Jpg or Gif?

[Self-sain]

Ok, so for all the digital artiest out there, I have a question. Which is the better format to save your picture in Jpg, gif, or some other kind?

[White Wolf Guardian]

Jpeg will have the most quality and resolution, gif is best used for small animations, that being because gif is a lower quality type of picture and will have more jagged edges. Now if you had to have a transparency feature and still want quality minus the animation, use png format.

[Self-sain]

O i see thanks white

[Somebody]

Minus for animation PNG is the best format by far. All the quality but not too much file size. I use it for everything

[Self-sain]

O, so I should always save in PNG?

[Tweak]

PNGs do support animation, just not many browsers do.

[Self-sain]

O, so PNGs the ultimate format, just to much for the browsers?

[Tweak]

For web-based graphics PNG will usually do the job. Bar animation which GIF should be used for compatibility. JPEG should only really be used for photographs where the perfect quality is needed.

PNG was created with the express intent of beng used on the web so it has powerful compression which isn't overly lossy but still maintains the quality required. There's no need for 1200 dpi images on the web afterall, your monitor can only display so much well.

[Self-sain]

All this just for something simple as a picture format

[WingedZephyr]

Tweak is correct.


JPG: Made to give the best quality for photographs, though can be used for any kind of static (non-animated) images. Depending on the graphics program you save it with, JPGs can look extremely crappy, or quite decent. (For example, saving a JPG in MS Paint could often leave your image looking speckled and blotchy, while saving it in Photoshop won't affect the quality noticeably.) It also offers the smallest file size, generally.

GIF: Primarily used for animated images and pixel art. For static images, this file type is designed to give better quality when you have large blocks of color (flat colored images, for example, without a ton of shading or details). GIFs can give you a transparent background, but there is no semi-transparency. That means that you won't be able to have any soft gradients turning into transparent space; it has to have a hard edge where it meets the transparent area(s).

PNG: Generally acceptable as the best overall quality with reasonable file size. Best used for static images. PNGs can give you both a transparency AND semi-transparency, so you can have soft edges unlike with GIFs.

[Self-sain]

The more you know

Thanks Zeph

[Somebody]

Note that repeated tampering with JPEG can utterly destroy the quality. Also note that JPEG will often look completely awful when uploaded to many web sources, particularly FA and DA as well as photobucket. I wouldn't ever use JPEG unless my life depended on it. JPEG images tend to form a "Fuzz" around elements in the picture that is downright ugly to look at.

As for animations a PNG animation will be significantly higher in file size then gif, and have a lot more compatibility issues. There is really no reason not to use gif as there's little to no reduction in quality and it will work just about everywhere on the web.

[Self-sain]

I guess its a good thing I asked, I would of kept useing jpg for the rest of my life thanks 

[Somebody]

It will effect colored images more then a black and white image such as your avatar. I can personally vouch for this as I used to use JPEG for posting arts. They looked awful.

If you plan on doing linearts as a primary form of art what you choose won't matter as much

[Self-sain]

No I do digital to, I just don't have a lot of time to edit my avi, but I do digital art work here and there