Digital BW, The Print

Hi Greg,

> So as just one examle, you are saying that the Foveon technology
> does not need to be
> white balanced? Setpoints and curves adjusted?

No, not at all.  I am saying the raw data from the Foveon camera is not
[your list above], but that is true for even the Bayer pattern sensors...but
with the Bayer pattern sensors, the data still has to have the color
interpolation done, but with the Foveon it does not.  It is the need for the
Bayer interpolation that causes the raw image data from these cameras to
have to be treated "special", and that's eliminated with the Foveon.

> I'll bet that just like every other manufacturer, they use a
> proprietary file format for their
> 'raw' files.

Well, they kind of do.  It's Run Length Encoded (RLE).  These formats aren't
really proprietary, in the sense that they're "secret", they just have to be
decoded.  RLE is very very simple to decode.  It's simply a list of two
numbers, first number being the count and the second number being the value.
I'm somewhat surprised they even do it at all.

I really wish they would just use TIFF with the Foveon.  With the Foveon,
using TIFF makes sense, since it's exactly like raw data from a scanner,
unlike the Bayer pattern sensors, which is simply single color information
per what ever you call a unit of a single color, as it isn't really a
pixel...and there's no official name for it...

> Nearly every pro I know using pro quality digital today is
> shooting in 'raw' file mode. The
> advantages are just too great to ignore.

What software do "they" use to do the Bayer pattern interpolation?  But to
go back to my original point on this particular discussion, the raw data
from the Foveon is entirely different than the raw data from a Bayer pattern
camera, since you don't have to do any interpolation, and every pixel does
contain full color information.

Austin