OpenRAW has pushed its typical antipathy towards DNG to a new level!
<http://www.openraw.org/>
<http://www.openraw.org/node/1482>

They are giving prominence to a long article "DNG is not the answer", from their mailing list. Some extracts:

"Let me first make one thing clear: DNG is not an open standard for defining and storing all needed RAW camera information.
DNG makes the RAW format problem worse, not better.
DNG is not an open standard in that it does not document all the essential information contained in current RAW format files like NEF and CR2 (which also don't document this information).
In many ways, DNG can be viewed as simply yet another RAW format with undocumented information - except that DNG has the added risk that information can be lost during conversion to/from DNG and other RAW formats.
From a software developer point of view, DNG is a step backwards. From a camera manufacture's perspective, DNG does not address the missing elements in EXIF.
From a photographers perspective, DNG is dangerous because people believe they are storing for the future with the format, when nothing could be further from the truth".
(And so on).

I've been a (somewhat critical) supporter of OpenRAW since it was launched. I think DNG and OpenRAW can complement one-another. Better documentation of raw file formats will lead to better DNG converters and then more confidence in DNG. I've published my views at:
<http://www.barry.pearson.name/articles/dng/openraw.htm>

Barry's response (last link in original post) to this rant on the OpenRAW mailing list is very good (and accurate).

Q: ?

Is the OpenRAW position representitive of a broad consensus of RAW users--
i.e. photographers, publishers, manufacturers, archivists, service bureaus,
printers --or is it mostly representitive of only a small part of that
population?




I hardly feel the openRAW groups position is representitive of designers, service bureaus, publishers, and printers??? There needs to be a portable solution aside from begging camera makers to reveal their commercial recipies.

nunatak, OpenRAW itself was launched over 11 months ago. They were, and still are, a "single issue lobby group". That issue is concern over the lack of documentation of the camera manufacturers' raw file formats, and they lobby for these to be openly published.

They have always taken a rather dismissive attitude towards DNG. Perhaps they see it as a distraction or diversion from the one issue they care strongly about. When their web site was launched, there were only about 25 non-Adobe products that supported DNG in any way, and it is unlikely they knew the number was even that size.

That anti-DNG article probably started out as a personal position piece by its author. But it was taken out of its original context, (the OpenRAW mailing list), and displayed in a very prominent place on the OpenRAW home page. That was a deliberate act by the OpenRAW team! Another deliberate act in the last couple of days was to remove "(and Adobe has created)" from part of their discussion of the problem: "Many have suggested (and Adobe has created) a common, open file format for RAW image files for all camera makers to use as a solution to the RAW problem".

There is a hint of a (one sided) "holy war" here. Perhaps the OpenRAW team feel threatened by the progress of DNG. In 11 months, DNG has increased its support to over 100 non-Adobe product. But OpenRAW hasn't made any visible progress of its own. As far as I can tell, the only change to the publication of cameras' raw file formats in the last 11 months is that some cameras now use DNG!

This is sad. OpenRAW has a "brand" that could be used to better effect. They have lots of individual supporters, many of who actually thought "OpenRAW" was all about an open common raw format! They live in a world where people ask them how they position themselves against those advocating DNG. They may have an unfortunate answer.