From the course: Photoshop 2023 Essential Training

Understanding file formats - Photoshop Tutorial

From the course: Photoshop 2023 Essential Training

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Understanding file formats

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- [Instructor] There are a variety of formats that you need to familiarize yourself with when you're working with images in Photoshop. Now, to simplify, I'm going to divide them into three areas of the workflow: the original source or capture file formats, working formats or your master file formats, and output formats created for specific devices. Today, most photographs are captured as either a JPEG or Apple's HEIC or as a raw file. JPEG and HEIC make up for the majority of images captured on mobile devices and are almost always an option on larger DSLR or mirrorless cameras. Both JPEG and HEIC files' popularity is based primarily on the fact that the files are really small so you can store a large number of photos on a single mobile device or on a card and they can be written to those devices very quickly. However, the reason that the files are so small is because these formats throw away information using a process called lossy compression. Depending on the amount of compression, which we don't always have control over, the quality of the photograph can range from being very high, where it's often difficult or even impossible to tell that the file's been compressed, to very low, where compression artifacts such as banding between colors or large blocks of color start to become noticeable. The primary issue is that these file formats that use lossy compression have significantly less flexibility when we're making adjustments such as changing colors or tone or contrast in Photoshop. Because of these potential problems, when given the option, many photographers prefer to capture images using a raw file format because raw file formats don't throw away any information using lossy compression. They still do use compression, but it's a different type of lossless compression that doesn't discard information, so the quality of the image is not compromised. This gives raw files more flexibility when making edits and enhancements to the image after they're captured because there's more information. There's more colors and there's more tones to work with. Now, most camera manufacturers have their own proprietary raw file formats. For example, Nikon raw files have the NEF extension. Canon uses CRW and Sony uses ARW, but they're all considered raw files. The DNG format is another raw file format, but it has a significant difference. It's not proprietary. Instead, Adobe chose to make it available to other software developers so that they can read and write DNG files. Not only do several camera manufacturers capture directly into the DNG format, it's now also available on several mobile devices. In addition, any raw file from a camera manufacturer can be converted to the DNG file format using Lightroom Classic or Lightroom or Camera Raw or the free Adobe converter. All right, the next group of file formats are used to save what I would refer to as working or master files and are used when you're saving multilayered documents from Photoshop, and these include the PSD file format, TIFF, and Adobe cloud documents, and this is where most designers start. They don't usually start with a raw file. If a photographer captures an image as a raw file, they'll usually retouch it and then save it as either a TIFF file or a JPEG or PSD file and then hand that off to the designer. Both Photoshop and TIFF files save all of Photoshop's features, such as layers, and masks, and type, and shapes, and paths, and smart object, and much, much more, and they both use lossless compression to decrease the file size, but the quality of the image is not compromised. The biggest difference is that a TIFF file can save a larger file up to four gigs whereas a PSD can only save up to two gigs. Now, Adobe's cloud documents are a special format that's designed to help transfer large files across devices, for example, between Photoshop on the desktop and Photoshop on the iPad. Now, when you save a document as a cloud document, the file is saved in Adobe's cloud instead of on your local device or an external hard drive, and these files have special features such as the ability to save only those portions of a file that have been edited, making it much more efficient to share files between devices. They also automatically keep track of things like versions as you work, and they have some collaborative editing options. The last group of file formats are used when it comes to output and share your files to be printed or to be displayed on a specific device. In most instances, you'll want to save a derivative or a copy of your image that's been resized and optimized for that output device. To reduce file size, these output file formats are often flattened so they don't contain any layers and they're often compressed, which makes it easier to upload or transfer the files more quickly. Exporting or saving a copy allows you to return to your working file or that master file if you need to make changes to it. When sending images to be printed, it's best to ask what format the lab or the service provider prefers. Ideally, they would request a flattened TIFF or a PSD file in order to maintain the highest quality possible, but often it's faster, and therefore more desirable, to upload or transfer and print a JPEG file. So if you're sending JPEGs, be sure that the quality setting remains high or you may see banding between colors or maybe some artifacts in the image. Now, when you're saving files to view on a screen such as a phone or a computer or a posting online, JPEG is, again, the most common format because of its ability to create small files that download quickly. Now, before we wrap up, there are two specialty file formats that I want to mention. PNG is a popular format to save type or graphics for the web that need to display transparent areas. For example, PNG would be an ideal solution for displaying a round logo or type that requires transparent edges because the PNG format will render smooth edges around the transparency. PNG is more typically used with flat art or graphics and not as much with photographs. Now, the GIF file format has a unique ability to contain an animation within the file, and it's often used to create ad banners and other short animations to view on screen. GIF files are compressed using lossy compression but in a different way than a JPEG file. To save as a GIF, you have to convert your images to a different color mode called indexed color which only allows 256 colors. So, again, it's not the best format to use when you're working with photographs, and although GIF files support transparency, it only supports one level, which means that if you have a circular logo, the edges are going to look jagged. We'll talk more in depth about GIF files later in this course when we actually create an animation in Photoshop. All right, that wraps up this overview of the most important file formats that you'll run across when you're working in Photoshop and when and why to choose one over the other.

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