The recent thread on png vs jpg might
provide some helpful information. I'll try to give a brief
answer.
Jpeg throws away much of the information contained in the
picture. If you just want to look at the picture but don't want
to edit it, jpeg should be ok.
Png doesn't throw away any of the data, but compresses it so none
of the data is lost. This makes for a larger file, but a better
choice if you want to maintain quality after editing the file.
Gif is an old format dating back to 1987. It's 8 bits per pixel
so you only get 256 possible colors.
Also anything I've read about tiff says it's preferred by
professionals especially when they're going to edit the result. A
tiff image can be uncompressed, or compressed using either lossy
or lossless options.
I would suggest saving anything you're editing as an uncompressed
tiff file while you're working on it.
I have a 10 megapixel camera that saves pictures as jpg files.
I've taken several pictures to walmart to have them printed, and
they look fine.
No doubt by the time the weekend's over, you'll get some useful
information.
bye
Derek
On 10/5/2012 16:08, Michael Havens
wrote:
I'm delving into GIMP. What is the best save format?
JPG, GIF, etc...
:-)~MIKE~(-: