Re: JPEG Files: Keeping Originals
Originally Posted by
soenda
I'm confused about when jpeg files degrade.
I shoot photos in high quality jpeg format. Using a card reader, I download a copy of the whole card in jpeg format onto an external hard drive. They don't get edited or reduced---just copied. For processing, I download a second copy of the whole card in jpeg format onto my hard drive.
At that point, I review the thumbnails in the browse feature of PaintShop Pro 9. I may open a few of them, but I don't rotate them or do anything else. I delete any that are obviously bad. Then I do a batch conversion of the jpegs into psp files for processing.
Here are my two questions:
1. Once in awhile, I mistakenly save a change to the newly converted psp file. That's when I go back to my "negatives" to make a new psp file for editing. When I open and copy a jpeg file, is that an editing process? Am I introducing loss into the original or the new psp file that I make from it?
2. If simply copying a jpeg file does not introduce loss, what's wrong with keeping my "negatives" in jpeg format? They sure take up a lot less space.
Thank you very much for any insight you can offer.
It seems to me that if you do not save the file with the JPEG extension, you haven't altered the original jpeg. If you check the file dates on the jpeg, you'll see that opening them does not change them UNLESS you resave it as a JPEG under the original name.
My camera does the same as yours does. I have all my originals in a "negatives" folder, and when I first open any of them, either to work on them or print them, I immediately save them as a psimage file in another folder before doing anything else.
That little habitual protocol maintains the originals in their virginal and unsullied state, safe in the "negatives" folder cloister
Regards,
Alan
Regards,
Alan
The unexamined life is not worth living--Socrates
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