Can I save my photos as "pdf" or should they be "jpg"?

[frostygirl]

Hi all,
this might sound like a silly question but I am just going through photo albums and going to scan them onto my computer. Can the photos be saved as a *pdf* or should they be saved as a *jpg*?
Thank you

 

[MacInWin]

jpg is the more typical format, or tiff (very large file). You can use pdf, but editing it later may be more of a challenge. Most photo manipulation programs work well with jpg.

 

[Raz0rEdge]

You do not want to save them as PDFs as the file size for a high-res image will be many many megabytes as opposed to PNG or JPG which will be significantly less.

 

[IWT]

Hi frostygirl

Thank you for your post.

I just want to endorse Jake’s comments. You really have to stick with the format that the pictures were taken in - almost certainly jpeg (jpg, same thing).

This format is compatible with virtually all viewing apps or programmes and is the format most suitable for editing. I don’t think you should consider anything else - certainly not pdf.

Ian

 

[ferrarr]

Are you trying to save storage space? Usually when I scan pictures, I use 300 dpi for clearer/sharper images.

 

[CharlesPhillips]

Hi all,
this might sound like a silly question but I am just going through photo albums and going to scan them onto my computer. Can the photos be saved as a *pdf* or should they be saved as a *jpg*?
Thank you

I have scanned many old photos (many from color negatives or slides) and the best format to go to is JPG. You are scanning prints? JPG is a compressed format so if you have a lot of room (and more time) you could scan with a higher resolution. By the way TIFF and PNG are other formats that are not compressed but are not as commonly used (for photos) as JPG.

 

[frostygirl]

Thank you all