When I take my photos in RAW+JPG format, there's a huge color difference between the RAW and JPG formats. I noticed this problem when I imported the RAW format photos into Lightroom. What's causing this? I'm leaving the sample photos in the link.

 

jpg print

https://ibb.co/932JTRhh

raw photo import lightroom

https://ibb.co/x88N1bTm

https://ibb.co/FbcDX81K

JPEG images are processed by the camera, RAW are unprocessed. Every photo software opens the file with their own starting point. Thus, Lightroom RAW can look different than DXO RAW can look different than ON-1 RAW, and so on.

The whole idea of RAW is to have a file that is unprocessed, with all of the data, making it more malleable than a jpeg file. It's up to you to make it look how you want.

A jpeg image is the manufacturer's engineers' opinion of how your image should look. They program the processing engine to create a 'final' image, which includes color, contrast, sharpness, brightness, etc.  

So, for example, where can I find the original vivid preset for Sony cameras?

In what? I don't use lightroom so I can't help you there. If you mean in camera RAW, there is none. Once you apply a setting the camera has to process it, and it's no longer RAW. There is only one in-camera setting that affects RAW (as proven by Gerald Undone), and that is Gamma.

You certainly can use the Sony JPEG camera Presets on a RAW file in Lightroom and Camera Raw. Right at the top where it says Profile and normally defaults to Adobe Color (which incidentally is about the worst profile you can use) just click on the little arrow and select Browse All Profiles. Under Adobe Raw you should see Camera Matching. Open that up and you will find all the JPEG Presets for your camera. You can mark any of these as a Favourite so they show up in the top menu.

Edited November 7Nov 7 by Richard A

Even if you use the Sony JPEG camera preset in Lightroom, it's just Adobe's attempt at simulating the default in-camera JPEG processing. The final JPEG will look different to the one your camera produced when shooting RAW+JPEG.

As @Cameratose said: there is no 'look' to RAW files. It's just raw data that is represented as an image by your raw editor. What you see when opening the RAW file is just a bare starting point from where you should start your own post-processing.

Although I will say that software is getting much better at coming up with a RAW starting point. I've been trying out DXO's trial of PL9, and it's so good there's not much I need to do with the basics. Very impressive. 

One thing I don't understand is if all you're after is Sony's jpeg look, then why bother shooting in RAW? Is it just the colors you want to duplicate, or the entire look?

When I first started processing, I shot RAW + jpeg and used the camera's jpeg to compare to my own efforts. I wasn't trying to duplicate the look; I was trying to improve on it. Now that I know how to achieve my end result I no longer shoot jpeg. It just takes up storage space and increases write/upload time.  

Edited November 9Nov 9 by Cameratose

Cengizt, what you want to get (and if you are usually mostly happy with the photos you directly shoot in jpg), might be better accomplished if you simply develop your raw files with Sony’s developing program: Imaging Edge Desktop (the one Sony allows to download from their website for free and can be used for the images taken with Sony cameras). Not bad and though very limited, it will allow you at least to recover shadows, a bit less of the highlights (not the burnt ones), correct white balance, and it will automatically correct lens distortions of most Sony lenses (not the ones from lenses of other brands in case you have any). With it, you can set the parameters for the take as you could have done it on camera (for example you can set the image to Vivid, as you asked for) or change the parameters as if you have done it on camera, but afterwards.

As it has already been said, every other program does its own interpretation of the raw data of the image the better and more accurately they can. But Sony knows and uses (I might guess) their own developing algorithms (or whatever they are called), so you might be better off in respect to your goal just using the Sony program. After developing the file, you can export as tiff for further editing (and therefore keep on working with a 16 bit per channel image instead of an 8 bit per channel image as a jpg is).

 

But if you really want freedom and total versatility, using another good specific raw developing program, is obviously the better way to go.

I don't use Lightroom, but from the ones I know and in my opinion, DxO PhotoLab excels for developing raw files (as has already been pointed out previously by Cameratose). It is expensive, but it is the champion concerning the automatic correction of the distortions of lenses and their chromatic aberrations, and one of the best if not the best for eliminating noise. It offers different good enough presets to choose from as a starting point, and you can make your own. Not complete enough for editing photos, though.

ACDSee Ultimate is OK for developing raw and very good in my opinion for editing photos and with this one you can save your own parameters/presets to use as a start point as well (and it excels as a DAM for managing your media assets).

Affinity Photo v1 or v2 (the previous ones to the very new and "freemium" Affinity by Canvas which I haven't nor will try) is/was limited for developing raw, it is good for editing images and very good in combination with Affinity Designer and Affinity Publisher for the tasks they can/could accomplish as a combo.

Corel PaintShop Pro is very basic for developing raw and most of the correction for lenses it supposes to do are simply not done or done wrongly, though it is not bad but kind of outdated in my opinion for editing images.

Capture One (which I tried when it had a limited free version for Sony cameras) is very good, but it has a limited list of lenses which distortions it corrects and is also very expensive.

Concerning the rest of the programs, I don't have a clue nor can I recommend any, as I don´t have them nor have I tried any of them long enough.

 

Anyway, for what you wrote, you already have Lightroom and might want to stay with Adobe's program, which everybody says is excellent, though seems that most people (including me) hate their subscription scheme, and the monthly price which ought to be paid as long as being used (whilst there are programs for which you can only pay once if you want or update now and again, not necessarily every year).

Edited November 9Nov 9 by Alejandro

8 hours ago, Alejandro said:

Cengizt, what you want to get (and if you are usually mostly happy with the photos you directly shoot in jpg), might be better accomplished if you simply develop your raw files with Sony’s developing program: Imaging Edge Desktop (the one Sony allows to download from their website for free and can be used for the images taken with Sony cameras). Not bad and though very limited, it will allow you at least to recover shadows, a bit less of the highlights (not the burnt ones), correct white balance, and it will automatically correct lens distortions of most Sony lenses (not the ones from lenses of other brands in case you have any). With it, you can set the parameters for the take as you could have done it on camera (for example you can set the image to Vivid, as you asked for) or change the parameters as if you have done it on camera, but afterwards.

That is quite a good idea...