RAW is a version of photo file you can choose just like choosing fine or low quality J-Pegs or TIFF which some cameras shoot. I usually do a RAW plus Jpeg option. JPEG pictures are compressed to make them a smaller more manageable size and the camera usually does a lot of the photo editing as well, such as adding saturation, sharpness, colour tones etc. RAW is an un-compressed file of the original data with no saturation or adjustments made to it. It is a higher quality file that cannot be viewed on the computer without some software to convert the file to something readable. Most cameras come with the software to do that. Many people use Photoshop Elements or Photoshop CS, Lightroom etc. to do that. It is much easier and doesn't degrade the photo to adjust exposure, white balance etc. in the RAW photo converter. Once a photo is changed to J-peg it is degraded each time you make adjustments and has less colour range and quality.
I'm sure the video can explain better since its easier to talk than type! You do need a bit of photo editing know how to do a good job with RAW files, but that's easy to learn.
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