I thought I'd explain a few different file types as I thought it might help you to understand what files you're receiving when I send over finished artwork, or if you're not a customer it might help you to know what to ask for from your designer. I'm going to talk about jpegs, pngs, eps and pdf files.

JPEG stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group, which is the group that created the ‘Jpeg compression standard’, the method of reducing the size of ‘raw’ photographic files from cameras. Jpeg (or jpg) is the file format usually used for images, especially on the internet. Jpegs deliver good quality images with small file sizes. They’re perfect to send via email and to use on websites and social media.

You can save jpeg files at different resolutions; a jpeg saved at 300dpi will be best for print whereas one saved at 72dpi will load more quickly on a page of your website but won’t be sharp if printed. The difference in the dpi, dots per inch, is to do with the number of dots or pixels per square inch of the image (see my post about pixels). The more dots/pixels the image contains, the sharper the image will be.

PNG stands for Portable Network Graphic format. Png files are often used for web graphics, digital photographs and images with transparent backgrounds. Not all png images have a transparent background as this is an option when saving the file, but those that do are especially useful as watermarks or logos placed over photographs, which is important for businesses to mark photographs of products as their own. A png image is generally a better resolution than a jpeg and will have a larger file size. 

When I create logos for customers I always include a png with a transparent background incase it’s needed.

EPS stands for Encapsulated Postscript and is a file format for vector images (I explained what a vector image is a few days ago). This is the file format I use the most, all of the artwork files I create in Adobe Illustrator for logos, flyers etc are eps files. 

When I send over a logo or design work I explain that the eps file is the artwork file, and whilst you may not be able to open it, it’s important to save it incase you need to pass logos/artwork files on to another designer/web designer/printer etc. So, this is a file that you may have heard of or seen, but it might not be one you can open depending on the programs you have on your PC or Mac.

PDF stands for ‘Portable Document Format’, it’s a format that can easily be shared and printed as most people have a program that can open it. It is also a file format that can be saved in a way that it can’t easily be modified. 

There are different options when saving pdf files, you can save them as ‘smallest file size’ right up to ‘press quality’ depending on what you’re using the pdf for. Whether it’s a pdf that’ll be stored on a website to be downloaded, or a multi page printed brochure, a pdf file could be used.