TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
Subject:Re: Image formats for tech. comms. From:"Dan S. Azlin" <dazlin -at- SHORE -dot- NET> Date:Wed, 14 Feb 1996 01:58:33 -0500
On Sat, 3 Feb 1996, Richard Foley wrote:
<snip>
> Do the people on this list (as authors or other) have an opinion on a
> prefered image format? I notice Frame used a lot, is there a 'best' format
> for use with this program here?
> EPS, DXF, IGES, TIFF, other?
Graphic Image Formats are a never ending problem. Experience seems to
lean toward .EPS files whereever possible because of their inherent
scalability. However, a bitmapped image converted to .EPS accomplishes
little as the bitmap resolution will still suffer upon being rescaled
(not to mention the potential duplication of storage space if a viewable
bitmap is embedded in the .EPS file). TIFF (or .TIF) files handle
bitmapped images very well and is a relatively stable format. Both do
the job well. They are not, however, suitable for all circumstances.
Thus you should be familiar with other formats and how to work with them.
For example:
It is common to have CAD drawings imported into technical documents.
Unfortunately, most CAD programs do not speak the same dialect of "fonts"
as the tools we use to write and lay out our documents. What comes to
the rescue is HPGL. Nearly all CAD programs can output an HPGL formatted
file where everything is vectorized, including the text. Importing HPGL
into Frame is no big deal, even if HPGL files don't look quite as pretty
as something dome in Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator. What is important
is that the CAD created text doesn't look like mutated alphabet soup.
Other formats have their place. Experiment with as many as you can to
know what works best for you. Even using a tool like Hijaak requires
some prior understanding of what each format is best at.
My $.02
Dan Azlin ** WORD ENGINEERS, Technical Writing & Publishing **
Ph/Fax: 508-921-8908 18 School Street
Internet: dazlin -at- shore -dot- net Beverly, MA 01915-4851
