Landscape, Nature And Travel Photography

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A follow up to my earlier post Microsoft HD Photo: DOA or image file format of the future?

The evolution of technologies, file formats included, and their adoption are always interesting. As much as companies like Microsoft attempt to market their standards the process seems to have a life all its own. Granted in this situation I think they’re success is going to be pivoted around adoption of the format by camera manufacturers.Photographers have been pitched the benefits of RAW and it is the centerpiece to most modern workflows. Saving images out in other formats for other uses are splintered (TIFF, JPG, etc.) Asking the public to replace one or add one is going to be a tough sell particularly if the format isn’t considered as open as these other formats.

Do I want to put a higher resolution image out on the web?
I probably don’t need to or want to. Its bad enough worrying about my images being lifted as JPEGs. Why would I want to put even better quality images out there? Low resolution images are just fine for web display. Are print houses or stock agencies suddenly going to support and ask for a new format beyond TIFF? I doubt it.

There is a huge uphill battle for Microsoft or any company launching new file formats. The only way I can see it seeping into mainstream is by lobbying camera manufacturers to adopt it. Beyond that I don’t know what else Microsoft can do to change photographer/photo industry perception to increase the likelihood of this formats adoption, but I’m sure they’ll build the format into all their software forcing people to use it or convert it. Would it be Microsoft if they didn’t?
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