Experienced photographers tend to shoot in the Raw file format because of enhanced image quality and greater flexibility during the editing process. But shooting Raw comes with a penalty because these files are significantly larger than Jpegs and other available formats.

What if you told you that you can take advantages of the benefits Raw files provide, and still save on file space so your storage devices don’t burst at the seams? In the quick video below from the FJH Photography YouTube channel you’ll learn how to enjoy the best of both worlds by converting Raw files to the DNG.

Instructor Francisco Hernandez is a professional photographer specializing in portraiture and lighting. But the conversion process he describes in today’s lesson will be a huge benefit to anyone with a camera—regardless of the type of images they shoot. Best yet, this method is so fast and easy that it takes less than five minutes to explain.

If you’re unfamiliar with the term DNG, it’s simply an abbreviation for “digital negative”—an alternative Raw format from Adobe. Hernandez describes the pros and cons of making the conversion, and in his mind the drawbacks aren’t significant. One thing to keep in mind is that some image editors, other than all Adobe products and Capture One, aren’t compatible with DNG files.

Another consideration is that DNG files don’t include “all the extra metadata” like GPS location data that you receive with conventional Raw files. If you unconcerned with these two caveats, converting to DNG is a great way to go. And you’ll still have key metadata like the camera and lens used, all important settings, confirmation if a flash fired, time and date, and just about everything else you expect.

Hernandez always shoots in Raw for reasons he explains. He pulls up one of his family photos and walks you through the simple step-by-step procedure for converting the file to DNG. He also explains a safety procedure if you’re initially wary of getting the job done so you don’t have to worry about making a mistake and losing one of your favorite shots (which is extremely unlikely) until you get the hang of it.

Once you’re in Lightroom’s Library module simply double click on the image on your screen, and you’ll see a selection of your photos in Filmstrip mode. Then you can select any image you want to keep in the conventional Raw format when converting the others to DNG. To make the conversion just tap on the Library tab atop the screen and then choose the Convert to DNG option from the dropdown menu that appears.

You’ll then see a window with the various settings available, which you can modify to your liking. For example, you can change whether the file extension appears in upper or lower case and determine if you want the original file deleted after it’s converted to DNG. That’s about it. As you’ll see,  the demonstration image shrunk from 2.09GB to 687MB once the conversion was complete.

After watching the video take a peek at the FJH YouTube Channel to see all the other lessons from which to choose. And don’t miss another helpful tutorial we posted recently, explaining how to print photos at home with consistently great results.

Sooner or later all of us hit the doldrums and run out of fresh ideas and inspiration. The quick tutorial below will pay big dividends the next time your imagination runs dry.

Instructor Mario Kilian is a professional photographer based in Germany with 40 years of experience, and he never seems to run out of ideas for helping Shutterbug readers improve their craft. In this six-minute tutorial he offers three great ideas that will provide a big jolt of creativity, and they may even help you “take the perfect photo.”

Kilian kicks off the lesson with this quote from Albert Einstein: “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” As you’ll see, this prophetic observation is just as appropriate for photographers as it is for scientists. In other words, sometimes fresh ideas for making better images require a fresh way of viewing the world around us.

This first tip includes a reminder that there are numerous ways to shoot the same scene or subject, if you’re willing to step outside your comfort zone. This could mean trying a different focal length than you’d typically use for the particular task and hand, experimenting with a new genre of photography, or shooting from a unique vantage point. Kilian suggests a few other possibilities worth trying.

Kilian strongly urges you to take time to carefully study a scene, maybe even walking around the area, before pulling out your gear and starting to shoot. In other words, explore the myriad of possibilities in front of you. This notion applies to the suggestions above and those that follow.

With regard to his second tip, Kilian says this: “A photo is not just a picture of something. A photo is not just a picture of a bird.” The point he’s making is that all great photos tell a story, and Kilian provides some straightforward advice that will help you become a better visual storyteller. Bottom line: when you find something interesting to shoot, do your best to help the viewer understand what was happening at the moment you snapped the shutter.

The video concludes with some recommendations for street photographers. Kilian begins with another insightful quote–this one from Saul Leiter: “There are some things that are out in the open, and there are things that are hidden…the real world has more to do with what is hidden.”  

Killian explains how to leverage this notion and he provide a few illustrative examples to drive the points home.

You can find much more of interest by paying a visit to Kilian’s YouTube channel, and by taking a look at a tutorial we posted recently that demonstrates several pro tips for shooting great landscape photos with a wide-angle lens.