Potential legal implications of using and editing graphical images

Explain the potential legal implications of using and editing graphical images

                                                   

The creators of an image or piece of work are given a form of protection called Copyright. This is to prevent that someone copies a piece work and then say that it is theirs. This Copyright form of protection means that no one can take work or images without the owner's permission. There are copyright free images that can be find in internet under web pages that are identified as copyright free, these images can be taken and freely used by anyone.

The copyright law's main purpose is to protect the images and work that have been created by people and to protect them from unfair use of their work. When downloading a song from the internet without having pay for it means that the user is breaking the copyright law, if this person is caught he/she will have to face serious consequences for doing such a small but important thing. Cheating and plagiarism are just problems that are caused because the creator's work is not protected by copyright, so anyone can state work as their own. 

If someone breaks the copyright law, the holder of it is able to sue that person, that will force the person to pay a fine. Of course it is not always the same for every single case (sometimes people could even have to face a prison sentence of a maximum of 10 years, or an enormous fine) as this depends on the amount of damage that has been caused by that person. 

When the user wants to edit images, the first step is to find the ownership of that graphic and whether it can be used or not. This can be done so easily as most owners print their names or copyright on or close to the image. When there is no name printed on the image, the ownership is most probably with the webpage or book where the image can be found. 

Explaining and discussing:

Explain how different types of graphic images relate to file formats: 

There are two main types of graphic images: bitmap (it stores an image as groups of pixels, each one with a certain colour) and vector (it stores an image as a collection of objects, each with coordinate points to define size and position as well as mathematical formulae defining line curvatures, thickness, fills and other properties). Each of these two types can be saved in many different formats to the disk.

Looking at graphic images we can say that vector graphics follow mathematical rules. Shapes are understood as coordinate points joined by lines with a defined fill. A line (straight or curved) that joins points has properties such as thickness, colour, solid or dashed. There could be no fill by making the shape transparent, or it could contain a certain colour or texture more than once. Vector images are stored and manipulated in a mathematical way by software packages, this makes them easy to edit and re size providing small file sizes. The editing that bitmap images allow is much more complex than the one with vector images. 

File format is the way the graphics are internally structured, every one of them uses a different structure. Programs that use a certain type of format must be able to show graphics on the screen, print them and edit them. Vector file formats are usually copyrighted with a few open or common standards to share between vector software applications. There are various file formats commonly used for bitmap files, bitmap applications usually open, edit and save many of them. Ownership is less use here than with vector images. 

For me, as an IT and Art student when I come up with the perfect edit I choose the .jpeg file format. I choose it because it is viewable by all and can be used for print and for the web, and in Photoshop I can even decide the quality I desire whether is level 1 or 12 which is the highest quality.

Discuss the impact that file format, compression techniques, image resolution and colour depth have on file size and image quality: 

Image file formats are resources of organising and storing all images. They are composed of either pixel or vector data. The pixels that constitute an image are ordered as a grid; each pixel consists of numbers representing magnitudes of brightness and colour. 

Raster formats:

Raster formats store images as bitmaps, .jpeg is a lossy compression method and its images are usually stored in the .jfif file format; also this format is used as the image compression algorithm in many Adobe .pdf files. Almost all digital cameras can store images in the .jpeg/ .jfif file format that supports 8 bits per colour: red, blue and green. There are 24 bits in total, which means small files. After the compression the quality is not really weaken from the original, however .jpeg files suffer generational generational degradation when repeatedly edited and saved. If photographic images are going to be re-edited they might be suitable for storing in a lossless non-.jpeg format.

The .exif (Exchangeable image file format) format is similar to the .jfif format with .tiff extensions; it is included in the .jpeg writing software used in most cameras. The purpose of this file fomrat is to record and standardise the exchange of images with image meta data between digital cameras as well as editing and viewing software. Things like camera settings, time and date, shutter speed, exposure, image size, compression, colour information, name of camera and lots more; are metadata that is recorded for individual images. All of this image information can be displayed when these images are viewed or edited by image editing software.

The .tiff format is a flexible format that stores 8 bits or 16 bits per colour: red, blue and green for 24 bit and 48 bit totals. Optional Character Recognition (.ocr) software packages commonly genarate some form of .tiff image for scanned text pages. When using .tiff or .tif file extensions we can notice that that .tiffs are lossy and lossless, and well for some black and white images the lossless compressions is relatively good. Some digital cameras use the LZM compression algorithm for lossless storage to save in .tiff formats. However .tiff image format is not widely supported by web browsers but it remains widely accepted as photograph file standard in printing business. It can handle device-specific colour spaces like the CMYK defined by a particular set of printing press links.

Vector formats:

As opposed to the raster image formats, vector image formats contain a geometric description that can be rendered smoothly at any desired display size; they can contain bitmap data as well. 3D graphic file formats are technically vector formats with pixel data texture mapping on the surface of a vector virtual object, warped to match the angle of the viewing perspective.

Eventually all vector graphics must be rasterised in order to be displayed on digital monitors but vector images can be displayed with analog CRT technology such as that used in some electronic test equipment. Plotters are printers that use vector data to draw graphics. (.cgm) is a file format for 2D vector graphics, raster graphics and text,. It is defined by ISO/IEC 8632. All graphical elements can be specified in a textual source file that can be compiled into a binary file or one of two text representations. This .cgm type of file format provides graphics data interchange for computer representation of 2D graphical information independent from any particular application, system, platform or device. For areas such as technical illustration and professional design there has been some updates to some extent but it has largely been superseded by formats such as .svg and .dxf

Scalable Vector Graphics (.svg) is an open standard created and developed by the World Wide Web Consortium to address the need for a versatile, scriptable and all-purpose vector format for the web. This format doesn't have a compression scheme of its own; however due to the textual nature of .xml an .svg graphic can be compressed using a program such as .gzip. Because of its scripting potential, .svg is a key component in web applications.