Photoshop Tutorial:File Formats
Photoshop is capable of adjusting to numerous ‘types’ of formats and its tools if used to their full capacity can create some amazing results including even the smallest detailing, It also uses many different formats and there are advantages and disadvantages to which format you choose to save your work in. Photoshop can also open and save several kinds of files and the more you further your knowledge as to why these files exist you can apply the correct files to the correct image type and in web design. When choosing your file format there are three main things you should consider which will help you to determine how to save your file – web use, layering and image quality.
Image quality begins when you first take a photograph with your camera, you should use the highest pixel setting that your camera contains because the higher the level of pixilation the better the quality of the final image, but this also means that the higher the quality of the image the bigger the overall file size will be. Your camera will give you the option of how high or low you want the pixilation to be, so change this in accordance to what the final image is going to be used for. Photographs are best taken as a raw image to begin with as you will have the option to convert them into a smaller file once you have imported them onto your computer, and the larger the image is to begin with I have found, the easier it will be to manipulate using Photoshop’s tools. Photographs can be imported as JPEG’s or as a raw image but if you save as a JPEG you will lose some of the quality of the image from the start.
Layering begins once the image is stored on your computer, the image will usually open itself in the default programme so you will have to open Photoshop and then find the image you want to open using file – open – and then where the image is stored. This is when you will do all your manipulation, layering and resizing using Photoshop itself. Once you have completed this you will then save your changes, if you save the images straight into Photoshop it will save them as a PSD, PDD or EPS file.
If your image is saved in these particular formats your file will stay large and hold the quality whilst preserving all layers, this is the best file format to use if you are going to be reworking the image. Other choices of formats for your file are TIFF – which will keep the quality but are large files and best used in design for print, BMP or bitmap is a windows file that creates good photos but creates large files and a PDF is a adobe acrobat file which locks texts and images so they cannot be further manipulated, usually used as a file for sending information or important documents.
File formats that are going to be used for web design UK use need to be small size files, which means using a format that highly compresses the file. But compressing a file highly using takes out some of the range of colours, the vibrancy and the sharpness of the photograph. JPEG – Joint Photographic Experts Group, is the most used web design England form file, this is because the JPEG compresses the file to a small size but it still holds the quality and displays millions of colours unlike most compressing files.
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