File Formats for Images
Images are something we all come across when we’re using computers and other pieces of technology, but not everyone knows how these types of files are stored and the different ways there are of doing so. It’s actually quite an important thing to understand when you’re using a P2P network, you need to know which files to expect when you’re starting a download. In this article, we’re going to do our best to explain some of them to you, such as the rates of compression you’ll be able to expect and the possible quality losses you could encounter as a result of this.
JPG – This is an image format that is usually used by cameras and camcorders, mainly because of the great quality that can be obtained. The problem with this is the file size you can expect if you use them, sometimes multiple megabytes in size per image if you want high quality. Compression can be completed but you’ll find the quality erodes very quickly so we wouldn’t recommend doing this, there are much better formats for optimizing space.
PNG – Probably the most common image format used for websites and general image usage, we recommend that you use this on ordinary pictures. This is because the file sizes are much lower, plus compression can be achieved without noticeable quality issues. Another benefit is that you can use transparent images, very useful in some cases if you want to place images onto a non-white background.
GIF – If you want an animated image of many frames, this is the format to use, the only popular format which allows this. The problem is that the quality isn’t always as good, which explains the very small file sizes that you’ll usually find when downloading these types of images. Only use these if you really have to use animation, the other extensions will provide you with much more – such as higher resolution graphics with a reasonable file size that will help you to store it and share it based on your needs.
BMP – This is one that should be avoided at all costs unless you really do care about the quality of your photo. Whilst you can get really great looking images, you’ll really suffer in terms of file size, with even just small images possibly taking over 10MB in disk space. This isn’t practical at all for distribution and storage and because of that it isn’t really used much in the real world, but the option does still exist in many applications to save to this format and that is something we advise you not to do.
In conclusion, we’ve talked about just four of many, many types of image files you could find when you’re browsing the P2P network included in our Ares free download. Most people don’t use it for downloading this type of data but it’s something we recommend you look into, people share amazing graphics through this method and they’re all free for you to view too, you can do what you like with them as long as it’s on your own personal computer. You could of course download any other type of media instead if you wanted to, but we’ll leave the freedom and the decision making up to you so you can get whatever you want.