Reducing File Sizes

cletus

I've noticed that lately the my collection of Photoshop files seems to be getting a little out of hand in terms of disk space.

I started looking around and noticed that I still had the Maximize PSD Compatibility option turned on. Having this turned on means that in every PSD file Photoshop stores a second, layer-flatened version of the image. Worst case, this option will nearly double the size of PSD file. I switched Maximize Compatibility off and opened a few files. By running a Save As... the file sizes started dropping.

I next tried to go through my PSD files looking for adjustment layers with empty layer masks. I then discarded the empty masks and resaved the files. I was a bit surprised when I saw that the file sizes weren't changing... at all. I wonder if Photoshop only saves a layer mask if it's non-empty :scratch

Anyone have any other ideas for how to trim the fat off of PSD files???

jay

save as a compact jpeg u can always convert them back over to psd

wxwax

jay wrote:

save as a compact jpeg u can always convert them back over to psd

You lose information everytime you do that, don't you?

Rhuarc

wxwax wrote:

You lose information everytime you do that, don't you?

THat was my understanding that each time you save to JPG you would lose some info.

cletus

Rhuarc wrote:

THat was my understanding that each time you save to JPG you would lose some info.

Saving to JPEG really isn't going to work for what I want. I want to keep all the things like layers, channels and paths so I'm going to need to keep the files in PSD format. I'd just like to trim them down if possible.

jfriend

Try TIFF with compression

cletus wrote:

I've noticed that lately the my collection of Photoshop files seems to be getting a little out of hand in terms of disk space.

I started looking around and noticed that I still had the Maximize PSD Compatibility option turned on. Having this turned on means that in every PSD file Photoshop stores a second, layer-flatened version of the image. Worst case, this option will nearly double the size of PSD file. I switched Maximize Compatibility off and opened a few files. By running a Save As... the file sizes started dropping.

I next tried to go through my PSD files looking for adjustment layers with empty layer masks. I then discarded the empty masks and resaved the files. I was a bit surprised when I saw that the file sizes weren't changing... at all. I wonder if Photoshop only saves a layer mask if it's non-empty

Anyone have any other ideas for how to trim the fat off of PSD files???

Try some experiments with layered TIFFs with compression on. You will get all your layers saved and there are a more non-lossy compression options with TIFF than there are with PSD. I've found there are some interoperability problems with compressed TIFFs with other programs (because there are so many options and not all program support reading all options), but they will preserve all your layers and, if they are TIFFs created with PS, they will not have interoperability problems with PS.

cletus

jfriend wrote:

Try some experiments with layered TIFFs with compression on. You will get all your layers saved and there are a more non-lossy compression options with TIFF than there are with PSD. I've found there are some interoperability problems with compressed TIFFs with other programs (because there are so many options and not all program support reading all options), but they will preserve all your layers and, if they are TIFFs created with PS, they will not have interoperability problems with PS.

Thanks

I figured that compressed, layered TIFFs would be worth looking into. Although I would keep normal layers, I'd loose my adjustment layers, right?

I'm also thinking about using Photoshops batch tools to generate preview JPEGs for my PSD files and then archiving all the original PSD files into zip (or some other compressed format) files. Does anyone know if there is a particular compression scheme that does a really good job with PSD files?

jfriend

cletus wrote:

Thanks

I figured that compressed, layered TIFFs would be worth looking into. Although I would keep normal layers, I'd loose my adjustment layers, right?

I'm also thinking about using Photoshops batch tools to generate preview JPEGs for my PSD files and then archiving all the original PSD files into zip (or some other compressed format) files. Does anyone know if there is a particular compression scheme that does a really good job with PSD files?

TIFF images seem to save adjustment layers and masks for me just fine. You should just try it out and see how much smaller they are than your PSDs.

When I tried ZIP compression on some of my PSD files, I only got 9-25% compression.

cletus

jfriend wrote:

TIFF images seem to save adjustment layers and masks for me just fine. You should just try it out and see how much smaller they are than your PSDs.

Will do

jfriend wrote:

When I tried ZIP compression on some of my PSD files, I only got 9-25% compression.

I ran bzip2 on a PSD and got similar results.

Rhuarc

My TIFF files saved with ZIP compression are actually twice as large as my regular PSD files with Maximize Compatibility turned off. So is PSD the smallest file size I could get?

rutt

Converting to 8 bits rarely loses anything important and can save 2x. There are rare cases where it does matter (gradients in particular), but as I said, they are rare.

Brett Mickelson

Get more storage.

I'd never want to shave off my file size if I could just get more room. Why change the way you like to save your stuff?

I just went from 1.1 TB to 2 TB. Seagate makes great 500 GB and 750 GB drives that are becoming quite affordable.

rutt

Someone with the big picture. Right on!

Brett Mickelson wrote:

Get more storage.

I'd never want to shave off my file size if I could just get more room. Why change the way you like to save your stuff?

I just went from 1.1 TB to 2 TB. Seagate makes great 500 GB and 750 GB drives that are becoming quite affordable.

jfriend

It's around 35¢/GB now

rutt wrote:

Someone with the big picture. Right on!

Yep, I agree. With storage at around 35¢/GB, it usually just makes sense to buy more storage, particularly if you compare the $$ you spend on storage to the $$ you spend on the equipment to capture your photos.

A typical (8MB) RAW file costs 0.2¢ ($0.002) to store and a 100MB PSD file costs 3.5¢ ($0.035).

I completely gave up archiving to DVDs and just buy more hard drive space now, including backup drives.

cletus

Brett Mickelson wrote:

I'd never want to shave off my file size if I could just get more room. Why change the way you like to save your stuff?

I'm not willing to trade image quality or editability for reduced file size. I'm just trying to find if there's things I should be doing to avoid wasting space. The Maximize Compatibility option is an example. It doesn't buy me anything but yet it almost doubles the size of most of my PSDs.

cletus

Thanks for the added storage advice guys.

In my case I'm going to need a 1000base-T switch in addition to more disk space!