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C1015 - Why doesn't my file decrease in size if I use small GIFs instead of big BMPs?

by - Joseph Ganci

I have to pose this question.  It was my understanding that using GIFs was far better than BMPs in our development where the size of the final product was concerned.   Have I been way off base all this time? My co-worker ran a test today and this is the feedback she provided:

"I decided to conduct some tests.  I took a big .bmp file - 1,351K - and used Photoshop to convert it to both .gif and .jpg.  Then I created several new Aware files and imported the different image types.  Interestingly, the Aware files created with .bmps were smaller than the files created using either the .gifs or .jpgs."

Isn't this funny? I ran across the same predicament a couple of years ago. Upon further investigation, I discovered that Authorware is automatically compressing BMP files. It doesn't do that with GIFs and JPGs, because these are already compressed. Whether it compresses the file or not, Authorware needs to add a little overhead to the graphic since it has to save information about its location on the screen, etc.

So, the gist of it is, using GIFs or JPEGs will not save you any room, because Authorware is already compressing BMPs for you. Depending on the content of the BMP file, Authorware will sometimes compress it to be even smaller than a JPEG or GIF. At other times, it might be bigger. But usually not by much.

Sounds as if you were as surprised as I was! 

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