TIF and JPG file which one quality better?

[Dan Dinh]

I use Milnnolta 5400 II, scan all my old negative 35 mm (more than 50 rolls). I don't know I should save in TIF file or JPG file. Which one better quality? Which one you recommend? Please help me.

[Jack Hogan]

Jpeg is a lossy compressor and limits you to 8 bits/color. You can set up TIFs to save your images with 16 bit depth losslessly, so if you have the space to store the larger files it is a much better archival standard.

[Dan Dinh]

Thank you soo much Jack Horgan. I should scan 35mm in TIF. All my family pictures in so many years. God bless you. Merry Xmas and happy new year.

[AlanP]

TIF is better quality, however a high quality JPG will look almost identical and is very much smaller. If you are not going to edit the slides then JPG is not a bad choice. If you are going to edit the slides then scan in TIF and store in JPG after editing.

[Geoff F]

If storage space is limited, there are some other reduced file size options which don't lose any detail, like PNG for example; although the compression doesn't give as much of a saving as Jpeg. Just be aware that a few alternatives like compressed Tiff may not be visible with some software.

But if you have sufficient space, then Tiff would be the obvious choice, especially if, like me, the scanned negs require a bit of tweaking after scanning.

The only other thing to consider, which you may well be familiar with, is deciding what image resolution to use for the scans.

[Sonic4Spuds]

If you have storage to handle the 16 bit TIFFs go for it. If storage becomes a problem PNGs are a much better option than JPEGs, as they aren't lossy.