Off the Beaten Path
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada.
Posts: 568
First you need to understand what a RAW file is, and why you would want to shoot RAW in the first place. Your situation sadly illustrates what happens when you do not understand these two things and trust an advice-happy friend who doesn't have to suffer the consequences.
When you shoot with a digital camera, the sensor captures luminance data on an array of red, green and blue sensitive elements. These data are not an image yet - the are the raw data.
There are two alternatives to convert that raw data into a final image. One is to let the camera do it for you. This is what happens when you shoot JPG - the camera's internal processor transforms the red, green and blue dots into an image with millions of colors and saves it to your card as a jpg file.
The second alternative is to save the raw data itself to the card as a RAW file - this is what you did. Because those files are uncompressed, they are huge. And because they are not an image yet, they cannot be parsed by standard image editors - they need to be converted first. Here's where RAW converters enter the picture.
Your camera almost surely came with a RAW converter. There are also free alternatives out there, as well as commercial ones. Lightroom is very popular, as are CaptureOne, DxO and, up the scale, Photoshop. Start with your camera's software and, if you became enamored of RAW, you can think about trading up later.
Why would you want to shoot in RAW in the first place? RAW files capture 12 or 14 bits of information, rather than the 8-bits of a standard JPEG image. There is much more latitude to play with the file should you want to adjust exposure, color settings, contrast, and so on. Computer processors are also much more powerful than camera processors, and hence can use more sophisticated conversion algorithms resulting in better images.
Why wouldn't you want to use RAW? As you have found out, the images are huge. Second, after shooting in RAW, you still have to "process" the images on your computer. If you enjoy getting out more than sitting in front of a screen, you may want to stick to JPEG.
I hope this helps.