CrunchBang Linux

iDIEDaLONGtimeAGO

Member

Registered: 2009-07-27

Posts: 32

[Solved] File format for backing up Pictures

Now i've had my first real scare with critical data loss, so the very least i want to do is backup all my pictures (around 40GB worth).
Now i googled this topic and most people seem to suggest tiff and jpeg 2000 formats. The main thing im looking for is no degradation of the existing pictures. Compression into archive is not an option for me (unless there's something magical in open source than can decompress a DVD in 5 minutes).
Are there any other formats which more experienced users would suggest along with the required tools. If im correct both imagemagick and graphicsmagick are CLI and i havent discovered a good gui for them yet. So are there any GUI tools for conversion?
[Edit: Just i case i do decide to archive my photos into say a .7z or .rar, will there be any quality loss when i later decompress it ?]

Last edited by iDIEDaLONGtimeAGO (2009-08-14 20:18:07)

---

Big mouth  don't  make a big man

Toolz

#! Die Hard

From: Asia

Registered: 2009-02-02

Posts: 937

Re: [Solved] File format for backing up Pictures

Best way is to copy them over in whatever format they're in. No compression, no decompression, no changing formats. Use a file sync tool.

Just i case i do decide to archive my photos into say a .7z or .rar, will there be any quality loss when i later decompress it ?

No. There'll be no compression either.

iDIEDaLONGtimeAGO

Member

Registered: 2009-07-27

Posts: 32

Re: [Solved] File format for backing up Pictures

Best way is to copy them over in whatever format they're in. No compression, no decompression, no changing formats. Use a file sync tool.
No. There'll be no compression either.

Agreed, the last resort would be a direct and straightforward copy. 
Winzip does mention image compression without data loss as a feature http://www.winzip.com/getcurrpage.cgi?l … rodpagewz.
And some test results carried out elsewhere does indeed show a 25% reduction in size of the zipped file for winzip.

---

Big mouth  don't  make a big man

Toolz

#! Die Hard

From: Asia

Registered: 2009-02-02

Posts: 937

Re: [Solved] File format for backing up Pictures

That's completely new to me. The actual claim is:

Compress JPEG files by 20 to 25% with no loss in quality or data integrity

Can't find any decent third-party backup here. All the top results are rehashes of Winzip's press release. Best non-press-release result actually shows the above claim to be false:
http://www.image-compressor.com/index.c … p_compress
We could all gain 25% compression on a folder full of 3kB images just by eliminating cluster waste. Could we do the same with larger images by compressing gobs of exif data? Hope Winzip are not messing around here.

I still say a straight sync is the best solution. Oh in another post you mentioned videos. Now videos from your typical digital camera *can* be compressed.

iDIEDaLONGtimeAGO

Member

Registered: 2009-07-27

Posts: 32

Re: [Solved] File format for backing up Pictures

yeah, i agree, dont think the time i'll spend in compressing 40gb of data will be worth the effort and the space it might save. Btw, i found out another windows app for converting - Pixillion . Its actually quite good and fast and versatile.
[PS: Marking it solved]

---

Big mouth  don't  make a big man