PhotoRaw App Reviews

When I started shooting mostly RAW it spoiled the fun of editing photos on my iPad. The iPad imports RAW but you really cant do much with the photos except store them and transfer them to your computer. This app changes that. I mainly use the app to convert my RAW shots to JPEG (although you can do some basic edining in the app). I can then edit the JPEGs with a variety of other, very capable photo editing apps. If theres a shot I really like I can edit the original RAW on my Mac. I have a Canon S95 and a Panasonic G1 and both RAW formats import into the app without prpblem. I did have some issues with the app becoming non-responsive after exporting to JPEG but after restarting my iPad the problems went away. In trying to figure out the problem I found the developer to be very responsive with email. There are some improvments that Id like to see and the developer said they will be comming over the next several releases. Top among them for me are: - Ability to select multiple photos and have them automatically export one after the other. - Less sensitive in-app image manipulation controls. Currently, a small movement of the slider prduces a BIG effect. - Ability to restore to the original RAW after manipulating an image. One word of caution. RAW images are large and the app takes a while to import a photo, about a minute for a 10 MByte image on my iPad 1. The developer said the next release will bring significant performance improvements. But I expect the times to remain in the 20 to 40 sec range for some time to come, perhaps much faster on the iPad 2. All in all the app provides important functions for RAW shooters and I look forward to its evolution.

Wonderful application. It is not the fastest workflow, but that has more to do with the horsepower of the iPad than the app. Equally important, fantastic support from Sandy, kudos there so in all, very happy with this

Not worth the money. You barely do anything with the image as far as editing. Im dissapointed. Wish i had saved my money.

Versions prior to 3 were a little slow when opening a file but version 3 seems better. I also like the new controls such as recovery, white balance, and reset. The app is also more stable. Good improvements! Thank you!

I am using the March 16, 2012 version with Nikon (D300) and Sony (NEX-5N) raw files and find the app works flawlessly. The Sony files are much larger than the Nikon files and take longer to open. This app is the only one I have that lets me see the raw files in a raw+jpg couple. Once the image is open, the live view while making adjustments is instantaneous. The image is large and the controls unobtrusive. The adjustments are the essentials that you need to get information from the raw files and are easy to use. The app has the nicest way of saving jpgs that I have seen. You turn cylinders, like setting times on the iPad calendar, to select the jpg size and quality. The app displays ample technical metadata. It would be nice if it also displayed IPTC (XMP version), because one Nikon model allows the writing of IPTC into the image and presumably more will follow. This app preserves the original filename. The time it takes for the iPad to open a raw image precludes mass production, but it is a very nice app for selected images.

At some point itd be great to get higher-res previews available for DNG raw files. The only way I can achieve this now using your app is to shoot raw+jpg (vs shooting only DNG raw). PhotoRaw then previews the jpg. I guess its an Apple compatibility issue (?), but having that feature would be great.

I am processing files from the Fuji x pro 1 which no one else really supports at this time. It does a good job but it is slow to process and seems to be missing tools like shaprening and cropping. I found I needed to use a stylus to move the sliders, but I do have big fingers and the stylus worked fine. I would like to see the speed increased as well as some more tools. It does work however. I moved the final Jpeg into Adobe Photo express, cropped it and sharpened a very tiny bit and sent to Facebook. I would also like the option of saving the file as a Tiff which I could work a bit more with in Adobe Lightroom 4.1 at least until Adobe adds the Fuji to its system.

If your are a Leica shooter looking for a solution for your dng files on the iPad this is the killer app! I have my iPad in my go kit and this helps with the iPad camera capture kit thumbnail problem and has helped speed up my work flow. Now only if we could plugin to Lr or Ps. Spend the money and see for yourself!

Im a semi-pro photographer and shoot in RAW format 99% of the time. Currently I use Apples Aperture for my RAW conversion and post processing. Although I find Aperture an excellent photo processor, it can be a little confusing at times with all of its capabilities. I saw this app while browsing the app store and decided to download after reading the developers web site. I was pleased to find it did what is advertised and does it well. Further, it is very simplistic to use and gets down to the basics of post processing. I wish it had an histogram view but not a major issue, just would be a little helpful. Performance is not bad but be prepared to wait a little during up loads. The controls are good but can be hard to make very minor changes with the sliders (a little tweaking could fix this), should be just a little smoother but, again not a major issue. For basic post processing work it is excellent; easy to use, all of the basic adjustments are available. I use this app in the field for quick post processing on my New IPAD, then up load into my MAC Mini or MAC PRO to use Aperture for extra fine detail work, then print or save to JPEGs. This app will get a lot use during my photo sessions. Nice job! Recommend to any photographer shooting RAW format.

The importing process is slow (45s/40MB image); this makes the app useful for individual photos but not batches. I use this with my D800 and it is fantastic to be able to see the full resolution RAWs on my iPad (normal import limits the resolution). The interface still needs some help. The recovery algorithm doesnt provide anything I would ever use, the sliders are a bit finicky, and could use a reset button. It would also be nice to have a comparison button that let you see the image before and after changes. While I certainly appreciate functionality over the GUI experience, this app leaves me wishing for a revamp. Overall, if you like to review specific shots on your iPad, this gives you the extra depth the native photo app does not.

Prior versions were buggy and slow to open DNGs even with a freshly reset device. Now DNGsopen fast and its worth the price. Great update!

I use this all the time with my Canon 1d Mark IV.

I have used PhotoRaw on an ipad2 for 1 1/2 years to convert Leica M9 DNG and Canon 5D RAW files while traveling. The earlier versions were slow but the current version of PhotoRaw is acceptable in speed on the iPad2 for converting a few RAW photos to email to friends while Im travelling. Once home, I would use Lightroom to make the final RAW conversions. It does not substitute for Lightroom or Photoshop on a full fledged computer. It is limited by the iPads limitations,such as inability to calibrate the screen to provide precise color management, the limited processor capabilites, and relatively small amount of RAM. I dont use PhotoRaw for most photos that I take, just the few that my friends would like to see before I return home. Users who complain about the program crashing may want to make sure that other programs running in the background are shut down, in order to free up additional RAM. For someone who takes RAW photos and would like to email (or upload onto social media sites) a few photos while travelling without a full-fledged computer, PhotoRaw provides a solution.

This wont help you download from an sd card directly into the ipad!

All I wanted was an app that ingests NEF files and exports them as high quality JPGs so that I can work with them in other apps; this app does exactly that! Thank you, Alexander McGuffog!

Please refund my money. If you were hoping for tools that work like in Lightroom, this app is unfortunately not a good choice.

There are faster apps with more features, but none matches this one for RAW processing. Those of us who take RAW images do so because we dont want an altered view of what we shot. Other apps seem to render something that bears little resemblance to the original. This one gives a faithful result, if slowly.

Works great on my 1st gen iPad Mini. Pulling 600 stock NEFs off of SD cards/ converting and uploading to DeviantArt as stock ... its working well for an app on a tablet. As in other reviews - dont expect something this CPU intensive to be rocket fast (its not), but if you enjoy sitting on the couch playing with RAW photos on a tablet then this is a good solid app for doing that.

This app decodes my Canon RAW files better than Filterstorm, Photogene, or PiRAWnha—the images are appreciably sharper, more detailed, somewhat less noisy, and have superior dynamic ranges, most of the time. Its the one RAW decoder app that consistently delivers the advantages of working with RAW files and without much more latency than Im used to running Aperture on my i5 MacBook Pro. On my iPhone 5S, its impressively fast—batch import/export ends up being very useful. In terms of workflow efficiency, the problem is the user interface needs work: sliders are hard to move accurately, theres no ability to save or load presets, etc. With a little bit of polishing, this app could be a game changer for photojournalists on the go. I cant wait for the day this thing is able to import a batch of files, apply a little bit of processing to them, and dump them into Photogene.

Nothing promised was delivered. Terrible app and very overpriced