File Question about Elements Digital Software

[RacePhoto]

Group,

If the JPEG file is a "loss type", then when you are using the various tools in say Elements, does your picture continue to lose detail as you use the program?

If so, then the only digital software tool to use would be the ones made for raw files?

Marc

NO, not "as you use the program" it stays the same, as you edit.

I could open a file today in Elements or Photoshop or anything else, and leave it until tomorrow, the image will not be altered or change, during that time... as I edit the image. I can make changes and save, as long as I don't re-open the image, the fact that I am editing, while I'm editing, doesn't alter the image, except the changes I have made intentionally.

Only one thing will alter an image and that's saving it which compresses the data using encoding. The process of opening any image, will also introduce some artifacts, as the software has to decode the image.

Saving with a different name, means the original image, if it has not been saved again, is still the original image.

 

[AlanKlein]

NO, not "as you use the program" it stays the same, as you edit.

I could open a file today in Elements or Photoshop or anything else, and leave it until tomorrow, the image will not be altered or change, during that time... as I edit the image. I can make changes and save, as long as I don't re-open the image, the fact that I am editing, while I'm editing, doesn't alter the image, except the changes I have made intentionally.

Only one thing will alter an image and that's saving it which compresses the data using encoding. The process of opening any image, will also introduce some artifacts, as the software has to decode the image.

Saving with a different name, means the original image, if it has not been saved again, is still the original image.

Save all intermediate edited files as tiffs rather than jpeg to avoid compression issues caused by jpeg.

 

[RacePhoto]

Save all intermediate edited files as tiffs rather than jpeg to avoid compression issues caused by jpeg.

Yes, if you need the intermediate files, one could go back. I thought of that the other day, and maybe I missed it, but having to go back CTRL-Z 10 times to revert, I made an error in the mask, is awkward. It would be nice to be able to see previous versions and just drop back 10. But, sometimes it's just my own doing as I have a CC subscription for Photoshop or Lightroom and I still prefer Elements.

My only point in writing the reply was the "While Editing" part. There's no destruction, during the time the file is open and edited.

The alternate answer is, save as a PSD, because they save all the data and are smaller than a TIFF.

There are also some complications, for those who care about every tiny pixel, because if I open a file, that's a JPEG and save it as a TIFF or PSD, the unpacking artifacts, banding, grids... are already there and included.

TIFFs are HUGE!

 

[AlanKlein]

Yes, if you need the intermediate files, one could go back. I thought of that the other day, and maybe I missed it, but having to go back CTRL-Z 10 times to revert, I made an error in the mask, is awkward. It would be nice to be able to see previous versions and just drop back 10. But, sometimes it's just my own doing as I have a CC subscription for Photoshop or Lightroom and I still prefer Elements.

My only point in writing the reply was the "While Editing" part. There's no destruction, during the time the file is open and edited.

The alternate answer is, save as a PSD, because they save all the data and are smaller than a TIFF.

There are also some complications, for those who care about every tiny pixel, because if I open a file, that's a JPEG and save it as a TIFF or PSD, the unpacking artifacts, banding, grids... are already there and included.

TIFFs are HUGE!

Lightroom allows you to save many intermediate edits in stages so you can always go back and start at an earlier point or just for comparison. Of course, you don't have the later edits in the earlier stage. But it's pretty flexible.

Since Lightroom doesn't save images when editing, only the data descriptions of the edits, these intermediate saves take up very little storage. The only time you get additional image files is after all the edits when you create let's say a jpeg for posting in a forum. You can otherwise just save the edits when closing the Lightroom app and no additional image files are created.

 

[AlanKlein]

One point. You can switch back into Elements and other editing apps such as Photoshop from within Lightroom and then back to Lightroom. However, because you're using Elements for some of the edits, you will have to create an additional image file in this case.

 

[Ysarex]

NO, not "as you use the program" it stays the same, as you edit.

The original image as saved to disk stays the same as you edit provided you don't save and overwrite that original disk file.
You opened the image and loaded it into memory in order to display and edit it. The image as loaded into memory and displayed does change in response to your edits.

I could open a file today in Elements or Photoshop or anything else, and leave it until tomorrow, the image will not be altered or change, during that time... as I edit the image. I can make changes and save,

"Save" means save to disk. If you make changes and save the image with the same name then that overwrites the original disk file and the original image is changed.

as long as I don't re-open the image, the fact that I am editing, while I'm editing, doesn't alter the image, except the changes I have made intentionally.

Only one thing will alter an image and that's saving it which compresses the data using encoding. The process of opening any image, will also introduce some artifacts, as the software has to decode the image.

The process of opening an image does not introduce artifacts as the software decodes the image. You can open and close a JPEG a thousand times and as long as you don't re-save the JPEG each of the 1000 openings will display pixel for pixel identical results -- nothing is "introduced."

Saving with a different name, means the original image, if it has not been saved again, is still the original image.

 

[RacePhoto]

I read the question as "While Editing", the rest is a matter of fact and yes, the image changes any time it is saved, over written or as a new file. No argument there.

 

[Ysarex]

I read the question as "While Editing", the rest is a matter of fact and yes, the image changes any time it is saved, over written or as a new file. No argument there.

But as per your previous post, the process of opening an image does not introduce artifacts as the software decodes the image. Opening the image introduces no change to the image data.

 

[AlanKlein]

What is tiff compression?

 

[Ysarex]

What is tiff compression?

TIFF is a common image file format. Like most digital data it can be compressed. Data compression encodes redundancy for storage and that process can be reversed to open the data in it's original form with no information loss. The compression algorithms are standard and the same algorithms as used for example to store a ZIP file.

The same compression algorithms are used to store a JPEG. The "lossy" aspect of JPEG doesn't occur when the data is actually compressed but before the data is compressed. The JPEG algorithm adds redundancy to the data (alters the data) to make it more compressible and then applies standard compression algorithms to that altered data. More data redundancy = more compression and vice versa.

Data with zero redundancy (uncommon) can not be compressed.

 

[AlanKlein]

TIFF is a common image file format. Like most digital data it can be compressed. Data compression encodes redundancy for storage and that process can be reversed to open the data in it's original form with no information loss. The compression algorithms are standard and the same algorithms as used for example to store a ZIP file.

The same compression algorithms are used to store a JPEG. The "lossy" aspect of JPEG doesn't occur when the data is actually compressed but before the data is compressed. The JPEG algorithm adds redundancy to the data (alters the data) to make it more compressible and then applies standard compression algorithms to that altered data. More data redundancy = more compression and vice versa.

Data with zero redundancy (uncommon) can not be compressed.

If there's no loss with compressed tiff, why not use compressed tiff rather than compressed jpeg?

 

[Ysarex]

If there's no loss with compressed tiff, why not use compressed tiff rather than compressed jpeg?

Massively less compression. The advantage JPEG offers is much much higher compression rates with the tradeoff that data must be altered to achieve those higher rates. There's no going back from the JPEG's altered data -- that becomes permanent.

 

[Original katomi]

The way I had Tiff vs jpg described is
for the colour EG red Tiff will assign a name/code for each shade
where as Jpg will say ok that red “a’ is nearly the same as b and c and lump them all together

 

[Ysarex]

The way I had Tiff vs jpg described is
for the colour EG red Tiff will assign a name/code for each shade
where as Jpg will say ok that red “a’ is nearly the same as b and c and lump them all together

That's a fair explanation of how JPEG works albeit pretty simple.
Compression requires redundancy. Zero redundancy and no compression is possible. Consider a page of written text in English. The five character combination: " the " is likely to occur more than once -- we have redundancy and compression is possible.

JPEG places an 8x8 pixel grid over the photo. Each grid cell then contains 64 pixels. If all 64 pixels are unique then there is no redundancy and no compression is possible. Assume the cell contains a little blue sky and 5 of the pixels are the same. Then slight compression is possible. JPEG's job (which it does brilliantly) is to analyze those 64 pixels and alter some of them to create/increase redundancy. How strong the user set's the JPEG algorithm the more aggressive it gets. So we start with a 64 pixel cell in which 5 pixels are the same and end up with a 64 pixel cell in which there are 4 groups of 8 pixels the same. Increased redundancy = greater compression. The changes JPEG makes to pixels to force redundancy can't be undone.

 

[AlanKlein]

That's a fair explanation of how JPEG works albeit pretty simple.
Compression requires redundancy. Zero redundancy and no compression is possible. Consider a page of written text in English. The five character combination: " the " is likely to occur more than once -- we have redundancy and compression is possible.

JPEG places an 8x8 pixel grid over the photo. Each grid cell then contains 64 pixels. If all 64 pixels are unique then there is no redundancy and no compression is possible. Assume the cell contains a little blue sky and 5 of the pixels are the same. Then slight compression is possible. JPEG's job (which it does brilliantly) is to analyze those 64 pixels and alter some of them to create/increase redundancy. How strong the user set's the JPEG algorithm the more aggressive it gets. So we start with a 64 pixel cell in which 5 pixels are the same and end up with a 64 pixel cell in which there are 4 groups of 8 pixels the same. Increased redundancy = greater compression. The changes JPEG makes to pixels to force redundancy can't be undone.

If I can only figure out how to do that with a $100 bill?