Did my NEF to DNG conversion work properly?

I had read that when I convert to DNG in Lightroom (v4), the file sizes will drop by about 20% (I checked the check box for compression). I'm converting from a batch of 16-bit NEFs I created when scanning slides using the Nikon LS-5000 scanner. Those scans and files were created with Nikon Scan 4.0. After doing the conversion in Lightroom, the DNG file sizes are around 3MB-17MB. The original NEF files were about 135MB. Where in the world did all my data go? I'm concerned that the conversion to DNG threw away a ton of the original data. How is that much of a reduction possible? I'm hoping that there wasn't some catastrophic problem during the conversion, as I also checked the check box to delete the originals after the conversion is finished.
The image quality seems to be okay when looking at the DNG files in Lightroom.
Thanks,
Jay

I scanned at the full resolution (4000dpi, I think) of the LS-5000. The DNGs all appear to have their full original resolution, 5782x3946. This was one of the first things I thought about, too, but the resolution doesn't appear to have been changed any.
Jeff, upon re-opening the Convert Photo to DNG dialog box, I see that I did check "Use Lossy Compression." I spaced. I belived I was telling it to use lossless compression (I was assuming that no compression would have been used otherwise). So the conversion makes them into a high-quality JPEG, basically (but still 16-bit)? If I don't check that, will the DNG conversion use lossless compression, or no compression at all?
These slides are from a few decades to several decades old, all shot by my dad. I'm wondering if I would even see any degradation from using the lossy compression option. 135MB per image seems WAY beyond what is necessary to maintain the quality of these slides, so I would like SOME compression, but don't want to see any clearly visible signs of quality loss. Any words of wisdom welcome.

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Hi all,
since I can't seem to find any definitive information on this... how's Lighroom 4 dealing with 14-bit raw NEF files (coming from a D7000 in this case) when it is converting to DNG? Is the entire 14-bit colour information being kept or is there some sort of loss or conversion going on?
Cheers
Michael

it sort of depends.
NC: Thanks so much, I think at this point the one biggest question I want to put to rest is this: When comparing the pure, raw, unmodified mosaic data in the original raw capture, is there any difference at all between that data and the image data contained in the DNG? A while back someone was trying to convince me they don’t like DNG because the raw data is being modified from the native capture. I’ve never believed this to be the case. Can you describe to me the nature of the image data in the DNG as it compares to the data in the original native file?
EC: This is a tough question to answer. It is a bit of a gray area. The shortest and most honest answer is: it depends!
now the important part for you:
NC: Great, got it. Just one final question, if you don’t mind: if I convert a raw file from a _typical_ DSLR (eg my Canon 5D Mark II) is the scene-referred data contained in that DNG any different than the original scene-referred data in the native raw file?
EC: No, they should be identical in the typical case (e.g., Nikon SLR, Canon SLR). An exception in the case of Canon SLR is the S-RAW and M-RAW modes. Those are not really mosaic files; they are stored in a quasi-JPEG like YCbCr space (luminance and color components), which DNG does not natively support. As a result, if you convert a S-RAW or M-RAW Canon file to DNG, it will get mapped to a RGB color space before getting stored into the DNG container (and hence will not be the same as the original).
read more here:
http://www.natcoalson.com/blog/2011/11/29/my-adobe-dng-chat-with-eric-chan/

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What info is tossed when converting from .Nef > .DNG?
For example, I just converted a file and the Info says:
.NEF (15.6MB) > .DNG (10.9)
Is that one third drop in MB just Nikon encoding? Or is the image affected?

Try posting in the DNG forum. There are separate forums for DNG and for ACR.
http://forums.adobe.com/community/dng#
http://forums.adobe.com/community/cameraraw
(The answer is probably DNG compression; but let the pros there tell you.)

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I was aware that the numbers were relative and would likely be different, but in this case the images are visibly very different--I just gave the numbers to indicate what LR saw them as. When the difference is between 5600 (NEF) and 7100 (dng) one sees a big difference between the cool NEF and the warm dng on the screen. This difference is seen systematically in a batch of about 75 images. LR shows no metadata differences except the WB reading. Could this have resulted from a dng conversion in an older dng converter?

NEF --- DNG Conversion: Is it lossy or lossless?

I was recently reading on a Nikon Forum where a writer stated that some data is lost when converting to DNG in Lightroom. His comments follow.
I'd appreciate if some of the seasoned experts here would offer an opinion, and hopefully, a rebuttal. Thanks for any information you can share on this subject
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Every compression algorith is flawed if a single bit is lost and the original can not be recreated. Since the DNG converter must know about your camera model and it actually converts the NEF into an image before compressing the image, AND you can not, after converting to DNG convert back to original NEF, it is to me obvious that it is indeed a lossy compression, not just 'simple' data compression like zip, tar or whatever other type of data compression you want to compare with, which is truly lossless.
The Nikon lossless compression works entirely on data compression principle, preserving every bit and recreating every bit of data when you edit the raw image, and that can not be done once the image is converted to DNG. That is why many people, who use DNG, also preserve the original NEF, which in my opinion, is a totally pointless work flow. The only reason I can see to use DNG is the ability to share the image with somebody else who is not able to edit NEF, but I might as well use TIFF in that case.
The DNG converter must have knowledge of the camera model concerned, and be able to process the source raw image file, including key metadata to be able to convert and compress. A real lossless compression algorithm NEVER looks at the contents of the data because it is totally irrelevant for the converter to know what type of data you convert and try to compress, since it is based on mathematical patterns and statistics only.
I look at DNG like I look at PDF. A Word document, especially with photographs in it, can be converted to PDF and it may look like you have not lost anything, but yes, you have lost a lot actually and you can never ever recreate the original Word document with the same quality like you have had in your original.
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727737757 wrote:
The only reason why I convert NEF to DNG is that I like *not* having sidecar files.
A perfectly valid reason to convert to DNG, in my opinion.
And if you are using in Adobe software, you will notice no ill side-effects (e.g. no data loss) whatsoever, so I think you can have full confidence..
But to offer a little more explanation:
The DNG converter needs to know the camera model because it's doing a lot more than "zipping" up the raw data. e.g. it's also creating a camera profile, and interpreting white balance..
Obviously, lossy compression is, well, lossy - I was talking about the lossless compression of raw data, which is 100% perfectly lossless (not a single bit is dropped..).
But if you open a NEF in Aperture, you can see the focus point. If you open the converted DNG, you can't. Not because the focus point information is not in the DNG file, but because it's not in a prescribed place where Aperture can find it - so you could say it's "lost" for practical purposes, although that's not how I think of it.
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Did my NEF to DNG conversion work properly?

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