OpenRAW

Tom, I think Adobe has a very simple agenda:

I think they want to make "Raw" an attractive and safe way of taking pictures, so that far more people will use Raw.

And more people using Raw means extra people needing photo-editing software.

And many of those extra people will buy their photo-editor from Adobe!

I'm sure there are some other concerns too, and Adobe can't be happy about the mess that Raw is in at the moment. But for Adobe to win, it doesn't mean everyone else has to lose. If DNG succeeds, lots of us will win too. (I feel I already have won, because it is better for me).

I think you may have hit the nail on it's head here. How do we know Adobe is really sincere with it's commitments. It could be bought, sold or taken over as any other company, and what happens to the camera manufacturers who are locked into DNG then ?

I am sure if the DNG had come from a "real open source" community, it would be better accepted by camera amnufacturers.

It is like saying to my car manufacturer - Hey, Mr Honda, why don't you put a ferari designed engine in my car while you are at it.

Conversion option is the best one and Adobe can partner (they already do may of the RAW formats) this. If Adobe is really serious, it should release and support FREE products which are as open as DNG to convert to DNG from the many formats.

Let's have the ball in Adobe's court for a while and see what they come up with.

- Harman

I don't think Adobe has any agenda here - they have gone on public record to state they are willing to hand over the DNG format to any international standards authority who would like to take it over.

Please lest's not distracted here - the 'war' is against closed proprietory systems which attempt to lock me out from processing my files in the software which I deem best for my images. Also the fact that those closed systems will stop supporting the files which I have taken in the past such that I can no longer open them.

Carol,

LOL ! While you are at it, include Digital Cable/SAT TV, DVD encryption, Reverse engineering for *any* software and a host of other demands in your wish list. All of them stand the same chance so we may as well get everything together.

- Harman

There is one major difference Harman that you have completely overlooked - my images belong to me, the data which constitutes those images belongs to me. The data from a Digital Cable/Sat TV etc belongs to the company that owns the copywrite to those films etc and it is licenced to me (or the cable company) under various conditions which I must abide by.

Harman, you say: "If Adobe is really serious, it should release and support FREE products which are as open as DNG to convert to DNG from the many formats".

They do! They provide a free DNG Converter (actually, one for Windows, one for Mac). It currently supports 70+ Raw formats. They provide upgrades perhaps 3 or 4 times a year to add extra cameras and extra features.

Free to download, completely stand-alone, no registration required, no time-out, no need to use any other Adobe software, no downside! I've been using it since 10th October last year, with complete success.

http://www.adobe.com/products/dng/main.html

One of the options is to preserve the entire original Raw file inside the DNG. Obviously this makes it a lot larger, but it means you can extract your original Raw file in future, using the Converter itself. (Just point to a folder of DNGs with embedded original Raw files, and to a folder to hold the extracted files, then go and have a cup of tea while it chugs away). Some people use this as their standard archive format - one file, both options.