.TIF Files

[P.M.B]

Hi,

So my client recently made a bunch of .tif files available to me for some new something or other.

When I bring them into AE they do have alpha channels but when I bring them into Photoshop

to convert them to a 1000% smaller .png the transparency is not there.

What's even weirder to me is that the images do have alpha channels but they're not the same

as they are in AE,

When I bring the images into AE I can view the alpha channel & there is transparency.

When I bring the same image into PS there is an alpha channel but it does not match the image

and there is no transparency.

I was given about 50 images in total and in photoshop they all have the exact same alpha channel even though the images are all different.

In AE every image has its own unique alpha channel that matches the image.

What the heck is going on?

Thanks,

Paul

[P.M.B]

Little update.    So when a drag a bunch of tiffs into an already open Photoshop window (as layers) they all get the same alpha channel.  There's still no transparency but apparently PS is choosing the alpha channel from one of the images and giving it to all of the images.

Again, even the image that does have the matching alpha channel has no transparency.  

If I open each of the images separately as it's own tab or project then it does have it's matching alpha channel, but still no transparency.

[Mike_Abbott · Accepted solution]

Ps won't automatically convert the tiff alpha directly into transparency on opening - unlike AE, which does.

But you can get transparency from the alpha very easily once open in Photoshop:

1. open your tiff

2. channels panel - Ctrl click on the alpha thumbnail (to load it as a selection)

3. layers panel - 3rd button from the left at the bottom of the layers panel (add layer mask)

...but if you've got a lot - I'd just load them into AE and render them out as a PNG sequence with alpha at the reduced scale you want : )

[P.M.B]

Mike_Abbott  wrote

- I'd just load them into AE and render them out as a PNG sequence

You see.  That's why two brains are better than one.

Thanks Mike

[Mike_Abbott]

Hey Paul - I'm honored that it was yourself that tipped me over the 500 point mark to become a '4 bar general' -ist...  ; )

[P.M.B]

You're on the fast track now......I'm 20 points away from my 5th bar   nudge nudge.

[Mike_Abbott]

15

[P.M.B]

Oh man.  I thought I need 1,000 points for 5 bars.  Turns out is 2,500....That's a pretty steep curve.

[Mike_Abbott]

The only bar you really need is one in which you can crack open a beer and bask in the knowledge that a 100 or so people are now better off because of your contributions

Having said that, maybe we should keep this thread going - ping-pong style.

5 points per post... we could get you there in 600 messages : )

[P.M.B]

Mike_Abbott  wrote

maybe we should keep this thread going - ping-pong style.

5 points per post..

I say!!  That's a splendid idea!!

[Mike_Abbott]

We could make this the longest thread on the After Effects forum - EVER!  : )

[P.M.B]

We'll become infamous.

[Mike_Abbott]

Mwahahaha!

(is that how you spell it? )

[P.M.B]

I don't know but I'm genuinely curious to see how long the Titans will allow this tomfoolery to go on?

[Mike_Abbott]

Here's an idea...

As this is the .TIF Files thread - let's make this the repository of all things TIF relating to Ae! 

TIF trivia, if you like : )

Let's start withn the basics...

Should it be TIF or TIFF ?

[Szalam]

I prefer file extensions to be three letters, but if we're just talking about the format, I suppose TIFF is fine since it stands for Tagged Image File Format. Hmmm

What I do know is that it's definitely GIF as in gift and not GIF as in giraffe. It's short for Graphics Interchange Format. G-raphics; not J-raphics. I don't care what the creators of the format say; they're super-wrong.

[P.M.B]

So is .jpeg pronounced jay-feg for joint photographic experts group? I say if jpeg is jay-peg then gif can be jiff.

[Mike_Abbott]

sometimes you just start a conversation by asking the wrong question... LOL!

for me:

TIF extension

TIFF when written

GIF as in gift

JPEG as in party... not pharty : )

anyway... moving on...

Did you know that TIFF was created back in 1986 by the Aldus Corp for use in desktop publishing!

[P.M.B]

In the Autumn, according to Wikipedia.

[Mike_Abbott]

I remember it well.

[P.M.B]

OK so tif/tiff files are meant to be like .psd files for apps that can't read .psd, right.  If there's no need for layers & no need for higher color depth then using a .tif is dumb, right?   For a simple 8bit image with transparency you don't ever want to use .tif?

[Szalam]

Gutter-Fish  wrote

If there's no need for layers & no need for higher color depth then using a .tif is dumb, right?   For a simple 8bit image with transparency you don't ever want to use .tif?

TIFFs load really quickly in AE compared to, say, EXR files. Quicker than PNGs too, I think (I haven't tested this myself yet). So, there are times when you might want TIFFs even in 8 bit with no layers.

[P.M.B]

Szalam  wrote

TIFFs load really quickly in AE compared to, say, EXR files. Quicker than PNGs too, I think (I haven't tested this myself yet). So, there are times when you might want TIFFs even in 8 bit with no layers.

So I received these .tif images of simple cartoon characters 1920x1080 72 ppi 8bit and each on is 8MB.  When I convert to png they're 50kb with no discernible difference in quality.    Are those huge file sizes normal for .tif or did the person who prepared the images just not know what they were doing?

[Mike_Abbott]

Yes - the huge sizes are 'normal'. Tiff is uncompressed, png is compressed - but lossless compression, so you don't loose anything when you open it.

[Mike_Abbott]

No compression - faster processing - but bigger file sizes.

You can save tiff with various forms of compression - LZW, ZIP - even JPEG, yes you can save a TIFF with internal JPEG compression!

You'd probably find 90% of modern software won't be able to read them.

PNG is massively superior in most situations - smaller files, same quality.