May 2014 Essay - Pixel-Based Graphics and Resolution

[Gare]

Actually user manual for the scanning software I use says they can but Windows 5 header is required for an embedded profile. No way to test though as the .bmp files that the software will output have Windows 3 header.

What it boils down to is what a programmer is willing or capable of putting into the I/O part of the program, theinonen. There's a compelling reason to use PNG as a bitmap export from Xara, instead of BMP, that has nothing to do with the latent capabilities of the BMP file format: politically, Microsoft has moved away from it. The icons you see in Windows 7 and 8 are PNG in file structure, BMP was a cornerstone of graphics when Windows began, but you're not likely to see it supported more today, but less instead, I'd think.

Again, it's not the latent capability we should be interested in, but rather what a company's engineers are asked to activate within the I/O engine. did you know that AVI files can contain an alpha channel? And did you know Adobe Systems is just about the only company that lets you into access an alpha channel for video compositing work in Photoshop Extended and After Effects?

I'm all for more diversity, and not less, but unless someone picks up the torch and runs with it for a specific feature or capability with a file format, output becomes meaningless when a different program can't input that output.

My Best,

Gary

[mwenz]

Heh. I did mutate your essay into an area it didn't really cover, didn't I? I have more to write on this subject as regards Xara products based on the last post addressed to me...but I will gladly refrain

More or less back on track, I gotta say that every application ought to display the effective "resolution" of images in the status bar as do Xara products. It's important information for print work.

Mike

[Gare]

More or less back on track, I gotta say that every application ought to display the effective "resolution" of images in the status bar as do Xara products. It's important information for print work.

Mike

It's truly nice and it's dynamic, agreed. The only improvement I could suggest is that this area should be interactive. Suppose you have a 96 pixel/inch image selected and you want it resized (not resampled) to 225 or the lowest value you can get away with for your inkjet printer. You should be able to type "225" in that readout box, hit Enter, and the image would shrink in dimensions and instantly become 225 ppi in resolution.

I wasn't rebuking, or rebuffing you for your posts on some of the lamentable things you finds in Xara earlier, Mike. I just want to keep this thing on topic because the article was a massive undertaking from a documenter's focal point of view, plus the research, to try to digest the nerdy stuff into a simple way to ensure the best bitmap out of Xara. I thought it was necessary, only because I've seen so many questions about resolution on tg, and I'd love a spirited discussion on color space and structurally different color modes, but the program doesn't really support them, so the discussion would be one large moot point, right?

I'd prefer to cover stuff such as Levels and other photographic modifications in the future that you can perform in Xara, with results that look every bit as good as if you used Brand "P", you know?

My Best,

Gary