About the file size on MM

[totorol]

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Hi everyone,

 

I just got my MM last week and I was wondering about the file size of MM.

 

I have been reading a lot about MM on the net, I found out that the uncompressed DNG which is 18mp will be about 36mb. I leave my setting in DNG 18mp which should be uncompressed but the file size I got was around 19-22mb.

 

Is there any part which I am missing or did I set it up wrong?

 

Any comments will be appreciated, and thanks in advance!

 

Tony

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[michali]

Have you checked the camera menu to make sure that the camera is set to "uncompressed" ?

 

18MP @ "uncompressed" setting produces a file of about 36MB.

18MP @ "compressed" setting produces a file of about 19MB.

[totorol]

Hi Michali,

 

Thanks for your reply.

 

I checked in Menu, but I can not find anywhere which indicates to set compressed or uncompressed. Can you please be specific on which option to select?

 

The only place I see is press set button and choose DNG, JPG or DNG+JPG, which I thought that I should set it in DNG and it will produce uncompressed format.

 

Thanks

Tony

 

Have you checked the camera menu to make sure that the camera is set to "uncompressed" ?

 

18MP @ "uncompressed" setting produces a file of about 36MB.

18MP @ "compressed" setting produces a file of about 19MB.

[sandymc]

Has the file been (re-)processed through Lightroom or DNG converter, etc? Because that sounds like LR or ACR's lossless compression.

 

Sandy

[totorol]

Hi Sandy,

 

Thank you for your reply!

 

Yes, I import it to LR, convert to DNG again, so that means I re-processed. Does that mean its been commpressed again?

What should I do, do I just copy the DNG on MM to LR to avoid commpreesion in LR?

 

Thanks,

Tony

 

Has the file been (re-)processed through Lightroom or DNG converter, etc? Because that sounds like LR or ACR's lossless compression.

 

Sandy

[01af]

I checked in Menu, but I can not find anywhere which indicates to set compressed or uncompressed. Can you please be specific on which option to select?

If I remember correctly, only the M9 and M9-P (and most likely now the M-E, too) offer the option to switch between compressed and uncompressed DNG modes. In the M8 and M8.2 it's always compressed; in the M Monochrom, always uncompressed.

 

If you're getting files that are significantly smaller than 36 - 37 MB then some other compression has been applied. My guess is the same as Sandy's: Adobe DNG lossless compression upon import to Lightroom. Did you use Lightroom's import feature?

 

 

EDIT: Oops, your reply came in while I typed ...

 

 

Yes, I import it to Lightroom, convert to DNG again [...]. Does that mean it's been compressed again?

No. It just means the files have been compressed.

 

 

What should I do, do I just copy the DNG from M Monochrom to Lightroom to avoid compression in Lightroom?

If you want to avoid the compression then you may indeed simply copy the files from the memory card to your hard disk manually, circumventing Lightroom's import feature. Or better yet, switch off the lossless compression in the Lightroom Import preferences. But then, Adobe's lossless DNG compression is a good thing. There's no reason to avoid it. To the contrary, you should embrace it. It saves considerable amounts of storage space in the long run and speeds up subsequent handling of the files when loading, copying, or backing up due to the smaller file size.

Edited October 15, 2012 by 01af

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To disable Lightroom's lossless compression, use 'copy' instead of 'copy as DNG' in Lightroom's Import menu.

 

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[totorol]

Thank you for reply, 01af!

 

I checked the file size in my SD card before import into LR, and the size is right, 34mb.

 

So now the problem is in LR, the loseless compression makes the size smaller.

The lossless compression is really loseless? It kind shrinks 30%of its size! If its really loseless, then there is really no point of using size of 34mb!

 

Cheers,

Tony

 

 

If I remember correctly, only the M9 and M9-P (and most likely now the M-E, too) offer the option to switch between compressed and uncompressed DNG modes. In the M8 and M8.2 it's always compressed; in the M Monochrom, always uncompressed.

 

If you're getting files that are significantly smaller than 36 - 37 MB then some other compression has been applied. My guess is the same as Sandy's: Adobe DNG lossless compression upon import to Lightroom. Did you use Lightroom's import feature?

 

 

EDIT: Oops, your reply came in while I typed ...

 

 

 

No. It just means the files have been compressed.

 

 

 

If you want to avoid the compression then you may indeed simply copy the files from the memory card to your hard disk manually, circumventing Lightroom's import feature. Or better yet, switch off the lossless compression in the Lightroom Import preferences. But then, Adobe's lossless DNG compression is a good thing. There's no reason to avoid it. To the contrary, you should embrace it. It saves considerable amounts of storage space in the long run and speeds up subsequent handling of the files when loading, copying, or backing up due to the smaller file size.

[sandymc]

The lossless compression is really loseless? It kind shrinks 30%of its size! If its really loseless, then there is really no point of using size of 34mb!

 

It really is lossless - its like a ZIP file.

 

The only possible disadvantage is that other raw converters may not be able to read DNGs that have gone through LR/ACR. So unless you're certain you won't ever want to use another raw processor, you should keep a copy of the originals as they came out of the camera.

 

Sandy

[totorol]

Thank you Sandy!!

I totally understand what it does now!

 

I probably will just stick in LR, so no problem for now!

 

Cheers,

Tony

 

It really is lossless - its like a ZIP file.

 

The only possible disadvantage is that other raw converters may not be able to read DNGs that have gone through LR/ACR. So unless you're certain you won't ever want to use another raw processor, you should keep a copy of the originals as they came out of the camera.

 

Sandy