Digital photography enthusiasts, you should visit Google Knol and look for a knol written by Vesna Kozelj offering a very useful information on digital imaging file formats, the difference from one to another, and what file formats should bo used to capture, edit, print, and publish images on the web.
Vesna explained that normally you can choose between the uncompressed (RAW, DNG, TIFF) and compressed file formats (JPEG).
She recommends the use of DNG whenever possible, or RAW if DNG is not available. This is due to the ability of the file formats to retain more information in a smaller file size.
JPEG is a good format for web publishing or for viewing only, due to it’s small file size. However, if you are planning to edit your digital images, TIFF is the better option.
In digital images editing, especially with Adobe Photoshop, the common file formats created are PSD, PSB (for large images, only available for Adobe Photoshop CS or later) and DNG. If the file formats mentioned is not available, you can use TIFF for all-purpose editing.
Vesna further explained that in printing images, PDF is the recommended format due to its support of many file types and small sizes. To view images only or send through email, JPEG, GIF and PDF are recommended.
She end the knol with file formats that should not be used in digital photography – GIF (limited colours – 256 max), JPEG2000 (usually used for previewing images), PICT (considered obsolete, replaced by PDF), BMP and PNG (positioned to replace GIF).
To have better explanations on each file formats, I encourage you to visit Vesna’s excellent knol.
Images by mandj98.
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