Digital Graphics File Formats

Tom Brett

Raster Graphics

Raster graphics are images made up of lots of bitmaps. Bitmaps are graphics made up of pixels, each pixel records colour information, but bitmapped images have a set resolution.

Vector Graphics

Vector graphics are made up of vectors which are also known as paths and strokes. Vectors/paths are defined by having start and end points (with curves, angles etc between them). Vector graphics can be scaled to be large or small because vectors have no loss in definition.

Raster Graphics

JPEGStands For Joint Photographic Experts Group

Used For/Example This format is used for most photographs and are used for web formats. Normally photos on face book and other social media are saved as JPEG’s

Advantage You can place the photos on social media and save them on there.Most cameras and phone pictures are saved as JPEG’s.

Disadvantage Looses quality after multiple edits due to compression and recompression.Has a set resolution due to being a bitmap image.

TIFFStands For Tagged Image File Format

Used For/Example Used for desktop publishing.

Advantage Adobe InDesign documents can have multiple page documents in one file as a TIFF.TIFF files have the option of lossless compression.

Disadvantage TIFF files have extremely large file sizes.

GIFStands For Graphics Interchange Format

Used For/Example Used for short digital animations found on the internet.

Advantage They load quicker than a video file .Lots of images played after each other in a loop, meaning you get more from a GIF file than a JPEG.

Disadvantage Extremely Short.Bad quality.

BMPStands For Bitmap Image File

Used For/Example To store bitmap digital images.

Advantage No loss in compression.Similar to TIFF and JPEG files.

Disadvantage They have large file sizes.

Vector Graphics

PSDStands For Photoshop Document

Used For/Example Image manipulation and post production, also used for magazine covers.

Advantage Saves layers, formatting information, swatches etc.Supports transparency.

Disadvantage Its complicated to use photo shop at first.You need photo shop to view the image.Large file sizes.

AIStands For Adobe Illustrator Art

Used For/Example Logo Creation and graphics to represent a company.

Advantage Can be scaled to be both large and small because vector graphics have no loss in definition.

Disadvantage Even though it is powerful it is reallycomplicated at the same time.

FLAStands For Flash File

Used For/Example Used to create animations and games.

Advantage They can produce high quality files but have a small file size at the same time.They can include sound and video.

Disadvantage Flash files are difficult to update.You need to have the right plug-ins.

WMFStands For Windows Metafile

Used For/Example Similar to AI files so used for logos.

Advantage Similar to AI files so it will be easier to get used to after previously using a similar file type. Can contain both vector and bitmap components.No loss in definition due to being a vector.

Disadvantage Not available on OS systems.Bad quality

File Format Capture and Optimising

CompressionDefinition Compression is they in which file sizes get

smaller because the information in them gets reduced.

Advantage There is the ability to create smaller files to put on the internet or social media.

Disadvantage There isn’t really a win/win situation because you get a bad quality image when there is a low file size but large file size when you want a good quality image.

Image CaptureMethod Scanner

How is it used for image capture of graphics

The ability to digitize sketches, photos and other media products when you don’t have them on a laptop/computer.

Method Camera

How is it used for image capture of graphics

You capture images by taking pictures of the selected subject.

Method Graphics Tablet

How is it used for image capture of graphics

It allows you to draw sketches on a tablet using an electronic pen.

OptimisingWhy would you optimise? You would optimise images so it is easier

to upload them to the internet and is easier to download them from the internet as well.

How can you optimise? You can optimise by: Reducing image size, reducing bit depth, reducing the resolution and by compressing the images.

Advantage to optimising By optimising an image you can reduce thefile size of an image meaning the there will be faster upload/download speeds.

Disadvantage to optimising There are certain requirements for example the images should not be more than 500 pixels wide.