12 bit vs 14 bit RAW

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maxward

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Looking at the new Nikon 3200 but it only does 12 bit RAW - I assume to compensate lifting Mpx too 24 - is the loss of 14 bit significant? Or is the uplift in Mpx and new speed processor a better option than say an older Canon550 with 18 Mpx and 14 bit RAW?
 
In all honesty I don't think you'll see much difference in real world photography from the bit depth.
 
Do you need 24Mp? More to the point do you have a PC that will edit files this size efficiently. My 550d gives me .dng files, after converting with ACR, of 15-18Mb, so you are looking at about 20-24Mb files for a 24Mp image. Most monitors will only display 8bits 10 if you are lucky (I think, could be wrong, often am). Its probably best to consider other features on each camera first and leave the bits and pixels to last.
 
Bambi,your correct, most monitors are 8bit displays,i know the larger Dell and hazro's are 10.maybe the dedicated Eizo's are higher,never looked into them but your answer re other features seems spot on even to this beginner(me)
 
The computer you are editing on (let alone the display) and final output format (JPEG) is only 8 bit anyway. What the extra two bits should allow you to do is recover detail/shadows/highlights better when you're processing the RAW file before you convert it to a JPEG.

You probably will only notice it in certain circumstances and you may find that the different implementations - Canon vs Nikon - make it immaterial.
 
Interestingly I was going to pose this question a couple of weeks ago, but as google generally gets me faster results off I went.

The general consensus appears to be that in terms of day to day photography, as Swanseamale has already said, there is no real world difference between 12bit and 14 bit. However it appears that in certain circumstances 14bit can allow a greater latitude in terms of recovering shadow details, also it appears that with a 14bit RAW that's considerably underexposed there's a slightly greater possibility of recovering something usable.

Another argument that abounds is the difference between compressed and uncompressed RAW. Some sources say that it may be possible to recover slightly more highlight detail from an uncompressed RAW due to way compression is applied to RAW, but again outside of lab conditions it seems highly unlikely to be of much benefit to us normal photographers.

This guy did an empirical test and basically found minimal differences. His examples are rather extreme however, and may well have negated any advantage to be found in the differing formats.

Basically YMMV, and probably not by much.
 
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