Graphic file formats and application

File formats

Raster
Raster images (bitmaps) are what the image type is. Raster images are made up of small
squares in rows and lines in the image. Each square is made up of a colour of its own, it cant
be 2+ colours, just one. When you zoom into the raster image, it stretches and you can see
all the pixels. They take up a lot of space compared to a vector image.

As you can see on this image, when you zoom into the raster image, it stretches and you can
see all the pixels and it looks rather blurry and unclear to see. They take up a lot of space
compared to a vector image. With raster images, they need a colour for each square they
have but vector images low on lines which can change colour as they go along. Vector
images can be shaped into anything like lines, curves and polygons.

Vector
Unlike Raster images, vector images flow on lines which can change colour as
they go along. Vector images can be shaped into anything like lines, curves and
polygons. Raster images are often used in GIFs (Graphics Interchange Format)
and is why the quality in GIFs arent that good and the colours arent all HD.

Vector images are good for being used in logos as you can put them on small
leaflets or business cards but also on huge billboards as they wont be all
pixelated and therefore be seen clearly. With vector images, it doesnt matter if
its been zoomed or stretched, itll still be clear and unchanged. This is all shown
on these images above. Vector is very close to see zoomed in, where raster isnt.
A vector graph is more straight and curvy lines which are used to see the image
better. On normal images, pixels are used to make up the image. Pixels are little
squares made up in vertical and horizontal lines with one full colour in them.
These may make it poor quality as they may come up on your screen when
zoomed in making it harder to see and work out the image. Vector graphs use
lines so its much more clearer to see then zoomed in. This image shows the
different between a vector graph and another use of imagery. Vector graphs use
these lines which are able to change colour, thickness, shape and size of it. This
makes it cleaner and clearer to see.
Vector graphs can be ideal for brand logos as you can create them to be small to
fit on leaflets or business cards but you can also make them huge to be clearly
seen on things like billboards without the little pixel squares.

Metafiles
There are two main types of metafile. Both being computer files, but however,
the first one is a type of file which basically gives you a description of the other
files on your computer. This may contain metadata which is basically what the
data is from other files which have already been sorted into their different files.
The other metafile is mainly used in graphics on your computer. This type of
metafile will give you a list of coordinates which will consist of objects and
images. Most of the time, this type of metafile is mostly used in images like
vector images.
.WMF: This stands for Windows Metafile. This allows you to store information from
both vector and bitmap images. This can be used on the main Microsoft
softwares including Word, PowerPoint and Publisher.

File extensions

.BMP stands for Bitmap Image File. A bmp is what stores the raster image. Its
one of Microsofts newest extentions, so therefore it works on anything to do with
Microsoft. You can use a BMP file to store 2D images, which could be created in
black and white or colour.

.PNG: stands for Portable Network Graphics. It is a file format for image
compression. A PNG allows the person who created it to adjust the colour,
brightness, file size when the image has been compressed.

.GIF: stands for Graphics Interchange Format. This is widely used on the web to
create small animations using the raster image type. It can use up to 256 colours
each time.

.TIFF: stands for Tag Image File Format. It is used for exporting grey scale images
to other programmes. This could be desktop publishing, faxing, 3-D applications,
or medical imaging applications.

.JPG: stands for Point Photographic Experts Group. A JPG is like a GIF but you can
have more colours on it. A JPG can be used on websites which you dont need to
zoom into as a JPG hasnt got great quality.
.PSD: is a Photoshop Document. When you save work from Photoshop, it saves as
a PSD which can work with all the layers. In Photoshop, you can then fatten your
layers together and save it as a JPG, GIF or TIFF file.

Applications
Vector-based applications
There are three main vector based applications which are mostly used for
metagraphics. The first one being Adobe Illustrator. This application is the most
popular, being created by Adobe. Illustrator is used for creating web and screen
based graphics so like on websites or on your handheld devices. However,
illustrator didnt always use to be for screen based graphics, it was originally
made for creating vector images for print.

The second is CorelDraw, which is also quite popular. Theres not many
differences between the two applications mentions as theyre quite similar.
However, one of the most beneficial things that CorelDraw has which illustrator
doesnt, is that you are able to edit multiple pages at the same time, whereas
you can only do one on illustrator. Although this is an advantage, a disadvantage
is that youre only able to use it on Windows, which is why more people use
illustrator.

The final one is Adobe Freehand which use to be Macromedia. Its like a less
upgraded version of illustrator, so Adobe are suggesting that their users move
onto illustrator, due to them not making anymore plans to update Freehand.
However, you can still buy and use it.
Raster-based applications
Raster images are often used in GIFs (Graphics Interchange Format) and is why
the quality in GIFs arent that good and the colours arent all HD. Vector images
are good for beung used in logos as you can put them on small leaflets or
business cards but also on huge billboards as they wont be all pixelated and
therefore be seen clearly. With vector images, it doesnt matter if its been
zoomed or stretched, itll still be clear and unchanged. This is shown on this
image below, Vector is quite close to see zoomed in, whereas raster isnt.

Use in different media forms (print, moving image, interactive)

Print
Magazines are a good example of media printing as magazine pages typically
have many images and texts on one page. However, due to more people using
the internet, magazines are going more online based as less people are buying
physical copies. You are also able to print your images or graphics on many
different types of objects or material like card, canvas, mugs, pillows and many
more. When you print whatever you want for your media, you usually use a
digital printer. You are able to use any application you want to print something
out which you desire, making sure its in the right file format. This could be
anything where all the graphics and text have been merged into one page, the
best type of print you can do is in a JPEG format.

Moving image
You can use moving image to describe a GIF. A GIF is usually made by using a
stop-motion animation process. Stop frame animation is a systematic process of
taking images of every move but stop motion does not necessarily have to be
created around clay, it could be humans, drawings, puppets etc. Again, every
move you take a picture of the frame and then edit it to become a smooth,
flowing animation causing an illusion that the characters/objects are actually
moving. This is usually created using the software Adobe Flash, but can be
created on Photoshop which is more complicated.

Another moving image technique which is popular on the cinema is computer

animation, which is more smoother flowing than GIFs. Computer animation is
used in films like Avatar, Up and Ice Age. This is where you use software on your
computer to create the characters, backgrounds and animations. The difference
between computer and plasticine animations are quite easy to tell as computer
animations do flow more into each other whereas plasticine is quite stiff and it's
sort of like the characters mouths moving doesnt quite match up to what's being
said. The whole animation on a computer is like an illusion as it uses images on
top of other images instead of new ones which makes the whole process
illusional.

Interactive
Most importantly, to be able to use any authoring tools, you need a computer to
work on. The tools are the software needed on your computer to organise and
edit what is needed on a multimedia project. On these software's, the user can
combine images, videos, text all into one to create a project the user can interact
with. You can use the tools on these software's to edit the interactivity on your
website/video game etc.
An example of a interactive media authoring tool is Photoshop where you create
the graphical image which you can then go further onto Flash and there, you can
change the image into an animation to put on a website. If you really wanted,
you could use the tools on Audacity to create a sound for whenever the GIF
plays. The tools can bring your work to life with the animation used.