How to get Apple ProRAW images to transfer from iPhone

[nightfly]

I just upgraded to an iPhone 12 Pro, and have been looking forward to using the new ProRAW format.  However, when I upload a photo to DB using the app on the iPhone, it transfers it over as a .JPG.  Does anyone know the way to get it to transfer as a native ProRAW, which I believe is a variant on a DNG file?  I notice there was a previous thread on the subject, marked "SOLVED," however, the solution of just renaming the extension of the transferred file, doesn't really work -- the file remains in JPG format (the file size shows it is highly compressed), and all it means is that the Windows apps ignore the extension, see that the file is in .JPG format, and load it as such.  Isn't there a way to simply get the file to DB in its original format?

[Sanchez]

Hey, @nightfly, welcome to our community. 

To be honest, I don’t know much about this new ProRAW format, or how it interacts with other editing and sharing apps. After a bit of research, I see that the file will get automatically converted to .JPG when shared, and possibly after being edited. 

How exactly are you uploading these ProRAW files to your Dropbox account? Can you tell me your steps? 

Have you tried manually uploading them, by tapping the "+" (plus sign) at the bottom of your screen, and then choosing to “Upload Files”?

Get back to me when you can. 
Thanks!

[nightfly · Accepted solution]

I finally figured out how to do it. 

You can't from within the Dropbox iOS app -- you're only allowed to "upload photos," and those can only be in the .JPG or .hiec formats, which are both compressed.  There's no option to just "upload files" from your iPhone -- that's only for files already stored in Dropbox.

The trick is that, instead of using the Dropbox app, you have to go to your camera roll, select the photo you want to upload, click on the "share" icon at the bottom left of the screen, and choose "Save to Dropbox" from the resulting menu.  Unlike the Dropbox app, the camera roll will upload the original .DNG file instead of a .JPG reduction.

[iar]

Hey, iOS engineer on the mobile Home / Photos team here.

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but I want to clarify that the mobile app does support automatically fetching from the iOS camera roll and uploading raw image types, including DNG files.

So if you have Camera Uploads turned on in the Dropbox app, and you shoot in RAW mode on your iPhone, those images will get automatically ingested into your Camera Uploads folder so long as you have that feature enabled.