PEF to Video Converter

PEF to Video — Which Output Format Should You Pick?

A PEF is Pentax's proprietary RAW photo — a single, unprocessed still straight off the sensor — and this page wraps that one still into a short, silent video clip. The output format is yours to choose from the Video File Extension menu, and the default is MP4 (H.264), which plays on virtually every phone, browser, and editor. Before you pick a video format at all, be honest about the goal: if you just want to view, print, or share the photo, you want an image, not a video — convert PEF to JPG or PEF to PNG instead. Choose a video output only when you genuinely need the still as a clip (a slideshow frame, a placeholder, a pipeline that expects video). If you do, leave it on MP4 unless a specific tool demands otherwise.

Which Video Format to Choose

For almost everyone, the default MP4 is the right answer. Every format in the menu produces the same thing — your rendered PEF held on screen for a set duration, with no motion and no sound.

What This Conversion Actually Produces

• A static frame, not a movie. A single PEF is one photograph. A single-file conversion is a freeze-frame: the rendered image held for the Image Duration you set (default 5 seconds per frame), with no panning, motion, or transitions.
• A silent clip, by design. A still photo carries no audio, so no audio codec is offered for any output format and the video is silent. To add music or narration, convert first, then add a track in a video editor.
• No added detail. Wrapping a still in video cannot create resolution. A 12–40 MP Pentax frame is scaled down to a video frame (up to 1080p), discarding most of its pixels — the output is always lower-resolution than the RAW.
• A one-way render. Demosaicing the RAW bakes in white balance, exposure, and tone — the editing latitude that is the whole reason to shoot PEF. Keep the original PEF as your master and treat any video as a disposable delivery file.

When to Build a Video Instead of an Image

• You want a slideshow: upload several PEF photos and choose Merge images to combine them into one clip, each shown for the Image Duration.
• You need a still as a placeholder or filler frame inside a video timeline or pipeline that only accepts video.
• A platform or kiosk that only plays video (not images) needs your photo on screen for a fixed time.
• You want a single shareable file that auto-plays a photo — though for most sharing, a plain JPG is simpler.

How to Convert PEF to Video

1. Upload Your PEF File: Drag and drop your PEF onto the page or click "+ Add Files." You can add several Pentax RAW photos at once — RAW files are large, so the upload is the main wait, not the conversion.
2. Pick the Video File Extension: Open the Video File Extension menu and choose your output — it defaults to MP4. Leave it on MP4 for universal playback, or pick another format only if a specific tool requires it.
3. Set Merge images, Image Duration, and Background Color: Choose Merge images for one combined clip or Video per image for separate files. Set Image Duration (default 5 seconds per frame), and pick a Background Color (default White) to fill letterbox bars when the photo's aspect ratio differs from the video frame. Leave Preset on Very High (Recommended) or cap output with a Video resolution preset.
4. Convert and Download: Click "Convert" and download your video. No sign-up, no watermark.

Settings Reference

Only a handful of controls actually change the result here, because there is no motion or audio to manage. This is what each one does and where its default sits:

Because the source is a single repeated frame, the Preset and resolution settings move the file size far less than they would on real footage — one still image compresses extremely efficiently no matter how you encode it.

Frequently Asked Questions

What video format does this page output by default?

MP4 with the H.264 codec. The Video File Extension menu defaults to MP4 because it plays on virtually every device, browser, and editor without extra software. You can switch the output to M4V, MOV, MKV, WebM, AVI, HEVC, WMV, FLV, and more from the same menu, and adjust the codec under Video Codec in Advanced Options. For the broadest compatibility, leave it on MP4 — that is what PEF to MP4 produces directly.

Should I convert PEF to a video at all, or just to JPG?

For most purposes, just to an image. A PEF is a high-quality RAW still, so turning it into a video stacks two mismatches — a photo becomes a single rendered frame, then that frame becomes a video with no motion or sound. To view, print, edit, or share the photo, convert PEF to JPG or PEF to PNG. Choose a video output only when you genuinely need the still as a clip — for a slideshow, a placeholder frame, or a pipeline that only accepts video.

Will the video have any motion or sound?

No to both. A PEF is one still photograph with no motion data and no audio, so a single-file conversion produces a freeze-frame — the rendered image held on screen for the Image Duration you set, with no panning, movement, or soundtrack. No audio codec is offered for any output format because there is nothing to encode. To build a moving sequence, upload several PEF files and choose Merge images; even then there are no transitions, just each photo shown in turn.

Will I lose image quality compared with the RAW PEF?

Yes, substantially, and that is inherent to the conversion. A PEF holds 12-bit or 14-bit unprocessed sensor data that must be demosaiced to become viewable; that render bakes in white balance, exposure, and tone — the editing latitude that is the whole reason to shoot RAW. A 12–40 MP Pentax frame is then scaled down to a video frame (up to 1080p), discarding most of the resolution, and the default H.264 encode is 8-bit and lossy. In our testing, a single 24-megapixel PEF held for 5 seconds at the Very High preset produced a silent MP4 of roughly 1–3 MB, since one repeated frame compresses very efficiently. Keep the original PEF as your master.

I shoot DNG on my Pentax, not PEF — can I still do this?

Yes. Most Pentax (Ricoh Imaging) bodies let you shoot Adobe's open, royalty-free DNG straight in-camera instead of PEF, so you can choose either at capture. PEF is slightly smaller and Pentax-native; DNG is broadly supported by third-party tools and is the safer long-term archive. This page reads PEF directly; if your files are DNG, the generic Image to Video converter accepts DNG and offers the identical workflow.

Why is there a Background Color option for a photo?

Because photos and video frames are different shapes. A Pentax still is typically 3:2, while most video presets are 16:9, so fitting the photo into the frame without cropping it leaves empty bars along two edges. Background Color (default White) decides what colour those bars are. White or a matching tone blends in when the clip is embedded on a light page; black reads as ordinary letterboxing if you prefer the classic look. The setting never crops or scales the photograph — it only paints the leftover area around it.

Does the video keep my PEF's EXIF and camera metadata?

No, and you should plan for that. EXIF is a photo-file concept — shutter speed, aperture, ISO, lens, GPS, capture time — and a video container has nowhere meaningful to put those fields. What you get instead is generic video metadata: duration, resolution, codec. Everything that identified the shot is left behind in the raw file. This is one more reason the original .pef is worth keeping: it holds not just the recoverable image data but the entire record of how the photo was taken. If you need the capture details preserved alongside a viewable image, convert to PEF to JPG instead, since JPEG carries EXIF natively.

What happens to my uploaded PEF file after conversion?

Your file is uploaded over an encrypted connection, processed on our servers, and deleted automatically a few hours after the conversion — no sign-up, no watermark, never shared or made public.