> > > > > Canon & Nikon don't make their RAW converters > > > available for free, do they? > Can someone enlighten me on the RAW format. Is this different per > supplier? Can't you use a converter from say Canon to convert a RAW > format coming from a Nikon camera?
No. Quite apart from the fact that the cameras use different chips (in some cases even based on different sensor technologies) there's also all the additional information; the stuff that shows up in the EXIF tags. I'd be extremely surprised if any two manufacturers even wrote out just the same data, let alone in the same units and in the same order. Then there are all the parameters and settings from the camera that don't show up in EXIF tags, but which might be needed. If you've got a converter that can read (and process) the data from one manufacturer it shouldn't be too hard to modify it to handle the data from a different manufacturer; most of the processing will be the same. That's what some third-party software does. But it's not in Canon's interests to make it easy for you to use a Nikon camera (and vice versa), so don't look for that ability in their software.
