Once the software is installed and it becomes the default RAW file opener in your operating system, you can use it to quickly view RAW images, delete unneeded/bad photographs and set ratings and labels right on your memory card or hard drive, so your post-processing software like Lightroom will be able to import and utilize the provided rating data. That’s where FastRawViewer comes to the rescue.
In short, one would be much better off by reducing the number of images before they are inserted into a photo catalog. Deleted photographs could still continue occupying space if not removed properly, and since photo catalogs utilize a database for storing information about images, it could get bloated over time, if not properly optimized. On top of this, post-processing software such as Lightroom and Aperture is far from being ideal for fast and efficient culling of images. This not only increases the amount of time it takes to import and process images, but it also slows down backup and increases storage requirements, essentially decreasing the overall workflow efficiency. With such a large number of images, photographers often end up importing all RAW files into their photo libraries and either do the culling/clean-up process afterward or end up storing all photographs indefinitely. Although the best practice is to shoot selectively and try to reduce the number of duplicates and problematic photographs in-camera, many of us run into time constraints and other issues, leaving the process of sorting through captured images for later. When photographing weddings, photographers often average between 15 images, and those who photograph sports and wildlife can potentially end up with many more. Why Use FastRawViewer?Īfter coming back from a photo shoot, one of the biggest problems many of us face is the sheer number of photographs that we end up with. Being a non-destructive editor (meaning, it only reads RAW images and does not modify them in any way), FastRawViewer can be used effectively for picking, ranking keepers, and discarding problematic images before they are imported into a photo catalog. Unlike many RAW image viewers, FastRawViewer does not just read embedded JPEG images from RAW files, but it also renders RAW files as a normal RAW processor would (such as Adobe Camera RAW, Lightroom, Aperture, etc).
Whether the software is used for the culling part of the photography workflow process, for technical analysis or basic corrections, FastRawViewer is not only capable of opening RAW files from virtually every known digital camera, but it also does it at an incredibly fast speed, as the name implies. In this review, I will take a closer look at FastRawViewer, go through some of its features, and hopefully help you in simplifying both your workflow and your photo backup/storage needs.įastRawViewer is a software utility for both PCs and Macs that is specifically designed for efficient viewing of RAW and DNG images. It was developed by the same folks that created RawDigger – one of the best scientific tools for analyzing RAW images. Enter FastRawViewer, an amazingly fast and truly inexpensive RAW file viewer that has become my personal choice for culling images. At $150, however, Photo Mechanic costs as much as a retail version of Lightroom, becoming a cost barrier for many. Sadly, Lightroom is quite weak at quickly previewing images, so working pros and enthusiasts usually end up complementing the culling part of their workflow with additional software like Photo Mechanic. Those who try to cull images in Lightroom know that if a full-size image preview is not generated at the time of import, it can take a long time to render each image. Many photographers end up keeping all RAW images on their computers, because they do not want to go through the hassle of deleting bad images they will never use, only to realize over time that their hard drives get filled up quickly and their post-processing time takes much longer. And this gets even more painful when working with RAW images because operating systems usually have no built-in capabilities to view and properly render RAW files. No matter what software one uses for post-processing photographs, the process of selecting what images to keep and work on, also known as “culling”, can be quite painful when dealing with thousands of images.
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