Basic raw developing question

[madhg]

I used to develop my Canon G16 raw images in PWPv8 before doing anything anything else. Then by accident I found that applying Color Curves to the raw image produced a tiff, very much like the tiff produced by the raw develop transformation.

Does Color Curves simply apply Raw Dev. before applying the curve, or is there an advantage in raw processing first? As an amateur, I'm not an advanced user (no color profiles etc.).

best wishes,
David

[jsachs]

Unless you have a camera profile and/or lens profile, there is no reason to use Raw Develop. While I can't create camera and lens profiles for every camera and lens, PWP does include a facility for creating camera and lens profiles yourself by printing out and photographing test targets. Admittedly this is a somewhat labor intensive process that most users will prefer not to perform.

If you want camera and lens profiles, the alternative is to use a raw converter such as DxO or Lightroom to read in your raw files and apply camera and lens profiles and possibly some overall tonal corrections and then export the files as TIFFs. Otherwise just open the raw files in PWP and start processing them.