photographer, final images too small.

[Erica98A4]

Hello I have a question. I am a photographer, I used to be delivering final images around 15mb. Recently I double checked and noticed my final images are around 5mb. Im not sure why this is happening. Ive imported a raw into lightroom, done literally nothing to it, then exported it and it went from 22.9mb raw in camera to 8.09mb (no cropping and no editing done). Why is this happening? Is there an import setting that is making them smaller as soon as they come in? My export settings are 100 quality jpeg srgb, with a resolituon of 300 pixels per inch. 

Erica

[GoldingD]

RAW file size does not equate to JPEG file size.

somewhat outdated, but see: 

https://blog.kenkaminesky.com/on1-photo-raw-review/raw-vs-jpeg/

[dgolfnut55]

Under phote you can "show in explorer".  Then right click on the raw file and verify it's size.  There is a preset when you export to export a full size jpeg.  Also see if you have "Resize to fit" checked under Image sizing in the export dialog.  This will shrink the final size.

[gary_sc]

Hi Erica,

I just did a test, my image size is comparible to you. I have a Canon 7Dm2 and the DNG size of an image is around 21-ish, 22-ish (depending on how complex the image is).

When I export as per your settings, I get 7.8 MB. If I take that same image, send it off to PS and export at comparible settings, I get 8.1. Not much difference. This particular image is half sky and half "stuff." I just took a different image with more "stuff" in it and that image saved out at 12.3 MB

The only thing I can think of is that these images are not as complex as your previous images. For example, if you take a photo of the sky and compare that to a photo of a field of flowers, you'll get significantly different file sizes.

[Just Shoot Me]

Without see screen shots of both the Library module showing the image you are asking about and the right hand side panel, Metadata section Expanded and all other sections Collapsed, and the Export Dialog window showing the settings you used for the exported image in question. It is hard to say why this image is such a small size in MB's

[D Fosse]

Jpeg file sizes can be all over the map according to image content. It tells you absolutely nothing.

Jpeg uses data compression to reduce file size. The quality slider determines how aggressive that compression is, but that scale goes from "extreme" to "strong". There is no way to turn it off. "Maximum quality" does not actually mean maximum quality. There is still very aggressive and destructive compression.

In fact, it can be argued that max quality jpeg defeats the whole purpose. There is still very much destructive compression, but you're not getting full payoff in terms of file size reduction. 60-80 will reduce file size significantly, with very little immediate visual difference.