Format saving question..pdn jpg bmp ect which is better?

[Strickalator]

:?:

Ok so far I have been saving files to view on the web as .jpg and for high quality scans im using .bmp

when you are editing a file or making a new one does it default to .pdn extention?

also can someone show me a help tutorial on the different extensions and what they are useful for and which to use in certain situations?

[Ash]

viewtopic.php?f=15&t=6440 will give you some ideas about the different file types

[Strickalator]

:idea: hmm ok then so if im doing a mixed image of text,drawn art and panels (comic book) is it better to save it as .png for web viewing or .jpg

It will be a web based comic book so thats what im concerned about..i read how .jpg is better for photos and that I knew but I have never saved anything with a .png format before

[Fisherman's Friend]

Basically, jpeg is better for the web in order to reduce loading times (both up- and download). Concerning it's a comic book, png might be better, not only for quality, in a lot of cases you can reach smaller file sizes with png, too, when encoding "simple and clear" pics, like screenshots (no wallpaper). Browse the plugin section of the forum for the optipng file plugin. Using this fine tool, you may get half of the size of a normal png. If your comic is black/white (manga), use greyscale as output, if its colored choose RGB. The sad point is that we have no advanced jpeg support in PDN at this moment. I have GIMP, too, and you can save jpegs in wonderful quality and better file size than png. In PDN, the best options for jpeg is between a value of 93 and 97, below 90 quality gets bad, if you take more than 96 you eventually will get large sizes without significant improvents of quality. Keep in mind that jpeg is extremly aggressive to red colored parts and black/white text (many compression artifacts).

If your comic has quite complex pictures you should consider to save it as jpeg. Save a photo of a camera as png to see what I mean. You may post a part of the comic here to allow to determine the best solution.

And never use bmp. It has been complety succeeded by png.

For your second question, .pdn (a format unique to Paint.Net) is the default file format if your picture has more than one layer, because formats like jpeg or png don't save layers. If your picture has only one layer, png is the default (lossless like bmp, but compressed). Note that for the optipng plugin I mentioned there is a discussion if it affects the dpi value of the picture in a negative way. This is only important if you want to print the pictures.

For your third request, I just suggest you to search wikipedia for it. If you still have questions after this, you can PM me (it may take a while until I notice the message).

[Tanel]

:idea: hmm ok then so if im doing a mixed image of text,drawn art and panels (comic book) is it better to save it as .png for web viewing or .jpg

It will be a web based comic book so thats what im concerned about..i read how .jpg is better for photos and that I knew but I have never saved anything with a .png format before

I would recommend to publish this kind of stuff in .GIF format. You will get the smallest file sizes without remarkable loss.

PNGs are huge, you dont want viewers to wait for images downloading.

Make both gif and png copies of your art and compare for yourself.

Some information here: http://www.wfu.edu/~matthews/misc/jpg_v ... VsGif.html

[david.atwell]

I disagree. I would recommend downloading the OptiPNG filetype plugin and saving your images in Optimized PNG format. It'll reduce loading time without reducing quality.

[Ego Eram Reputo]

I would recommend to publish this kind of stuff in .GIF format. You will get the smallest file sizes without remarkable loss.

Isn't there a problem with *.GIF not supporting partial transparencies? (Or am I thinking about *.JPG?) I came across this problem when overlaying an image with a partially transparent drop shadow over a given (website) background. One of these file formats didn't want to play nicely....,

[I Like Pi]

GIF does not support partial transparency (called alpha channel). JPEG does not support transparency at all.

Images saved as GIF usually beat PNG because they always use a palette of 256 colors (lossy compression), while PNG are usually saved with four full channels (RGBA, 32 bits/pixel) because this format is always lossless. However, PNGs usually beat GIFs if properly saved in palette mode (8 bits/pixel). PNG also supports RGB (24 bits/pixel) , grayscale (8 bits per pixel), and grayscale+alpha (16 bits/pixel) modes. The amount of bits used per pixel can be reduced by lowering the bit depth.

Summary: A PNG with quality identical to a GIF will usually be smaller if saved in the right color mode.