So I'm less than a week into a break away with the kids and I have taken 600 photos

More kids playing, capturing a few candid shots than landscapes

What's the best way of processing the RAW images? A few selected ones will be done via PS CS5, but majority might just need a few levels adjusting etc then converting to jpg for a album to take to hospital for my mum to see

Is there a batch process edit on CS5 ?

You can create any number of batch processes in CSx ... the point is, batch processing obviates the need for taking RAW in the first place! (Unless, you've done something silly like using the wrong white balance, in which case loads of shots all have the same error.)

Your best bet is to use Nikon View NX2 which is free from Nikon. I'm also a bit wary of Adobe's interpretation of what a corrected Nikon NEF should end up like. Let's face it, you're (Adobe) is reducing a 12 or 14 bit shot to a jpg of limited colour space of just 8 bits... that's a minimum quality reduction of 33%

There are a number of free NEF converters out there... some good/some bad. Believe it or not one of the best is Picasa which comes from Google... it's quick, efficient and accurate. In my opinion, more accurate than CSx. (You don't have to worry about the Adobe Police either) Freelander 1 TD4 HSE - gone, 2 weeks after the Cat.Converter!
Freelander 2 TD4 SE Auto MY08 - Santorini black

Use Nikon NX2, Pegleg is the person for help there.

First step, go through all the pics and be ruthless, mark poor ones as rejects, dont bin them just stick them in a folder for a rainy day, I mean ruthless too, you should end up with about 10-20% of your starting pics, if that.

They will ALL need to be sharpened if they are RAW and possibly increase saturation a little, not too much of either, over sharpened pics leave a halo around objects, for holiday pics that should be you finished and they can be viewed once you have sized them, as Razmabaz has said, converting to jpeg is a pain as you can end up losing loads of detail if your not careful.
I enter camera club comps and the digital entries are sometimes restricted in size to 1024x768 pixels as a jpeg, compare a 14Mb raw file to a 400kB and you can see that something will be missing.

If you are planning to have any printed large or entered into a comp, then start playing with CS5 and all its complexity, its not worth the time for anything that are only going to be "general" pictures.

So lets see 'em then

I will have a look at nx2 when I get home

http://www.capturenx.com/en/index.html

Don't dismiss Picasa - it IS quick easy and you get good results. Having said that I do like View NX2... Capture NX2 is impressive but you do have to pay for that... if you want a legal copy  Freelander 1 TD4 HSE - gone, 2 weeks after the Cat.Converter!
Freelander 2 TD4 SE Auto MY08 - Santorini black

When I get back I'll post a couple up for a little critique

Still got over a week here though at Clumber CC though

remember that if you want to batch process just for viewing at home on the compooter... then just make sure you have the Nikon Codec for windows, and you can just use the picture viewer.. then pull the ones you want to publish into PS, tweak it and jpeg it : )

You can do a bit of proccessing with Nikon View NX2 but i'ts very basic and not a patch on Nikon Capture NX2.
For example the sharpening in View NX2 is not the same as the excellent Unsharp Mask with Capture NX2.
You can download a free trial version, think it's for 60 days.
It's a doddle to use, and if you're serious about getting your shots with a Nikon camera, then i'd not hesitate recommending Capture NX2. It's not a creative as Photoshop, ie you can't clone or overlay other images but i'm not into that anyway. Another member of the failed FL2 clutch/DMF club, twice.

A quick example of the difference between RAW and a final jpeg, the camera does not process RAW files to any great degree, they look flat and unsharp unless processed.

Click image to enlarge

that car colour looks better in the raw At work
At home

"I can't always believe facts I read on the web" - Charles Dickens

winner by default of the tractor vs caravan race

I also quite like lightroom for processing pics

Does Lightroom batch process ?

npinks wrote:

Does Lightroom batch process ?