Why I’m Glad I Kept My Old RAW Images.
This isn’t a RAW vs. JPEG debate blog post, I promise. Rather, this is a story, an experiment, and an experience. But maybe by the end of this post, you’ll think about saving some of your RAW files too, even if you don’t think you’ll use & edit them today - because looking back, I’m really glad I did.
Background
In 2018, when photography was just a hobby, I visited Japan for the first time. I’d just graduated from college and was excited to be spending two weeks exploring Japan, half solo and half with friends. Just prior to Japan, I’d spend ten days exploring Seoul and other parts of South Korea. For a young kid, it was just about a dream summer trip.
My old photography kit was one camera and one lens: the 18MP Canon Rebel T5 + 18-55 kit lens. Until this trip, though, I’d never kept any RAW images - I’d just save the JPEGs I liked to my laptop and reformat the card after. After coming back home, I decided to keep the RAW images for the first time, unaware that I’d create this time-capsule-esque project for myself seven years later. Looking back, I don’t recall if there was a particular reason I decided to keep the RAWs this time around. I do remember that I’d started to get more interested in editing, and everything I read online pointed to starting with RAW image files. But even after the trip, I only edited, posted, and shared a few JPEGs.
After forgetting about them for years, I rediscovered about 500 RAWs from that trip while backing up some old files from my HDD to my NAS last week. And that’s when the fun began!
My Approach to Photography in 2018: Very Casual
In those days, as a relatively inexperienced hobbyist, I didn’t pay much attention to the technical aspects of the exposure triangle and mostly shot in aperture priority or full auto. Looking back, it’s funny to see the settings on some of the images I took with full auto, because especially in lower light scenes, the camera chose to really slow down the shutter speed versus widening the aperture or bumping the ISO, resulting in a healthy number of blurry or shaky images. For the most part, the younger me did a good job of taking a few different images in each scene, so there’s probably at least one sharp frame per place/subject. But of 500 RAWs, there’s still maybe only 100 that are exposed properly and sharp throughout.
Composition wise, other than a light application of the rule of thirds and symmetry, many of my images were largely just based on feeling: maybe a cool landmark, a pretty flower, an eye-catching detail, or a scene that just felt interesting enough to take a photo of it. Some were likely spontaneous clicks while on the go, as I crammed Fukuoka-Nagasaki-Hiroshima-Miyajima-Osaka-Kyoto-Nara-Hakone-Tokyo into just two weeks.
Editing My 2018 RAWs in 2025
Looking back at these images from 2018, I can see that my younger and less experienced self still made (in my opinion) some decent photos. Having revisited many of these places since 2018, some of them multiple times, I’ve come to appreciate how these older images capture and memorialize a certain point in time. For example, I have photos below of Miyajima’s Grand Torii before the recent restoration project, where you can see the dirt, discoloration, and peeling paint. The same can be said about Nagasaki’s Tamazono Inari Shrine, which sits behind the more famous Suwa Shrine. I didn’t even remember that this shrine’s torii were in such poor shape until I compared my photos from 2018 to the ones I took a few months ago in March 2025.
As I explained before, not all of the images were exposed optimally, but with where my Lightroom knowledge is today, and the quality of features available in the software, many were still salvageable. I spent about 3-5 minutes max on each image, using this quick workflow: auto exposure > preset > manual exposure re-adjustments > white balance > basic masking. Now, for the exciting part - let’s take a look at the gallery.
The Gallery: My First Trip to Japan in 2018
Reflections
There’s a few things I’ve taken away from this experience:
I’m reminded of the power of good light. In situations where the light was even, the camera made better decisions in auto, and therefore made those images easier to edit. Also, at no point on this trip was I waking up for sunrises nor camping out for a sunset - things I do today to find good light.
Software keeps getting better, even if just incrementally. Enhancements to tools like Masking in Lightroom make editing and balance photos like these, which weren’t shot very well, much easier. It’s simpler than ever to target the Sky, Landscape, Subject, or Luminance/Color ranges. Although I didn’t even try to edit these RAWs in 2018, I’m sure it wouldn’t have been as quick as it is today.
Gear matters, but it also doesn’t. I still really enjoy these photos, which are at max 18MP. They probably won’t make for a 20x30 print, nor will they live in my current portfolio, but that doesn’t mean they’re not fun to look at. When pixel peeping, there’s a healthy amount of noise and chromatic aberration, but I think with more time some of those things could be corrected with software.
Honestly, for this trip, I remember the experiences, meals, laughs, and memories with friends more than I remember taking these pictures. A reminder that getting nice photos is great, but it’s not everything. It’s important to live in the moment too. I’m lucky that now, there’s a lot of alignment between my travel experiences and photography, but most of all, I’m reminded that even if the photos don’t turn out perfect, it was still always worth going.
Sometimes it’s more about feeling than hard & fast photography rules. If something looks interesting, just shoot it. Don’t overthink it. It’s easy to tell yourself that maybe the composition isn’t interesting or the lighting isn’t great, so I’ll just pass on clicking something. With digital, you can always click it and revisit later in post.
You don’t know how many chances you’ll get to visit or re-visit a place - just try to capture it to the best of your ability based on the skills and gear you have with you, even if it’s just your phone. I’ve been lucky to return to most of these places, but they’ll never be exactly as I saw them that day or year. In my case, many of the places ended up being restored, but it’s also possible that the opposite can happen - places fall apart, disappear, close down etc.
Even if you aren’t proud of your work today, if you stay consistent & sharpen your skills, you’ll be proud of how far you’ve come in seven years. I know I am.
Wrapping Up
In short, this experience was fun & rewarding. It brought back some great memories of my first trip to Japan and helped me internalize just how much I’ve grown as a photographer. If you have some old RAWs lying around and the time to spare, I guarantee it’ll be fun to play around with them and see what you can do. And if you’re a newer photographer just starting out, think about saving your old RAWs for your future self, as a time capsule.
I’ve found some more RAW images shot on the same old Canon Rebel T5 from a trip to Taipei and Hong Kong in 2019, as well as the trip I did around South Korea in 2018. When I have some time, I’ll probably comb through those too and try to edit them - so there might be a follow up post!
Thanks as always for reading - and see you in the next one.
