XnView Software

Two words: DVD burner
...Or even a CD burner. 50G per year would only be 2 50 packs of CDs, or 1 20 pack of DVDs.



I checked out the PDF with the comparisons (from the 1st site), and quality of WMphoto seems very similar to JP2.

Yes, there isn't a great deal of difference, although as you lower the quality j2k starts looking more detailed but dirtier. (Like someone scuffed the image in the sand.) Hard to see a lot of the differences in a pdf, unfortunately, without doing your own tests. In general, I assume most people just don't care about squeezing blood out of the proverbial turnip (or things like let it wave would be much more popular), but want accurate pictures with quick saves, even if it means a little more noise.

If jpeg supported 16+-bit, I couldn't see this getting any traction at all, since a 30% filesize gain isn't that amazing. Some high-output photographers will really appreciate less write time and less card changes, though, without having to make the raw vs 8-bit jpeg tradeoff.

(For technical reasons jpeg's color detail is actually much less than 8-bit in the darker and brighter areas, one of the reasons even I hate shooting at night, but it's not that relevant.)

Drahken wrote:I checked out the PDF with the comparisons (from the 1st site), and quality of WMphoto seems very similar to JP2.

Here is a picture I found very interesting about his explanation on how 'differences' were distributed in the picture, with a smoother grain/noise-like for WMP compared to other formats, even with similar PSNR.


His comments on using R+G+B PSNR rather than Y PSNR (as usually done), focusing on the 35-45db range for quality work, using current samples (rather than smallish scans used in most comparisons) makes a lot of sense too. Those more realistic situations may give them enough headroom to best the ACDSee JPEG2000 implementation (considered as the best one). Being competitive with JPEG2000 on quality/compression efficiency is actually what they claim for... not to outperform it.


On storage: I just realized that with 16 bits per channel and no outline/halo JPEG artefacts... I would probably favor WMP over RAW for my own regular use of digital cameras. That would imply something like 2/3 filesize reduction (in addition to: better usability while on the move, simpler workflows, faster processing, etc...).