The Redmond-based software and game console company will work with Adobe, Canon, Fujifilm, and Nikon to better support digital cameras.
Better support of digital cameras will be part of the forthcoming Longhorn operating system from Microsoft. Native support of the RAW image format was announced by Microsoft today.
The company also announced upcoming tools to work with Windows XP. The Microsoft RAW Image Thumbnailer and Viewer for Windows XP, allowing consumers to view thumbnails and preview and print Canon and Nikon RAW files from Windows Explorer.
And, Microsoft will develop a third-party certification for RAW image codecs; any type of format used to compress a file to a smaller size is a codec.
“The explosion in popularity of digital photography on Windows continues to progress and evolve as consumers discover the quality benefits of digital camera RAW,” said Amir Majidimehr, corporate vice president of Windows Digital Media at Microsoft.
Research firm IDC anticipates an increase in demand for digital SLR cameras, according to a press release. That demand will in turn generate demand for support of the RAW format on PCs. The RAW image functions as a digital negative, capturing many more colors and hues than a camera-processed JPEG file.
RAW images have to be processed on a PC rather than in a camera, hence the need for its support by the operating system and imaging applications running on it.
High-end digital images will push another technology besides Microsoft’s next generation operating system. The debut of dual-core processors, which will better support demanding multimedia applications, will give users the hardware support they’ll need for higher-end imaging applications.
That hardware boost along with Longhorn’s RAW format support and new applications from Microsoft’s partners listed earlier all paint a bright picture for digital photography.
David Utter is a staff writer for murdok covering technology and business. Email him here.
