Today’s Question: Regarding the use of Camera Raw to process a JPEG image, how do you actually get the image to open in Camera Raw? When I open a JPEG in Photoshop it doesn’t bring up Camera Raw.
Tim’s Quick Answer: If you enable support for JPEG/HEIC or TIFF files in the Camera Raw preferences, opening an image in Photoshop will cause it to open in Camera Raw. You can also use the Camera Raw filter to process non-raw images in Photoshop.
More Detail: While Camera Raw is primarily aimed at processing raw captures to open in Photoshop, you can also process JPEG, HEIC, and TIFF images with Camera Raw.
Many photographers may find the option to use Camera Raw as a filter as a more streamlined option. You can select an image layer on the Layers panel in Photoshop (and duplicate that layer or convert to a Smart Object if you prefer) and then choose Filter > Camera Raw Filter to process that layer using the Camera Raw filter. This isn’t entirely the same as Camera Raw, but it does provide most of the features with a more streamlined workflow.
You can also configure Photoshop to automatically open JPEG/HEIC or TIFF images with Camera Raw through the File Handling tab of the Camera Raw Preferences dialog. You can access this dialog in Photoshop by going to the Edit menu on Windows or the Photoshop menu on Macintosh and then choosing Preferences (Windows) or Settings (Macintosh) followed by Camera Raw. In Camera Raw you can click the gear icon toward the top-right of the interface to bring up Camera Raw Preferences.
On the File Handling tab of the Camera Raw Preferences dialog in the File Format Handling section you’ll find popups for JPEG/HEIC and TIFF. If you want all images to open with Camera Raw you can choose the “Automatically open all…” option. If you only want to open non-raw images that have previously been processed with Camera Raw you can choose “Automatically Open… with Settings”. If you don’t want to open the images in Camera Raw you can choose “Disable… Support”. Note that these popup options will also reflect the JPEG/HEIC or TIFF file format for the respective popups.
Based on the setting you have selected, JPEG, HEIC, and TIFF images can then be processed with Camera Raw when you open them with Photoshop (or via Adobe Bridge to Photoshop).
