a tiff.  They have the data in the right format as part of the processing.

2. Because there are a couple of special applications where you might want a high quality uncompressed file that comes out of the camera ready to use.  Off hand I can think of high quality magazine work and (possibly) some branches of forensics.  The people who need this will buy another brand if their required format isn't supported.