RAF to MPEG-2 Converter

RAF to MPEG-2: Turning a Fujifilm RAW Photo Into a Video Clip

A .raf is a single still photograph — Fujifilm's RAW format, holding unprocessed sensor data from an X-series or GFX body before any in-camera rendering. MPEG-2 is a motion video standard (ISO/IEC 13818-2, technically identical to ITU-T H.262), the coding that carried DVD-Video and digital broadcast for two decades. There is no sense in which one is a version of the other, so this page does the only thing that makes sense: it demosaics your photograph into ordinary pixels and builds a short silent video clip that holds that frame on screen for a duration you choose.

Convert here when a DVD-authoring tool, a broadcast ingest step or an editing timeline from that era needs the photograph delivered as video. If you simply want a picture you can look at, RAF to JPG or RAF to TIFF is the page you want instead.

How to Convert RAF to MPEG-2

1. Upload Your RAF File: Drag the .raf onto the page or click "Add Files". Several photographs can be queued; the next control decides whether they become one clip or several.
2. Set Merge strategy and Image Duration: Merge strategy offers Merge images, which joins every uploaded photo into one continuous clip in upload order, and Video per image, which returns a separate file for each. Image Duration decides how long each photo is held — seventeen entries from a single frame (1/60 s, 1/30 s, 1/24 s) through fractional steps up to 10 seconds per frame, defaulting to 5 seconds.
3. Set Video resolution, and Background Color if you are changing the frame shape: Video resolution offers Keep original, a Fixed Resolutions list of exact width-by-height entries, Preset Resolutions (height-only, width follows the photo's aspect), Width, Height and Width x Height. Background Color fills any padding introduced when the output shape does not match the photograph's; it defaults to White and offers 25 named colours in total.
4. Convert and Download: Click Convert and save the result. Files are uploaded over an encrypted connection, processed on our servers and deleted automatically after a few hours — no sign-up, no watermark, never shared or made public.

Which Controls Change the Output, and Which Do Not

This page renders a File Compression group with three modes, and it is worth knowing what each one does before you spend time on it, because MPEG-2 has no CRF mode and a still photograph has no source bitrate.

So the practical workflow is: choose Video resolution deliberately, choose Image Duration, and leave the compression group alone.

The Bitrate Is Derived From the Resolution You Choose

MPEG-2 cannot encode reliably below a resolution-dependent minimum, so the encoder is given a floor calculated from the output pixel count — and on this page that floor is effectively the bitrate, since none of the quality modes overrides it. The floor never drops below 2 Mbit/s.

Combine that with Image Duration to predict the file size: 5 seconds at 1920 x 1080 is roughly 4.7 MB, and the same 5 seconds at 4K is roughly 28 MB, for exactly the same photograph.

A note on what happens before encoding. The RAW is demosaiced and rasterised to a clean intermediate PNG first, and the long edge of that intermediate is capped at 4,096 pixels — modern Fujifilm captures comfortably exceed that, so a full-resolution RAF is downscaled before the encoder ever sees it. The frame is then encoded at one frame per second with B-frames switched off, which is why the file is far smaller than a real 25 or 30 fps clip of the same length.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is the clip completely silent?

Because a photograph has no sound to carry over. On this page there is no Audio Codec control at all — it is suppressed for image sources — and the encoder writes video only, so the result has no audio stream rather than a silent one. Most players report this as a missing audio track, which is expected. Add music or narration afterwards in any video editor if the clip needs it.

How much of my Fujifilm RAW's quality survives?

The tonal latitude does not. A RAF holds 12- or 14-bit linear sensor data with enormous headroom for recovering shadows and highlights; MPEG-2 Main Profile stores 8-bit samples with 4:2:0 chroma subsampling and lossy DCT compression. Smooth gradients — skies, studio backdrops, deep shadow — band first. The resolution is also reduced, because the intermediate frame is capped at 4,096 pixels on the long edge. For anything you intend to edit or print, keep a still format such as RAF to TIFF.

Does this handle X-Trans files, or only the Bayer ones?

Both. Fujifilm's X-series bodies use the X-Trans colour filter array — a 6 x 6 pattern rather than the conventional Bayer grid — and the demosaic step handles it, as it does the Bayer sensors in the GFX medium-format line. The render is a standard neutral one; it is not an attempt to reproduce a specific Fujifilm film simulation, since those are recipes the camera applies when writing its own JPEG rather than data baked into the RAW.

I uploaded several photos. Do I get one video or several?

One, unless you change Merge strategy. Its default, "Merge images", concatenates every uploaded photograph into a single continuous clip in upload order, so the total running time is roughly the number of photos multiplied by the Image Duration. Switch to "Video per image" if you want a separate MPEG-2 file for each RAF instead. This is the setting worth checking before you convert, because it changes the shape of the result more than any other.

Why does my file end in .mpeg2, and will a player open it?

The extension follows this converter's naming. What is inside is an MPEG program stream carrying MPEG-2 video — the same wrapper family as .mpg and .mpeg files and DVD .VOB objects. VLC, mpv and anything built on ffmpeg identify the contents and play it regardless of the name. Some older players and hardware devices dispatch strictly on the extension, so if one refuses the file, rename it to .mpg and it will be recognised. Nothing about the bytes changes.

I need exactly 720 x 480 for NTSC DVD authoring. Where is it?

Not in the Fixed Resolutions list, which runs from 7680 x 4320 down to 256 x 144 and includes 854 x 480 and 640 x 480 but not the DVD frame sizes. Use Width x Height and type 720 x 480 for NTSC or 720 x 576 for PAL. Remember that DVD frames are anamorphic, so a 3:2 photograph placed in a 720 x 480 frame will be padded — and the padding takes the Background Color, which is white unless you change it.

What is Background Color for if a photograph is opaque?

It fills whatever the photograph does not cover. RAW files have no transparency, so at Keep original you will never see it. The moment you force a different frame shape — a square Instagram size, a vertical format, a DVD frame — padding appears around the picture, and that padding is painted in the Background Color. It defaults to White; set it to Black for conventional letterbox bars, or pick from the 23 other named colours in the list.

Should I use MPEG-2 or something modern?

MPEG-2 is the right answer only when a specific downstream system demands it — DVD authoring software, a broadcast ingest specification, or an editing suite from that generation. Everywhere else H.264 in an MP4 is smaller at matching quality and plays on phones, browsers and televisions without argument, which is RAF to MP4. If the requirement is just "a video file", choose MP4.

How long should I set Image Duration?

Five seconds, the default, is a reasonable hold for a single photograph in a sequence. Shorter entries down to a single frame exist for building an animation out of many stills — bear in mind the encode runs at one frame per second regardless, so selecting "1/30s (single frame at 30fps)" gives you one frame in the output rather than a thirtieth of a second of motion. Ten seconds is the longest hold available per photo.

Why is the clip's frame rate so low?

Because the source is a still image, and holding one unchanging frame at 25 or 30 frames per second would spend a great deal of bitrate storing the same picture over and over. The encode runs at one frame per second with B-frames disabled, which produces a much smaller file that looks identical — there is no motion to lose. If a downstream tool insists on a broadcast frame rate, re-encode the clip in that tool or in a video editor after conversion.

What happens to my photographs after the conversion?

They are uploaded over an encrypted connection, converted on our servers and deleted automatically after a few hours, along with everything the job produced. There is no sign-up, no watermark and files are never shared or made public. Fujifilm RAW files run to tens of megabytes each, so a large batch is limited mainly by upload time on your connection.