Suggestions for Choosing Images

[Steve]

Suggestions for Choosing Images:

Images that fit these criteria are particularly useful for use in electronic publications:

1) Black and white images with high contrast (Line Art), rather than gray shading.
2) Small file size (less than 100 KB is optimal).
3) Use of the “.png” format, so that little data is lost and ghost pixels are not created.
4) The amount of blackspace is limited.
5) A dpi of 300+ is preferred, but the total number of pixels is more important than the dpi since images can always be squeezed down.
6) Dynamic art is always better than static art.
7) Avoid pixellated images like the plague.

Things to remember:

People love to download OSR pdfs, but those files need to be hosted on servers where file space is paid for. Thus, publishing teams are always trying to optimize file sizes and will appreciate files that have many pixel but small file size.

Those who download a pdf for home printing want to minimize the amount of toner that is used. Since blackspace eats up toner electronic publishers will be leery of using images that have a lot of it. Printed products don't have to worry about that issue, so what is good for a printed module you buy at a your FLGS is not necessarily what's good for a printing at home.