Digital BW, The Print

Bruce,

> Set your digital camera to save your photos in RAW mode. This will retain
> all the information captured by the chip and adjust your "development" in
> software when converting from the RAW format.

No matter what you do, you can't contract the original image to fit within
the range of the sensor.  You can, of course, expand the image data to
occupy the entire N bit space...but, unlike film, you don't get the actual
intermediate tonal values.  Those are retained on film, but can not be with
a digital sensor.

> I don't know that this will equal shooting B&W film for exposure latitude,
> but it should easily record more of the scene than slide film
> provided that
> your camera is up to the task.

Raw mode does not effect what the camera records, and therefore doesn't
actually "record" more of the scene.  The camera ALWAYS takes the image in
raw mode.  The camera uses that same raw data to convert to what ever output
you want (apply setpoints, tonal curves, Bayer pattern reconciliation etc.).
What you can do with the raw data is possibly set better setpoints than the
camera chose for you.

Regards,

Austin