Industry Analysis: The Quiet Revolution in Proprietary File Formats

Andreas Pfeiffer

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From The Pfeiffer Report. To learn more about The Pfeiffer Report, click here.

One of the most important contributing factors for the success of desktop publishing was the arrival of standard file formats. Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) and Tagged Image file format (TIFF) were revolutionary efforts to do away with the limitations and complexities of proprietary encodings of pixel and vector illustrations. EPS and TIFF were little revolutions in their own right, which made it possible to build and output complete pages, including illustrations. The advantages of these file formats were so obvious, and the limitations at the time so negligible, that EPS and TIFF moved on to become cornerstones of any self-respecting professional publishing workflow.

And They Lived Happily Ever After?
For the best part of the last decade, these workflows have not changed. But not all was quiet behind the scenes. Photoshop moved on to become increasingly powerful as well as ubiquitous, computer hardware did what computer hardware tends to do: it became more and more powerful, and digital photography erupted as a major force in the market.

And all of a sudden, it became clear that those wonderful standard file formats weren’t so wonderful after all: having to convert files from Photoshop into TIFF or EPS slows down creative work, especially when several revisions are required. Even worse, JPEG (another long-time favorite, which is used in most digital cameras), does not do justice to the dynamic range and capacities of modern CCD or CMOS sensors.

Moving Ahead in Creative Workflows
Whenever you question an IT manager about what his preoccupations, streamlining the workflow comes in as the clear winner. However powerful computers and software have become, nobody likes to spend precious time repeating unnecessary operations if it can be helped.

It was therefore not surprising that the possibility to work with native files rather than their standardized counterpoints has become a hot trend in the market It all started with Adobe InDesign which allowed users to place native Photoshop and Illustrator files in a page layout. And when version 2.0 of the program included the possibility to bring in transparency information directly from Photoshop, more and more designers took notice. With the Adobe Creative Suite released this fall, working with native file formats has become even more generalized across several applications.

The productivity gains of working with native files is in any case very appreciated. In a recent research project conducted by Pfeiffer Consulting, IT managers in publishing companies almost universally named this possibility as one of the major attractions of the Adobe Creative Suite in general and InDesign CS in particular.

But Wait, There’s More…
However appreciable productivity gains of native Photoshop files can be, there is an area where accessing proprietary data instead of a standard file format is even more ground-breaking, and that is in the realm of digital photography. Adobe Photoshop CS now can access the majority of RAW or native file formats of digital cameras. These formats capture the totality of image data “seen” by the image sensor (provided the camera allows saving these files, which is the case of many modern prosumer models.)

For a photographer, accessing a RAW file is pretty much a dream come true. Not only does the format generally store 16 bits per color channel instead of 8, but it allows changing camera specific settings such as exposure or light temperature, using the full amount of data which was captured by the CCD — which means for instance that an over exposed picture can recapture some of the detail lost in the lightest area, or that seemingly invisible shadow detail can be extracted.

There’s No Turning Back
While there is not much point in using RAW files for family snapshots, professionals should only use this format if at all possible. There is of course a downside: file sizes are much larger, which means that for instance on a 6.3 megapixel Canon EOS 10D only about 50 pictures fit on a 512MB compact flash card — while the same card could store several hundred JPEG images of the same pixel count. But the gain in flexibility is certainly worth it. I have yet to see a professional photographer who is not immediately taken by these possibilities.

The Social Life of Standards
All this goes to show that we may have to redefine our notion of standards. Now that Photoshop has reached near-total ubiquity (according to a recent global research project conducted by Pfeiffer Consulting, 97% of creative professionals use Photoshop) switching to the native file format makes complete sense, and it is clear that we are witnessing the beginning of a profound change in professional publishing workflows.

And as far as digital photography goes, support for RAW file formats , along with the quality of the latest spate of digital SLRs are a decisive step towards an all-digital workflow.

Sometimes revolutions arrive without making much noise…