Adobe Photoshop CS3 and Nikon NEF files

I've been into photography as a serious hobby for about one-and-a-half years now. And all along, I've been only shooting JPEGs. As a beginner, that was alright. But as the hobby started getting serious with a lot of investment (time and money) going into it, I wanted to start shooting RAW because almost everyone whom I looked up to in photography advised so.

Before we continue with my story, some basic explanations first.

What is RAW? Well, consider this: before you get your JPEG image files from your digital cameras as the final output, the camera (after taking a photograph) does some internal processing "automatically". In this internal processing, the camera does what it thinks is best for the final outcome to look "optimal". It also depends a lot on what kind of settings you choose in your digital camera. In DSLR's and some high end point and shoot cameras, there is another type of file that you can get from your camera: RAW. These RAW files are essentially the same image files without any of your camera's magic applied to it. These are huge files because none of the picture information is lost, and everything is stored by the camera. This gives the photographer leverage in post-processing, which is "tinkering" with the photo in an image editing software manually to make it look optimum. Still not clear? This is how Jeff Keller, DCRP Founder/Editor explains it in almost all his DSLR reviews:

So what is RAW, anyway? The RAW image format (Nikon calls it NEF) stores unprocessed data from the camera's sensor. Thanks to this, you can adjust all kinds of image properties without degrading the quality of the image. So, if you botched the white balance, you can change it in your RAW editor, with no ill effects. It's almost like getting a second chance to take a photo.

NEF is Nikon's version of the RAW files which stands for Nikon Electronic Format. Canon has its own extension, and so has almost every camera maker out there (Sony, Pentax, Olympus, etc).

Now, coming back to my problem. Recently I've been trying to shoot RAW using my DSLR Nikon D5000. But the biggest problem that stopped me from continuing was that when I copied the NEF files to my computer and tried to open them in Adobe Photoshop CS3, the software would just say that the file was invalid! That was very pissing off! I researched on the Internet like crazy, downloaded the latest plugins, followed all the instructions that people had to say but CS3 refused to recognize my NEF files. It was depressing enough to convince me to get back to shooting JPEG.

Today I thought I'll give this whole cycle one more try. And that is how I learnt that this was a very well known issue with CS3. And the workaround was to convert the NEF files to Adobe DNG (Digital Negative) files, which could then be used in CS3 easily. That sounded great! I read further that DNG is essentially a RAW file format which would preserve the original image information, and that was even better news. I tried, and it worked like a charm!

Following were the steps I did. There are two assumptions that I'm making: 1) I'm assuming that you have Adobe Photoshop CS3 already installed on your computer, and 2) You're on a Windows machine. For Mac users, the steps will be the same except that you will need to get the Mac specific files since some of the below URL's point to Windows specific files.

1. Download Adobe Camera Raw plugin for CS3. Current version is 4.6 and is available here.
2. Once the download completes, extract the ZIP file to get its contents. Place the "Camera Raw.8bi" file to "C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Bridge CS3\Plug-Ins" folder. If you had an older version of the Camera Raw plugin, you might need to replace the existing file. Also, saving the original .8bi file might be a good idea, you know, "just in case"!
3. Download and install the Adobe DNG converter from here. The current version is 6.1. Once the download completes (its about 50 megabytes in size!), run the installer. Its fairly simple - you don't need me to tell you how to install that!
4. Once the installation completes, go to Start > Programs > Adobe > Adobe DNG Converter. This will launch the DNG converter utility. It looks as shown below (click on the picture for an enlarged view):
5. Select the folder where you have your NEF files (assuming you've already copied them to your computer from your camera). Select the destination folder and other little options that you want.
6. The important option is to select the compatibility with your camera raw plugin you downloaded in step 1. To do that, click on "Change Preferences" button. It will load another dialog box as shown below (click on the picture for an enlarged view):Make sure to select "Camera Raw 4.6 and later" option in the "Compatibility" drop-down. This is because in step 1, we installed version 4.6 of the plugin.
7. If you wish, you can also embed the original RAW file into your converted DNG files. Such files will be very heavy but the good thing with such files is that from your DNG files, using this utility you can extract back your NEF files. However, the decision is yours.
8. Once done, click on "Ok".
9. Back in the DNG conversion utility, once your settings are complete, click on "Convert". Your files will now start converting to .DNG files. The utility nicely shows the conversion progress for each file you selected.
10. When the conversion completes, simply go to your .DNG files and open them in Adobe Photoshop CS3. It will then open the file using your camera raw plugin, and you can adjust all the settings you want!

Like I said, these steps worked for me, and I am finally able to see just how much of a difference shooting in RAW makes. Although this means that my 4 GB card is probably going to fall short, but from now on I'm going to only shoot in RAW. Maybe I'll have to buy an extra card, but it's definitely worth the little cost.

However, I agree with many who are of the opinion that Nikon needs to get its software act together. The free software (View NX) is hardly of any help when you're shooting RAW. And very cleverly, Nikon markets the better software (Capture NX) in a separate, paid bundle. Sad!