Which Image Format Do I Choose?

If you are into digital photography, chances are that youhave already come across the different file formats used bydigital cameras.

It doesnt matter if you are an amateur or a professionalbecause you will have to deal with them when takingpictures and transferring them to your computer andeventually editing them.

But which image format is best for you? It all depends onthe result that you want and how much control you want tohave over editing your images. Below are the most commonimage formats used by digital cameras.

1. JPEG

- this is probably the most popular image format used notonly in digital photography but also in web design. It is agood thing because you can be sure that you can open yourfile using any computer and without the need of specialsoftware.

Theres a downside, however, since JPEG is considered alossy format, which means that a lot of details are lostdue to the formats compression.

2. TIFF

- the answer to JPEGs lossy quality is the TIFF format. Itmeans that more details are saved which translates to abetter image quality.

But it comes at a price since TIFF files are notoriouslyhuge and could eat up storage media space in no time.

3. RAW

- among the three, RAW could be considered as the file thatshows images at its, well, rawest. RAW images areunprocessed which gives photographers more control inediting them later on.