Re: Fwd: Converting JPRGs & TIFs to GIFs

[Michelle Nolan <nolanmj -at- HOTMAIL -dot- COM>]

This is pure and utter nonsense.  Before we send everyone into a panic
over how many times they've saved their JPEG files.....

1)  Any graphics package worth its weight will not degrade a JPEG image
each time it is saved.  BTW, for anyone looking for a nice, cheap
alternative to Photoshop, I suggest you go to http://www.jasc.com and
download Paint Shop Pro.  PSP can easily address the problems your
friend is having.

2) I would hardly call the JPEG file format "worthless".  It is one of
the few formats supported by web browsers and is arguably the most
popular form of image compression in the world.  JPEG has become the
format of choice because it maintains a high quality in the image while
achieving a high compression ratio.

3) The JPEG format does cause a loss of information in an image, but
most of this is due to rounding error (e.g., 128.127345 becomes 128).
For visual use, nothing to get all worked up about.  If you show someone
a raw, uncompressed image and it's JPEG counterpart, I highly doubt they
would be able to tell them apart.

4) For more info on this topic, I suggest the comp.compression FAQ or
the JPEG home page http://www.jpeg.org .

Remember, what drives your image file format should be your application.
If you are trying to automatically detect missile silos in Iraq, JPEG is
probably not the format to use.  For technical documents it is fine.



Michelle Nolan
Lead Technical Writer
The Nolan Technology Group, Inc.
http://nolanmj.home.ml.org
nolanmj -at- hotmail -dot- com
(703) 768-3497


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