- [Instructor] When you're creating artwork,
how do you determine the format
that you're going to save it in?
Well, let's look at what your options are.
For vector formats, which consist of smooth lines
and they're infinitely scalable.
Adobe Illustrator Native is really nice format
because it has support for layers,
it supports transparency
and interesting blending modes.
Those are just ways for objects to interact
with the color of other objects
behind them in interesting ways.
Illustrator Native files can be imported
into InDesign and into Photoshop
and they can also be imported into QuarkXPress.
Now, there are other alternatives.
There is something called encapsulated postscript.
I'm sure you've seen this file extension, eps.
It's an older format.
I would refer to it as a legacy format
but it's usable in a wide range of applications.
It supports embedded fonts.
Doesn't have any support for transparency.
If you submit files to a sign company
they may ask you to send them an eps
and they may ask that you create it
in an older version of Illustrator.
In other words, you can use a modern version
but you have to back save to an older version of eps.
And here's something else to consider about eps's,
they don't have any support for layers
Portable Document format, well, hence the name.
It's a very portable file.
It has support for layers
as long as you create an Acrobat file
that's compatible with Acrobat 6 or above.
It has support for transparency.
As long as the file is compatible
with Acrobat 5 and above.
Of course it embeds fonts,
and it's okay to use as art in Adobe applications.
Don't be afraid to place a PDF in InDesign.
InDesign handles it perfectly well.
As long as that PDF was well created,
InDesign is going to digest it fine.
So that's why it's okay to submit for print.
Now, CorelDRAW, is a proprietary format,
and you can't directly open those files
in Adobe applications.
If that's something you wish you could do, you can't.
I think to make this the most portable possible,
if you're working in CorelDRAW,
consider exporting it to PDF for print,
rather than sending CorelDRAW to your printer
or to send to a designer down the line.
At least if it's a PDF,
you know that it's truly portable.
There's a file type called Windows Metafile.
And you may see that in some mapping applications
and so forth.
Now it supports embedded fonts.
It does not support transparency
and it doesn't support layers.
I wouldn't really recommend this for print.
There's a sort of related file format,
Enhanced Metafile, which again,
supports embedded fonts
but doesn't support live transparency or layers.
And I would highly recommend this for print either.
Let's talk about the Raster formats.
Remember they're made out of pixels
and there are advantages
and there are limitations to Raster Formats.
Tagged Image File Format, tif,
is really widely supported.
I can't think of a program off the top of my head
that doesn't take tif's.
Tif's support transparency
and they support layers
and they support spot colors.
So pretty good flexibility there.
And they support clipping paths.
If you choose to create silhouettes that way.
Now a native Photoshop document,
gives you support for layers.
It gives you support for transparency,
gives you support for spot colors,
support for clipping paths.
And here's something else to consider.
Pixel per pixel.
Usually a PSD is going to be smaller on disc than a tif.
So if you're interested in saving a little disc space,
this might lead you toward psd's.
Now jpeg's, very common format.
It's a compressed format.
So it's going to be a small file size
but that comes at a little bit of a cost.
If you aggressively compress an image
using the jpeg approach,
you can compromise your detail.
It does support clipping paths.
It doesn't support layers.
Doesn't support transparency.
Now here's an example of a jpeg that's perfectly acceptable.
Now I've zoomed way in on this woman's face,
but you can see that it looks pretty good.
So keep in mind that jpeg's can get kind of a bad rep
but a jpeg that hasn't been aggressively compressed
is still a perfectly usable file.
But what if you get a little bit carried away
with that compression.
Look at the detail loss on the right
and I'm sure you've seen this effect,
this sort of rectangular corruption,
this rectangular artifact that you see on images.
This would not be appropriate for print.
It's probably a very small file,
but there's no reclaiming that detail
once it's been compressed like this.
So don't stay away from jpeg's
because you think they're inherently bad.
Just don't aggressively compress files
when you creating jpeg's.
Portable Network Graphics, png's.
Support for transparency.
It doesn't support CMYK though.
So if you're creating files for print,
that might be a problem.
Although most printers will accept rgb files.
Png's don't support clipping pads
but I will say this for portable network graphics, png.
It's just fun to say.
Then the Graphic Interchange Format,
which I pronounce gif,
many people pronounce jif,
including the creator of the format,
but I'm sticking with gif.
This is something called indexed color.
You might think of it as a very limited box of crayons
expressing an image.
There's no support for CMYK
and it's a limited color palette, just 256 colors.
That sounds like a lot.
But when you have a color image
you actually need millions of colors.
So I would say that this is not recommended for print.
Now, didn't I mentioned eps before?
Why am I talking about it again?
Well, the encapsulated part is the part to keep in mind.
An Encapsulated Postscript file
could have image content in it,
it could have vector art content in it.
This is talking about an eps that has Raster content in it.
It's not vector just making an image into an eps
does not convert it to vector.
It's just pixels,
but it's in a PostScript wrapper.
You may find that some older workflows
need for your images to be saved as eps
and that's just fine.
It's still the same amount of pixels,
it's just in a little different package.
So some digital asset management systems
require that your file format is eps,
but you'll find because it's a package
with something else inside,
that eps's are often larger disc files
than either tif or psd,
but they do support clipping paths.
So what's the best format to use?
Well, of course, if you're creating artwork
for someone else's use,
ask them what they need,
but if you're using Adobe Creative Cloud products,
I recommend that you stick with the Native Photoshop psd
and the Native Adobe Illustrator formats, the ai file.
Those offer the most flexibility
of all of the graphic formats.