PNG's? whats the problem with them

James M. Shook wrote:

Yes indeed. Firework's decision to use .PNG as its native format was a huge
mistake, in my opinion. I keep hoping they will change this but so far...

Why? How has it caused problems for you?

Linda Rathgeber
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Design Aid: 10-Palette Pack for Fireworks & Flash
http://www.webdevbiz.com/graphics.cfm
Playing with Fire | http://www.playingwithfire.com
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In article <bu95eh$ju5$1 (AT) forums (DOT) macromedia.com> , Linda Rathgeber
<lightly (AT) sc (DOT) rr.com> wrote:

Why? When you save from any graphics program you save in a proprietary
format, like PSD, or CDR. You have to export from any of them to end up
with a Web ready format.

Because .PNG is *also* a web graphics format (although not perfectly
supported by every browser.) Fireworks uses it as its native file format,
but tucks in a lot of extra data that is useless for displaying an image in
a web page but which makes it p[ossible to continue editing the file within
FW. So some people just save their working .PNG file and insert it into
their page. Even for browsers that support .PNG, the file is much too large
since it still has all of that proprietary Fireworks stuff.

If you had an image editor that used .GIF as its native file format, would
it be obvious to you that you shouldn't just use that file in your page?

-- James M. Shook
http://www.jshook.com

Murray *TMM* wrote:

darrel:

They decided to use PNG (probably) because a) they didn't want to use PSD,
and b) they didn't want to create a proprietary format, and c) PNG was
already robust enough to support the feature set they wanted to use. But
I'm guessing....

Another reason is that the PNG format allows you to write proprietary
data chunks to the head of the data file. The Macromedia engineers have
taken advantage of that option by using it to store information about
live effects and other editables. That's why there is such a large
difference in the file size between a saved version of a Fireworks PNG
file and an exported one. When the file is exported/flattened, those
chunks get removed.

Linda Rathgeber
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Design Aid: 10-Palette Pack for Fireworks & Flash
http://www.webdevbiz.com/graphics.cfm
Playing with Fire | http://www.playingwithfire.com
Victoriana | Theme Pack 03 - Club | http://www.projectseven.com
Team MM Fireworks Volunteer | www.macromedia.com/go/team
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James M. Shook wrote:

If you had an image editor that used .GIF as its native file format, would
it be obvious to you that you shouldn't just use that file in your page?

Yes. I'm too used to exporting images to use them on Web pages.

Linda Rathgeber
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Design Aid: 10-Palette Pack for Fireworks & Flash
http://www.webdevbiz.com/graphics.cfm
Playing with Fire | http://www.playingwithfire.com
Victoriana | Theme Pack 03 - Club | http://www.projectseven.com
Team MM Fireworks Volunteer | www.macromedia.com/go/team
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In article <bu98v5$ore$1 (AT) forums (DOT) macromedia.com> , "Murray *TMM*"
<forums (AT) HAHAgreat-web-sights (DOT) com> wrote:

In Photoshop, you have to select Save for Web to get those options,
otherwise you save as a PSD. That's the confusion.

No. That's not the only way to save an image for the web. I make everything
in Photoshop and never use "Save for web..." yet I end up with GIFs and
JPGs. How is this possble? It's as simple as "Save as..." and selecting the
desired format from the pop-up menu. And not only are web formats available
but many others as well.

-- James M. Shook
http://www.jshook.com

In article <BC2D67CE.1D31C%mark.morse (AT) sanmina-sci (DOT) com> , Mark Morse
<mark.morse (AT) sanmina-sci (DOT) com> wrote:

You can use save as and save as a jpg, png or gif but they aren't optimized.

Wth GIFs, you must convert to an indexed color file. This is the point at
which you can select the number of colors to use or choose an adapative
palette (with several options.) The image is now optimised. "Save as..."

With a JPG you select the amount of compression when you "Save as..." and
select JPG.

-- James M. Shook
http://www.jshook.com

That's true but the save for web gives you greater control. You can see the
results before you save and I can always get smaller files.
mark

In article <BC2D67CE.1D31C%mark.morse (AT) sanmina-sci (DOT) com> , Mark Morse
mark.morse (AT) sanmina-sci (DOT) com> wrote:

You can use save as and save as a jpg, png or gif but they aren't optimized.

Wth GIFs, you must convert to an indexed color file. This is the point at
which you can select the number of colors to use or choose an adapative
palette (with several options.) The image is now optimised. "Save as..."

With a JPG you select the amount of compression when you "Save as..." and
select JPG.

-- James M. Shook
http://www.jshook.com

In article <BC2D718A.1D6AF%mark.morse (AT) sanmina-sci (DOT) com> , Mark Morse
<mark.morse (AT) sanmina-sci (DOT) com> wrote:

That's true but the save for web gives you greater control. You can see the
results before you save and I can always get smaller files.

Actually I save them as .PSD files and then optimise them in Fireworks :-)
I was just showing that you *can* save from Photoshop in web formats without
using the "Save for web..." thing.

-- James M. Shook
http://www.jshook.com

Linda Rathgeber wrote:

Why? When you save from any graphics program you save in a proprietary
format, like PSD, or CDR. You have to export from any of them to end up
with a Web ready format.

Not necessarily. I use Paint Shop Pro and don't have to use its internal
PSP-format (which is quite useful though), I can choose between a few
dozen different formats, all with their different compression and/or
optimization options. No export, it's the usual "save as ..."

Micha

Michael Fesser wrote:

Not necessarily. I use Paint Shop Pro and don't have to use its internal
PSP-format (which is quite useful though), I can choose between a few
dozen different formats, all with their different compression and/or
optimization options. No export, it's the usual "save as ..."

You can't save as GIF. You have to export in GIF format from PSP. You
can save as JPEG, but it's not optimized for the Web. I don't see any
advantage there.


Linda Rathgeber
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Design Aid: 10-Palette Pack for Fireworks & Flash
http://www.webdevbiz.com/graphics.cfm
Playing with Fire | http://www.playingwithfire.com
Victoriana | Theme Pack 03 - Club | http://www.projectseven.com
Team MM Fireworks Volunteer | www.macromedia.com/go/team
----------------------------------------------------------------------