Saturday, August 2, 2014

What is..? - GIF


                            GIF is the acronym for Graphics Interchange Format and pronounced as 'jiff' is an image file format, or more specifically compressed image file format.The GIF was designed by CompuServe with the official specification released in June of 1987. Yeahh that's why we see the term "CompuServe GIF" in Photoshop. This format supports both static as well as animated images.


                          The format supports up to 8 bits per pixel for each image. It is based on indexed color(indexed color is a technique to manage digital images' colors in a limited fashion, in order to save computer memory and file storage, while speeding up display refresh and file transfers.)which is a palette of at most 256 colors for each frame. This reduces the file size and thus they can be easily transmitted over a network. Thus we occur to see gif images at most of the web pages.
                            But these compression creates some issues as well, the color reproduction is poor,creating a distortion in the image, and so this format is unfit for viewing high quality images ,having a continuous range of colour (digital photography.). Digital photographers use image file formats capable of reproducing a greater range of colors, such as TIFF, RAW or JPEG.
                                GIF format is suitable for images being transferred on network places,  for sharp-edged line art (such as logos) with a limited number of colors,to store low-color sprite data for games,for small animations and low-resolution film clip.
                                Some of the best picks from the app to make animated gif's :-ImgFlip , picasion. Photoshop, GIMP, GIFBrewery ,gifferpro, GifBoom,GIFMaker.me,.Even today the google+ photos sections has an option to create beautiful GIFs.
Check this GIF's image for instance...

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