File Types

RAW - The RAW image format is sometimes called a digital negative. It's called a digital negative as the file itself is not directly editable or usable as an image, but has the means to create one. Also, much like a film negative, RAW files have a greater dynamic range and enable you to capture the most amount of information available in an image. RAW files must be converted to 'positive' files such as TIFF or JPEG files to be edited or manipulated.

TIFF - Firstly TIFF files are lossless file types. This means that the image does not loose information over time, therefore the maximum quality is maintained throughout editing and post processes. This also means that file size is much larger.

JPEG - JPEG files are extremely versatile, they can be used to publish work online and don't take up much space at all due to the small file sizes. However, JPEG files are lossy files, this means that when saving an image as a JPEG it will compress the image to a much smaller file size. This compression therefore degrades the quality every time the image is opened and re saved.