Ok...so this is a confusing issue for me and occasionally there is a brain f**t and I have not received a definite answer from BH Photo....no, have not talked to Nikon at this point.

FACT: When the setting is RAW only, there is no option to set L,M or S, at least on the D7000 so it would seem that it is shooting at the native resolution on the camera of 16.2 MP.

FACT: The L,M or S image size applies to .jpg only so with reference to the D7000 the L=16.2 MP .jpg, M=9.0 MP .jpg and S=4.0 MP .jpg

Question 1: Regarding the Nikon camera such as D7000, D800, when the camera is set to shoot at "RAW + jpg Normal-S(mall) my understanding that the "Small" refers to the image quality of the .jpg file only and the RAW (NEF) file is ALWAYS the native resolution of the camera ie: 16.2, 36.3 respectfully, is this correct?

Question 2: When considering the purchase of the D800, is there any way to set the camera to shoot anything less than 36.3 MP with a RAW file?

Maybe I'm answering my own questions

1) RAW is always at the native resolution.
2) No

Enjoy!

Randy

Shooting Raw Compressed or Raw Lossless will create a smaller Raw file than Raw uncompressed. These option are in your settings menu.

For question 1, the small, medium, and large only effects the JPEG. The Raw size is still determined by what you have set up in your menu area as Raw compressed, Raw lossless compression or raw uncompressed.

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>The Raw size is still determined by what you have set
>up in your menu area as Raw compressed, Raw lossless
>compression or raw uncompressed.

Lest this confuse the OP, the RAW file is always the native resolution.

The compression options change the RAW file size, not the resolution --- the compression options invoke in-camera processes to reduce file size, sometimes to the detriment of quality, but the resolution always remains the same.

As an aside, JPG is always detrimental to quality -- the question is, can you perceive it?

AviSys

>>The Raw size is still determined by what you have set
>>up in your menu area as Raw compressed, Raw lossless
>>compression or raw uncompressed.
>
>Lest this confuse the OP, the RAW file is always the native
>resolution.
>
>The compression options change the RAW file size, not the
>resolution --- the compression options invoke in-camera
>processes to reduce file size, sometimes to the detriment of
>quality, but the resolution always remains the same.

Thank you for your clarification, I did assume that the actual MP was not being reduced in RAW merely by reducing the compression
>

Welcome to Nikonians, Bob

Answer 1: You're correct that the choice of Image Size - L, M or S - applies only to JPG images.

Answer 2: Whilst NEF images are always native size, the D800 has a selection of Crop Modes which use smaller areas of the sensor, and thus produce lower NEF file sizes. The pixel dimensions of the various crop options are:

FX (the whole sensor) - 7360 x 4912
5x4 - 6144 x 4912
1.2x - 6144 x 4080
DX - 4800 x 3200

NEF file sizes can also be reduced by selecting one of the Compressed NEF options, as mentioned above.

Brian
Welsh Nikonian
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