SEPTEMBER / OCTOBER 2009

Dear Laura,

GRAPHIC FORMATS can seem very mysterious. If you're not a graphic designer or printer, jpg, tif, eps, and ai may look like so many alphabet noodles. But just about everyone who has a hand in marketing an organization will be asked to supply an image in a specific format at some point. Mind if I try to de-mystify this for you?

Graphic images are saved in various digital formats for different uses. The format follows the file name after a period (dot), such as mycompanylogo.eps or mybusinessphoto.jpg.

Below are guidelines regarding how the most common formats are used.

eps, ai
BEST FOR: Printing to Postscript office printers and commercial presses. Most promotional products companies prefer these as well. Also called vector graphics, these are the gold standard of graphic formats because they may be scaled to any size without loss of quality. They are high resolution no matter how large or small you make them. Most designers prefer to create an master image, a logo, for example, in ai (Adobe Illustrator) format, because they can produce whatever is needed for Internet use, presentations, etc., from this base artwork.

gif, png
BEST FOR: Screen display on your computer, especially on the Internet. Good for graphics with sharp, clean edges. Displays well on a screen, but does not print well. Should never be used for commercial printing on a press because of low resolution (72 or 96 dpi*). PNG format is better when a transparent background is needed. Gif and png images will lose quality when re-sized.

jpg, jpeg
BEST FOR: Screen display, especially photographic or continuous tone images, color or gray-scale, on the Internet. Depending on software, may be acceptable on office laser and ink jet printers. Will lose quality when enlarged. Sometimes acceptable for commercial printing, but must be high resolution, i.e., 300 dpi* or more. 

tiff, tif
BEST FOR: Printing to office printers and commercial presses. Must be high resolution for commercial printing, i.e., 300 dpi or more. Not the best for web or screen display. Will lose quality when enlarged.

pdf
BEST FOR: Viewing on the screen and printing out for in-house material. However, when saved at the proper resolution and color mode, pdf files are preferred by most publications that receive ads from various sources, as well as by many digital printers. Commercial printers may prefer artwork in native files, but can work with pdf files if properly prepared. Ask first.

bmp
BEST FOR: Black and white images, screen display under Windows. Acceptable for some commercial printing and desktop printing uses. Must be very high resolution when printing, usually 1200 dpi*. Will lose quality when enlarged.

 * dpi means "dots per inch." The more dots per inch, the higher the resolution (quality) of the image. Dots are also called pixels, so you will sometimes see "ppi" used (pixels per inch).

As always, I'm available to help with your web site, branding, electronic or conventional mail campaigns, fund-raising, trade show displays or advertising.

Thanks for reading.

LauraH@totalspectrum.com

Call us at 817.921.3115 to learn more about Total Spectrum's creative and marketing consulting services, or visit our web site.

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