My Photoshop Elements 11 won't open my Nikon D800's RAW files

My Photoshop Elements 11 won't open RAW files from my Nikon D800 even after I downloaded Adobe RAW converter 7.1. It does open RAW files from my old Nikon D300s.
Please advise. Thanks so much.

Tjie

You'll need ACR v.7.3 to open those RAW files in PSE 11. Go to Help->Updates to download.

Thanks John. My PSE 11 already has ACR 7.3 installed when I bought it, it still doesn't open the RAW from my D800.
Should I purchase PS CS6 ?

Tjie

Tjie,

I'm confused. In your first post you said you downloaded ACR 7.1, but then you said ACR 7.3 was installed when you bought PSE 11. Why did you install an older version of ACR over the latest version?

I find it hard to believe that Adobe would let you install an older version of ACR over the latest version without some kind of warning message.

You should do as John suggests and download ACR 7.3 and install it. If worst comes to worst, you might have to completely uninstall PSE 11 and ACR, download the latest version of it, and ACR 7.3 and then reinstall both.

--P

Thanks Preston. First I went to my PSE 11->help->about plug in->camera raw and found out that it has ACR 7.3 installed. It didn't work. Then I went to ->help->updates and downloaded the ACR 7.1 , because that was the only one available to download, there was no warning. Still it didn't work. So I uninstalled my PSE 11 completely and reinstalled it again, and it still didn't work. I have no idea how I can download ACR 7.3 if there is a version different from the one already installed.
Thanks again.

Tjie

Tjie,

Something is definitely cross-wise and I can't offer a specific solution, but here's something you can do to try to see what's faulting...

Do you have access to another computer that has ACR 7.3 or another compatible RAW converter? If so, try to open your D-800 NEF files on that machine. This will tell us whether or not it's the files themselves, or an issue with PSE 11/ ACR on your computer.

Here's another thing to try...Take some photos using a different card in the camera. If the files will open, then this points to a faulty card.

I'm unsure as to what other steps you might take at this point. Hopefully, others will chime in.

--P

D800 raw files were supported in ACR starting with version 7.1. Anything newer than that should be able to open D800 raw files, so I don't believe the version of ACR is the problem here, provided you do have 7.3 installed.

What steps are you taking to open the files? Do you have another camera's raw files you could try to open?

Thanks David. When I go to help-> about plug in-> camera raw, I see that version 7.3 camera raw is installed. To open the files, I click the 'open' on the upper left hand corner and I choose a the D800 file xxxxxx.nef. I got a message " can not open the file, because your raw file is not supported by the ACR installed". I tried to use a different card from the same camera, no success. It did open the xxx.nef files from my D300s camera. Thanks again.

Tjie

Are you using Nikon Transfer or ViewNX2 at all? Many users report that using NT or ViewNX2 from your previous camera to move your images from card to computer is corrupting the files enough so that ACR will not read them. Install the version of ViewNX2 that came with your D800 and try that utility.

Thanks John and David for your advice. Yes, there is something wrong with my Nikon Transfer. All raw files from D800 downloaded with Nikon Transfer won't open in my friend's computer using PS CS6 either, but all my new raw files from D800 downloaded using PS downloader work fine in both programs. Thanks again.

Tjie

Hi Tije.

I don't know the process for using ViewNX2 or Nikon Transfer for transferring your RAW files. I have a card reader (for either SD or flash) and I just pop the card out of the camera and use the card reader. I just do a direct file transfer (copy from one directory paste in another directory). I don't know if this would remove any functionality for you that you are expecting from the Nikon transfer options. This should certainly remove the chance of corruption. This also means that you save on your camera's battery life (since you are not using it for the copy) and you also do not have the chance of knocking the camera off the desk during the transfer. YMMV...

Nathan