Technical data

96 Color and Input/Output Options
♦ You can use the Color Pickup tool as a probe to read component
values in an image. Move the tool around the image and watch the
HintLine. Depending on the color mode, you’ll see a readout of
values (R, G, B, H, S, L, O, etc.) under the current cursor position.
By the way, the “O” represents Opacity.
Optimizing images
In a perfect world, there would be just one digital picture format that
everybody used. Infinite storage capacity and bandwidth would allow
full-color images to be stored and transmitted instantly, uncompressed...
but let’s leave that for a sci-fi novel! The reality is that at least hundreds
of picture formats have been created, with more ever on the way. A
dozen or so are currently in widespread use among computer
professionals. The tradeoff between image quality and file size will
remain a fact of life. Hence the need to optimize images—that is,
achieve the best quality in the least file size, and within whatever other
constraints (such as number of colors) the job may impose.
PhotoPlus features a powerful Export Optimizer (introduced in
Chapter 2) that serves as your “command center” for exporting images
to various formats. It not only provides a variety of options for each
supported format, but lets you compare image quality using different
settings and even retains your preferred settings for each format. You
can access the Export Optimizer at any time—not just at export time—
to take advantage of its comparison capabilities. While the visual
comparisons speak for themselves, some of the available settings may
need some explanation.
Palettes
The PhotoPlus Export Optimizer offers two standard Palette options
when you export using 8 bits or less. A color palette (no relation to a
“floating” palette) is a table of color values that gets stored with any
image having 256 colors or less. This could mean a .BMP, .GIF, .PCX,
or .WMF image—plus quite a few more. Computer users with high-
color monitors may not give it much thought, but in the realm of 256-
color displays, palettes can make a great deal of difference. Windows
itself reserves “slots” for its own “system” colors, and each application
must “declare” a palette while the graphics system tries to ensure
peaceful coexistence. When several colorful applications are in use, and
you switch from one you another, you sometimes see the ghastly result
of palettes clashing as neither application wants to relinquish its hold on
a scarce system resource.