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Photo Magic: File formats

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Photo Magic supports numerous file formats. The following information will help you decide which format to use.

Quick summary

  • Use gif, jpg and png for the web. Widely supported.
  • Use bmp files for fastest loading and saving. Not for web use - they take lots of space. Widely supported.
  • Use jpg, png, or tif to save on disk space. Widely supported.

Web formats

Web browsers support only a small number of formats. If your images are meant for viewing through a web browser, use the following formats:

  • CompuServe Graphics Interchange Format (gif) or Portable Network Graphics (png), for 256-color images (8-bit, mostly computer generated images)
  • JPEG File Interchange Format (jpg, jpeg) or Portable Network Graphics (png), for photographic images and high-resolution images (24-bit - millions of colors)

Supported formats

  • Adobe Photoshop (psd). The format produced by the Adobe Photoshop graphics editor.
  • CompuServe Graphics Interchange (gif). This format is created by CompuServe for storing and exchanging color raster images. It is widely used on the web for 256-color (8-bit) images. It does not support more than 256 colors.
  • Dr. Halo (cut). Dr. Halo files are device-independent images. The image is stored in one file (.CUT) and the palette is stored in a separate file (PAL). If the image has no corresponding .PAL file, it is considered a grayscale image. Supports only 256-color images.
  • Encapsulated PostScript (eps). These files are used primarily on PostScript printers. These printers usually offer more variety of fonts and higher resolution than standard laser printers. EPS files will work on any PostScript compatible printer and any end-user application that supports placement of EPS files in its work space.
    The image that you read from an EPS file can be either a PostScript raster image, an embedded TIFF image, or an embedded WMF image. The image that you write to an EPS file is always a grayscale PostScript raster image with 256 shades of gray.
  • Flic Animation (flc, fli). The Flic file is an animation file created by Auto-desk. This file has two versions. The fli file types support 320x200 images with a maximum of 64 colors per image. The FLC file types support up to 64k x 64k images with 256 colors per image.
  • Interchange File (iff). This is a general purpose data storage format that can associate and store multiple types of data. You can read RLE-compressed (Run Length Encoding), and non-compressed images. You can write only RLE-compressed images. RLE-compression is fast, but not as good as other compression methods.
  • JBIG format (jbg). This is an industry standard lossless compressed file format for bi-tonal (black and white), grayscale and color images.
  • JPEG File Interchange Format (jpg; jpeg). JPEG format offers high-compression ratio and comes in many lossy and lossless flavors. It is widely used on the web and supported by all web browsers.
  • Kodak FlashPix (fpx). The FlashPix file format was developed through the combined efforts of Eastman Kodak Company, Microsoft Corporation, Hewlett-Packard Company, and Live Picture Inc. It combines the best features of existing formats with object orientation to make the use of digital color images easier. 8-bit and 24-bit images are supported.
  • LEAD CMP (cmp). This format offers excellent JPEG-based compression, but is not widely supported.
  • MacPict (pct). MacPict files are produced using Macintosh QuickDraw, and are used in desktop publishing and imaging applications. PCT Vector files can be read and written as raster images in the non-vector toolkits.
  • OS/2 Bitmap (OS/2 bmp). These are files created on an OS/2 operating system. Both 1.x and 2.x formats are supported.
  • Portable Greymap (pgm). This format only supports grayscale images with 256 shades of gray.
  • Portable Network Graphics (png). This format is a replacement for the gif format. It offers excellent compression ratios and is widely used on the web. It supports 1, 4, 8, and 24-bit images.
  • Portable Pixelmap (ppm). Rarely used format.
  • Silicon Graphics Image (sgi). This file format was developed at Silicon Graphics, and is used for uncompressed and RLE-compressed black and white, grayscale and color images. 8, 24, and 32-bit images are supported.
  • Sun Raster (ras). This format native to Sun UNIX platforms. 1, 4, 8, 24, and 32-bit images are supported.
  • Tagged Image File Format (tif; tiff). This is a widely used format supporting multiple compression methods and color depths.
  • Truevision TARGA (tga). This file format is created by Truevision Inc for uncompressed and RLE_compressed images.
  • Windows Bitmap (bmp). This is a file format created by Microsoft. Some BMP images are compressed with an RLE-type compression. Bitmaps are fastest to load. However, they are not suitable for the Internet because they occupy plenty of disk space.
  • Windows Clipboard (clp). This format is used to exchange data between different Windows applications.
  • Windows Enhanced Meta File (emf). The Enhanced Windows Metafile format is a vector format that may or may not also contain a raster image. Emf and wmf vector files can be read and written as raster images in the non-vector toolkits.
  • Windows Meta File (wmf). The Windows Metafile format is a vector format that may or may not also contain a raster image. Emf and wmf vector files can be read and written as raster images in the non-vector toolkits.
  • Word Perfect (wpg). This format can contain vector or raster images. Photo Magic handles only the raster images. 1, 4, and 8-bit images are supported.
  • X Window Dump (xwd). This file format is used to store and restore screen window images. Two versions of this file exist, the X10 window dump and the X11 window dump. These versions differ slightly in the format of the data.
  • XPicmap File (xpm). These files are used to store X Window PixMap information to disk. They are capable of storing black-and-white, grayscale, and color images. Image data is stored in the form of ASCII text formatted as a standard C character string array. 1, 8, and 24-bit images are supported.
  • ZSoft PCX (pcx). This is a file format created by ZSoft. This format compresses its image data with the RLE type compression. 1, 4, 8, and 24-bit images are supported.