Images In HTML
Graphic Interchange Format (GIF)
Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) uses a compression technique that preserves all color information for the image. It uses maximum of 256 colors. Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) format is best for displaying images like logos, icons, and buttons. A Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) file with fewer number of colors has smaller file size and allow greater compression. However the use of Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) format is limited because of color depth limitation. It should not be used for photographs and complex graphics.
Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) Images are in two versions. These are Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) 87 And Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) 89a format. Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) 89a is newer and has following features.
Interlacing
Interlacing is a capability that enables the browser to display the image as it loads. The image gradually get clearer until it loaded completely. Interlaced images are slightly larger in the size than non-interlaced images.
Transparency
Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) 89a format can be used to set a single color to be transparent. It will allow the background color or image to show through it.
Animated Graphic Interchange Format (GIF)
Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) 89a can also be animated using special software. Graphic Interchange Format (GIF) images are actually a number of GIF Images saved in a single file.
Join Photographic Expert Group (JPG, JPEG)
Join Photographic Expert Group (JPG, JPEG) is good format for images. It can contain millions of colors. It does not provide the option of transparency or interlacing. It allows to specify the degree of compression to create a balance between image quality and file size. It uses a compression technique that discards some colors that cause the less quality of the original image.The higher compression reduce the file size but provide lower image quality. A new addition to JPEG format is Progressive JPEG. PRO JPEG provide superior compression and give a wider range of quality settings. Pro-JPEG also support interlacing.
Limited Support Or Non-Supported Images Formats
The following formats are supported by some computers but not all computers. These are not recommended to be included in HTML pages. The images can be converted to supported formats by using graphics editor such as Corel Photo Paint Or Adobe Photoshop.
Portable Network Graphics (PNG)
Portable Network Graphics (PNG) is good for combination of text and graphics within one range. It supports transparency and interlacing but not animations. It was specially designed for use on web. It was intended to place GIF format. However it is not popular because of lack of browser support. PNG is supported by Internet Explorer.
Bitmap Picture (BMP)
BMP stands for bitmap picture. It is most commonly used in Windows environment. It provides high quality images. BMP images are nor compressed and produce large file size. That is why it is not used on Internet.
Tagged Image File Format (TIFF)
TIFF stands for Tagged Image File Format. It is widely supported format to store bitmap images in the computer. It is commonly used in desktop publishing, 3D applications and medical imagining applications.
PCX
It was devoloped by ZSOFT for PC Paintbrush program. PCX is a graphics file format for graphic programs running on PCs.
