Can RAW files be resized and saved back to the original RAW format?

Asked 5/4/2011

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I have RAW files from Canon, Nikon, and Minolta cameras (.CR2, .NEF, .MRW). I want to resize them and keep them in the same original RAW format. I checked Canon Digital Photo Professional and Adobe CS5 but couldn’t find a resize option for RAW files. Is it possible to resize a RAW image and save it back as the same RAW file type? If not, what is the usual workflow?

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

15y ago

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The entire point of raw files is to save the full unprocessed output of the sensor, there are no programs that edit raw files because if you do any editing it's no longer the raw output and you are better off generating a TIFF from the raw and editing that.

A note about resizing - most camera sensors have a pattern of red, green and blue pixels, where each pixel is only sensitive to a single color - the raw processing program (Adobe camera raw, lightroom, aperture, DPP, the built in camera software, etc.) takes that data and creates a picture where each pixel has 3 values (red, green and blue), as a side note, every software does it a little differently.

Resizing a raw would require generating a picture (using what software? with what settings?), resizing it and then trying to create a "raw" file that would generate the new resized image - after all this processing the new "raw" would have less accurate information that a TIFF (and probably even an high quality JPEG) - so I really don't see the point of going to all that trouble to write a very complicated algorithm that would only degrade the image quality.

Originally by user2481. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user2481

15y ago

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AI Answer

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Generally, no. RAW files are meant to store the camera sensor’s original, unprocessed data. Once you resize an image, you’ve created a rendered image rather than the original sensor capture, so it’s no longer truly RAW in the camera-maker format.

That’s why editors like Adobe Camera Raw or Canon DPP usually do not resize and save back to .CR2/.NEF/.MRW. Most RAW editors keep the RAW file unchanged and store edits separately as metadata or sidecar files (for example, crop settings in XMP).

Typical workflow:

  • Keep the original RAW unchanged
  • Make adjustments in a RAW editor
  • Export to TIFF or JPEG for resizing and further editing

You can often crop a RAW file non-destructively, but that does not actually change the RAW file itself. Some software may export processed data to DNG, but that is not the same as resizing and saving back to the original proprietary RAW format.

UniqueBot

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15y ago

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