Filed under: Software, Beta Beat
Get your Microsoft HD Photo plug-in for Photoshop
With the speed of evolution in computing, standards and the web, have you ever wondered why we've been stuck with JPG as an image format for so long? Microsoft sure did, and after about 5 years of mulling the question, the company has produced what sounds like a very promising replacement: HD Photo. Offering greater support for new digital imaging trends like HDR (High Dynamic Range), HD Photo boasts the same or better image quality than JPG in half the file size. While Microsoft has patents on some of the technology in HD Photo, they are surprisingly allowing anyone to license it for free for use in apps and devices like photo editing software and digital cameras. To learn more than you might ever want to know about HD Photo, check out its Wikipedia entry or episode #51 of TWiM (This Week in Media), one of my favorite podcasts in which the crew sits down with Bill Crow, Microsoft's Program Manager for HD Photo. Be careful with that one though - TWiM's cast is composed of some incredibly knowledgeable, hard-core media geeks, and they eventually get their geek on with Crow as they delve into the discussion.
Long story short: excitement is steadily building for HD Photo, as it is shaping up to be quite the revolutionary image format that could (hopefully) knock JPG off its pedestal some day. Fortunately, the HD Photo team have taken another step in spreading the format by releasing a Photoshop CS2/CS3 plug-in for PowerPC and Intel Macs running Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. The plug-in can be downloaded from Microsoft, and it for some odd reason expires on December 31, 2007. If you know your stuff when it comes to image formats and you give this plug-in a spin, let us know what you think in the comments.
[via Macworld]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Scott said 12:23PM on 8-22-2007
Has a new, freely distributed and embraced open standard ever come from Microsoft? I'm suspicious--it's not their way of doing things. Could the "odd reason" that the plug-in expires be that Microsoft intends to monetize the HD Photo format once it catches on?
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Les Filip said 12:27PM on 8-22-2007
Free or not, having the standard in the control of Microsoft is a terrible idea. Until they promise not to pull the rug out from under us at some future point with changes to the licensing terms, I will remain suspicious.
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PSM said 12:35PM on 8-22-2007
I was just searching around for some new desktop images last night and was sad to see that some of the ones I liked best were unusable to me because of JPG artifacts. It did make me wonder when something better will come along.
I hope this isn't some ploy by Microsoft to make this format all free and wonderful and then once the world is hooked on it, start charging for it.
I'm no image expert, but I've downloaded the plug-in, so I will be ready when the revolution comes.
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JeffDM said 12:40PM on 8-22-2007
Given the shenanigans that happened with GIF, I'm not interested at all.
JPG is fine as long as it's not over compressed. I personally hadn't seen any high resolution desktop wallpapers marred by overcompression.
PNG is fine if losslessness is desired.
I prefer this freedom over the risk of being bound to Microsoft.
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brian said 1:40PM on 8-22-2007
"HD Photo boasts the same or better image quality than JPG in half the file size."
Just like how WMA sound just as good as an MP3 in half the size, right? No thanks.
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Karl Childers said 1:00PM on 8-22-2007
Why patent the tech it you intend to keep it free? Open source it then I'll believe.
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Bruno said 1:31PM on 8-22-2007
The file expires because it's a BETA. Like many other software vendors, MS doesn't want you running crusty old and possibly incompatible (in the future) beta versions of their releases. So they make it time out and offer you a new download.
Apple, Adobe and countless others have done this as well.
Microsoft has a decent track history as far as these types of releases go. I do not recall them ever releasing something for free with a promise that it will remain free only to later pull it out and/or start charging for it.
Many people suspected this about Internet Explorer as well.
They want to advance the file formats and JOEG is very old and out-dated beyond belief. I'm just saddened Microsoft didn't take this approach by supporting PNG back in 1995 (or since), not to mention JPEG 2000.
Adobe is also to blame as they have abysmal image support that is tied back to the mid 90's. Their PNG support still stinks and they rarely do anything to properly advance support for anything but their own formats (like PSD).
An image format needs a few things to really take off and support from industry players is #1. Browser support is the key area here, followed closely by default OS support and inclusion into Adobe imaging products. Everyone else will follow, so that's little concern.
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Bruno said 1:33PM on 8-22-2007
Because of the US patent system, if you want to keep something free the best thing to do is patent it and then offer it free to anyone who wants it.
That prevents some other sneaky bastards from gaining patents on the technology or parts of it, thereby completely screwing up your chances of giving it away for free.
Stop the blind MS bashing for a second, take off the freetard hat and think.
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Michael said 1:39PM on 8-22-2007
"... the revolutionary image format that could (hopefully) knock JPG off its pedestal some day."
One can only hope not.
JPEG is fine on the web, and nicely backwards compatible. JPEG2000, it's intended successor, might make a promising replacement some day:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JPEG_2000
And besides that, we have PNG and TIFF.
The one thing we don't need is an image format owned by Microsoft about which they have made promises that they may -- or may not -- intend to keep.
It's interesting that they have a Adobe Photoshop plug-in. Microsoft was like Adobe's image business, just as they'd like Adobe Flash-based web-authoring business (c.f. Silverlight). I've little time for Adobe but far less for Microsoft.
I've looked pretty closely at Microsoft's past behaviour and I'm not throwing myself under their chariot wheels. No Office "Open" XML for me, and no MS photo formats either. Nothing from them, because I already know the end of this story.
Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. Well, they won't get the chance to.
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Jon Niola said 1:45PM on 8-22-2007
This is the same Microsoft who has issues with the Open Document Format and used their lobbyists to prevent states from adopting ODF as preferred file format.
An open, interchangeable, non-proprietary file format does not suit their business needs.
HD Photo is a nice spec, but I doubt that it comes without strings attached.
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Navstar said 1:46PM on 8-22-2007
MS needs to open source and ISO this baby. It sounds impressive. But there's no way I'm going to dive into this as long as M$ has its grubby little hands around it.
Hey it's got the initials "HD" in it! That means it must be awesome!!!
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twistedarts said 1:48PM on 8-22-2007
Microsoft... Image?.. Free?... Standards?.... Who are they trying to fool here?
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twistedarts said 1:48PM on 8-22-2007
the sheeple I guess.
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Michel said 1:49PM on 8-22-2007
I fu... don't care about whatever "freetard" insult of people reading too much fake steve
I will say, yes Patent system is GOOD to protect from sneaky bastard , yes.
BUT, the good thing to do to promote free(dom and as beer) standard is to give rights of patent to an industrial consortium, to publish all explanations of the format publicly and real official test implementation of the new standard and let ISO to normalize it.
to be sure whatever product and licence can write their own implementation of the new format, whatever it's a commercial, a non-commercial, a MIT licence, GPL, BSD, typical industrial EULA or whatever. with _no_ fees and no legal risks.
at last, reasonable warranties are produced.
--
jpeg is good and fine to publish picture to people.
why to change ?
Tiff, png and others are totally fine to archive pictures.
why not jpeg2000 ? because jpeg2000 is too much encumbered with POTENTIAL patent and no warranties to be free of legal threat. the fact is, if you want to use jpeg2000 in your product, you have to be sure yourself there are no a sneaky bastard waiting with a complex patent.
of course, jpeg2000 is available in some products and even in free software in debian linux, but there are no massive use of it because of "fear".
I'm sure if Firefox, IE or Webkit officially support jpeg2000, someone will appear immediately to say he has a patent and want 3 gazillions dollars of the offenders.
Mozilla foundation can't support a long legal fight. MS seems to not wanting to lose time and prefer to control all standards of computing. Apple will pay whatever it has to pay.
sad.
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to summarize :
technically, I'm all for a great microsoft standard, politically, no until microsoft accept to loose all control of the standard for an industrial entity (with microsoft in it). MS has to transfer patent to it.
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Albert Martin said 5:25PM on 8-22-2007
Curious to see whether Microsoft can back their claims (and a bit skeptical I might add--I hate Windows Media Player and all associated codecs) I set out to do my own amateur real world tests by simply opening up a RAW image in Photoshop and saving it in both JPEG and HD Photo format.
I must say I was VERY pleasantly surprised, and for those that are bashing the format just because Microsoft is behind it I encourage you to at least give it a try.
I wrote in more detail and also have a multi-layered PSD with the results here: http://www.albertmartin.name/blog/?p=18
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Syd said 5:59PM on 8-22-2007
I can't even install this plugin - I have CS3 running just fine but the installer tells me it can't be installed because it couldn't find CS3...
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Hawkman said 6:20PM on 8-22-2007
@Bruno: You didn't just talk about how Microsoft might be reliable, upstanding and honest, and then mention Internet Explorer in the next sentence - did you?
Whenever something comes out of Redmond, it almost always has strings attached. Even if it's technically good, or has laudable principles behind it, there's some dude in an office looking to leverage it to his advantage.
I'm not saying any other company is better - it's human nature - but when there aren't insurmountable problems with the status quo why take a risk on *known* bandits?
History's biggest tyrants have portrayed themselves as friends. And boy, do these guys have history.
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Bruno said 8:54PM on 8-22-2007
Read the article in Wikipedia about the proposed standard. MS is already working with the Joint Photographic Experts Group - HD Photo may one day be called "JPEG XR"
JPEG is fine? Whomever is saying this probably doesn't have much graphics experience and certainly doesn't work on the web. If you argued that it's "passable" for Digital Cameras, then I'd give you that. But for the web we really need better compression and more widely supported formats with alpha channel support (read: transparency)
JPEG2000 is *slow*
Back to my previous comment. IE is a terrible browser. At one time it was the better browser (Netscape was RANK). But that has nothing to do with the fact it's always been free.
Please someone, anyone, put forth an example showing MS jerking the public around on a similar type of commitment.
I'm hoping Apple add support for HD Photo into an OS update sooner rather than later. Baby steps of course.
And yes, I know all about PNG and use them extensively on my site. Almost exclusively as a matter of fact.
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john Foster said 1:04AM on 8-23-2007
After doing the interview on This WEEK in MEDIA with Bill Crow I'm convinced that there isn't anything "sinister" behind what Microsoft is doing. In this case it's the behemoth using its powers for good. There are so many different problems when it comes to manufactuering things from ICs, casing, software, packaging, etc. And anything adding to the cost of a product simply won't get adopted. That is, if there is a fee that needs to get paid to a "patent owner" the technology will get skipped. This is why panarama photography has taken so freaking long to catch on because a greedy patent holder made it impossible for nearly everyone to participate. Sure the patent still exists but becuase IPIX is caput nobody is chasing down potential "money".
The HD photo team is very aware that this "standard" will not get adopted if there is draconian anything attached to it.
The reason why we did the "Anything but JPEG" show is the help fuel the discussion that RAW is too heavy (for 96% of the marketplace) and JPEG sucks.
The link to the episode is above.
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Hawkman said 2:43PM on 8-23-2007
I disagree with the stance that we are in a position where we require this new format - the time will come, sure, but we're some way off. We are not in such a hurry that we need to go running to Microsoft.
Whether this new format will still be free in the future is rather beside the point. Let's say it is - that doesn't stop it doing widespread damage, in the same way as a free IE has been doing for the last decade.
Microsoft's business tactic has consistently been to flood an emerging market with substandard products, and hope to dominate by bullying and sheer inertia. It happened with Windows, it happened with web servers, they tried it with Windows Media, it happened with Office (although that, despite being as user-friendly as a fuseless firework, is actually one of their better products)... It's happening as we speak with the BBC's on-demand video services, and I'm a damned licence payer - we mustn't be so naive as to welcome them into yet another market with open arms.
As has been said, let's see them spin it off into an independent body, over which Microsoft have no influence. Then I might believe them.
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