PhotoKit-EL
Saving Images
Once
you learn how to use PhotoKit-EL, a very important consideration
will be saving your images. If you opened up an image from a digital
camera, the odds are the file format is .jpg (JPEG) which is a
common file format for digital cameras. JPEGs are useful for situations
where an image's file size is important such as when being written
to a compact flash card or put up on a web site. However, JPEGs
are not an ideal file format for digital imaging.
The
way that JPEGs are created is to compress the color information
while trying to preserve the luminance information. This compression
process is called "lossy" because some information in an image is
"lost". While the initial compression you get from a digital camera
is not severe, opening a JPEG in Adobe Photoshop Elements and
re-saving as a JPEG will add to the loss of image integrity. Repeated
opening,
modification and re-saving should be avoided.
When
you run a PhotoKit-EL effect on an image, the result is a layer
sitting on top of the original image. This is extremely useful
for the purpose of image corrections and manipulations. However,
adding layers not only adds to the size of the saved file, it also
limits your choice of file formats when saving.
  
If
you go to save an image that has a PhotoKit-EL layer on it, you will
not be able to save as a JPEG because JPEGs can not have layers.
So, you have several options, either flatten the image and allow
Elements
to re-compress the image as a JPEG or save the image in a different
file format.

Because
Elements tries to prevent you from accidentally saving over a file,
Elements will add the word "copy" when you try to save an image as
a JPEG with a layer in the file. This will prevent you from accidentally
over-writing your original file. The is a good thing, but can
be annoying.
At
this point when saving, you can choose to manually remove the word
"copy" and therefore over-write your original file. However,
this will flatten the file and eliminate any layers. If you are
absolutely
sure you do not wish to do any additional work on the image, you
may wish to do this. This will re-compress the image as a JPEG
and replace your original image with your new version of the image.
We recommend, however, that you give serious consideration to this
decision. If there is any chance you may wish to do additional
work on the image or that you may need to go back to the original
image for any reason, we suggest you either leave the word "copy"
in the file name or use another name addendum such as "ADJ" to
preserve your original.


As
an alternative, you may decide to keep your image with any PhotoKit-EL
layers intact.
This will allow you to come back to the image and make additional
changes without having to worry about problems you may have with
JPEG artifacts
from repeated saves while preserving your layers for later editing.
Element's
native file format is .PSD (Photoshop). With a PSD file, anything
you create in an Elements file can be saved including image layers,
adjustment layers and type layers. The PSD file format includes
a level of compression using a completely lossless scheme so you
can be assured that you'll never suffer recompression artifacts.

While
many applications can open PSD files, there is another format that
has
even wider acceptance called TIFF. It should be noted however that
while Elements can indeed save layered files in the TIFF file format,
layered TIFFs can only be read by Elements and Photoshop at this
time. TIFF files, therefore do not have the same interchangeability
that PSDs have. However, TIFFs do offer additional lossless compression
schemes that can make the saved file size smaller.

A
TIFF can use LZW, ZIP and even JPEG compression. Note that the
JPEG compression
inside a TIFF is still lossy. If you select ZIP compression-the
most efficient TIFF compression-you will get the following warning:

You can choose
to not see this message again.
To
recap, running a PhotoKit-EL effect on a file will add a layer.
Not all
file formats can save layers so you need to choose whether or not
to save the layers or flatten. If you do flatten, consider adding
a file name addition to avoid saving over your original file. If
you need to save in a JPEG file format, understand that it will
compress your file in a lossy manner. You should avoid re-saving
over and over as a JPEG.
Both
PSD and TIFF file formats can save layers. TIFF has a ZIP compression
which is the most efficient lossless compression scheme.
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