As a former teacher, I'd like to commend you on your explanations. They are clear, free of anything that might be misunderstood (or else you explain those parts as you go), your pacing is slower as you reduce procedures into small increments, and you demonstrate your explanations with visuals. You're a natural. All so very helpful, thank you! :)
We recently upgraded our MacBook and I've taken this opportunity to collect all of our photos and transfer to the new machine. I knew nothing about the Photos app. Having watched many of your videos on this topic, I'm gaining a very good understanding. You present the information in your videos in a clear, concise manner that makes learning a lot of fun. Thank you for helping us all to get more out of our Macs! I'll be checking out much more of your content as I learn the new MacBook.
Thanks Gary. The only times I have an issue are sending pics to my Android friends, and that's also an MMS issue, and posting pics to a forum I'm a member of that uses the old VBulletin software and doesn't recognise any HE formats. I usually convert these in Finder, I didn't know they could be converted automatically in Mail, etc.
Bravo! 👏 The best overview of the HEIC format I have ever seen. Prior to today I wasn’t aware of your channel, but the UA-cam algorithm actually worked and recommended this video. And you have a new subscriber. 😃
Thanks for the video! I like your flow without anxiety music on a background. There are so many noises in 2024, the guide needed to be quite, thank you for your kind and pleasure.
Thanks Garry. After watching this video and doing some experiments with the 14 Pro Max and finding that not all the iPhone lenses are created equal I have changed my shooting format to HEIF Max. Cheers
The wonderful thing about Gary, is that you can learn to drive a fomula 1 car Even if you don't yet know how to drive! Thank you Gary always pleasure to watch your tutorials !
Another image compression format that I've been seeing more of is Google's WebP which is claimed to also maintain good quality and result in files smaller than jpeg. It would be interesting to see a comparison of HEIC and WebP.
Thank you for the info! HEIC! Always wondered what that meant. But I had to send large amounts of photos to a client and they all went as HEIC. The client couldn't open them! I had to hand convert ALL the files to jpeg. Ugh! But this video helps with future transfers of photos and how to do it. Thank you Gary!
Thanks this had rendered my iPhone 14 photos incompatible with several other systems, I only care what it looks like on a website. so it's very annoying when we cannot use or see photos we need to upload. Had switched from using iCloud last year because of this. Google photos. Was used between coworkers. Until my iPhone started saving as HEIC
In regards of images formats, wanted to ask if is there some format of background picture with real time metadata vector, I mean I would like to have a background image in my WebEx or Zoom videoconferencing but with image showing current time changing in my background scenario, for example a Wall watch, the time showed might be the local time of each assistant. I guess it will be an innovative format!
Never mind, I looked it up. When you take a photo on your iPhone or iPad, the image - or images, in the case of dual cameras and live photos - saves as an HEIC file. HEIC stands for High Efficiency Image Container. The format is an updated variant of the High Efficiency Image Format (HEIF), traditionally used by Apple across its mobile devices.
I was literally scrolling down to the comments to ask about if Photos app can convert JPEG and H264 content to the newer format 😂 Thanks for the info Gary!
6:34 -- thank you! i use both windows and mac and ifruit (iphone) and android and toggling this BACK to "more compatibility" will make me sleep better at night. thank you!! i have TB and TB of storage so i dont care about that -- for me i need compatibility! also thumbs up and this is the first time ive seen your channel. thanks youtube algorithm!
This is very informative. What I've had a problem with is when I NEED to send a photo to say a DMV or IRS website they won't accept anything but a jpeg, so I have to convert it which means I have duplicates of those photos in HEIC and JPEG.
Fun fact: Bayer image sensors are not fully resolved like an ancient 3chip camera or a computer generated graphics file. A 12MP bayer sensor has 6MP green pixels, 3MP blue pixels, 3MP red pixels. So viewing a 12MP file as a true 12MP actually extrapolate, creates data that never existed to begin with. The raw file likely is three black and white images 6+3+3MP (12MP) images, as that’s what is captured by the sensor. Not much point pixel peeping a camera still image as the image literally is upscaled, more pixels/colors than the sensor that took the image :-)
Several years ago my sister told me that an iPhone photo she took could not be opened by a Windows recipient, yet you say shared HEIC files are converted to JPEG format when shared. I do not know what she did, so I have not tried to duplicate her process. Instead, I told her to simply change the format in Camera settings, as you suggest.
If you want to edit your photos, store your photos as lossless (like TIFF) or in raw format, so you don't get compression on compression. For editing videos, the preferred source format would be ProRes, while the end product can be in H264 or H265 (HEVC)
Depends on the original photo. If you have a jpeg from your camera, then converting to TIFF won't get you anything but a much larger file (you can't convert to RAW). HEIC also has a lossless level. But note that the difference between high HEIC (or jpeg) and lossless TIFF or HEIC is so small that it will come down to the quality of the photo captured in the first place. Probably not worth it for the vast majority of people. ProRes is huge and should only be used when making professional videos and films, when money is no object (you'll need some big fast drives to store it all).
I've been wondering how to manage when I take large numbers of photos from my iPhone to my work Windows pc. I'll change the default setting in my work phone now! Thanks a lot! ☺
You can open HEIC on Windows if you have the code from the Windows store on 10 and 11. For HVEC there's a fee for the codec but there used to be a way around it, not sure if it still works.
Hi Gary. You are such a talented presenter. Whilst there are denizens with lots of knowledge and lacking presentation skills and lecturers with insufficient knowledge and inability to teach, you are a multitalented individual and highly valued by your fans. I also watched your photos duplicates video and still trying to figure out how I managed to have thousands of duplicates on my Mac after switching from Windows to Mac. Would there be a way to establish where each duplicate is located before I delete/merge, as I always only place my photos into one folder? Hope this makes sense.
@@macmost Thanks Gary. I found this function and see 2,100 jpegs and 78 videos out of almost 19,000 images. It would be great to see where the duplicates are located before merging. Thanks again.
@@macmost Thanks Gary. I am aware of that as well. However, the location information is missing. Since these are detected as duplicates they must be located in different locations.
@@60beats44 If you are using the Duplicates function in the Photos app, then all you see there are photos IN your Photos Library. So they are both in the SAME location: your Photos Library. If they are exactly the same, then you can merge them and really you lose nothing.
Making the files smaller actually encourages taking more pictures, which will drive up demand for larger storage devices, like in smart phones. But most phone vendors want to push something that costs PER month in a subscription, like cloud storage. As demand grows, so will the prices for onboard storage and for cloud storage as well. Any large vendor, like Apple, is very well aware of how to manipulate their user base; this is just one example.
@@macmost right, but since you only mentioned Apple products, i thought I'd comment so people would know that Android also handled those files, since you didn't.
One huge problem is the need to convert as many file users will not accept heic files. My health insurance co. is one such provider that only accepts jpeg files
Good day sir. about obsolete mac like imac 2014 that no longer be supported with new updates.. do you recommend recommend antivirus for additional security? i only use it for browsing and i do not install apps that i am not familiar with or outside appstore. i hope you can give advice
Hi Gary, related question.I have several thousand photos on my local hard drive. I want to use the Photo's app to 'manage' them but it always tries to store them in iCloud which I don't want. I do have my everyday phone snapshots in my iCloud account which is great and works well but I want my local photo's managed separately outside of iCloud. Is that possible?
Yes. Just create a separate library for those. The main downside is that you then need to switch between libraries, but that is OK if those other photos are not something you want to be associated with your personal photos, but work or a separate project.
I don’t think Apple looses out by implementing HEIC…or even HEVC. I think it’s more of balancing act as camera sensors get larger so do file sizes under the older formats. By shifting to more efficient file formats it offsets the increasing camera resolutions. So in the end maybe it’s closer to a wash. Plus as time goes on people tend to take more and more photos and videos. So storage requirements will still likely to increase, maybe just at a lower rate.
Excellent video. However, you skipped right over something staring us all in the face; LOSSLESS! 4:01 I'd love to know how well that setting compresses the image, and how that compares to other lossless formats.
That's not something most people would want. It would create very large files and you'd never want to convert a lossy file like jpeg to lossless as all you'd be doing is creating a perfect preservation of the lossy compressed jpeg as a much larger file. You wouldn't gain anything at all, and lose quite a bit in terms of a larger file size.
@@macmost You're totally misunderstanding my comment. I'm talking about using the lossless setting on HEIC for storing your newly taken uncompressed pictures, not for converting your old already compressed ones. How well does the lossless setting compress, and how does that compare to other lossless standards, like TIFF?
@@theclearsounds3911 Unless you are using RAW, then when you take a picture it is compressed right at that moment. Either HEIC or JPEG. If you take RAW and "develop" to an uncompressed HEIC, you'll get a smaller file with the light and color "develop" selections baked in (since it is not RAW anymore). I assume it would be much smaller than RAW. It should also be smaller than TIFF (which is an old format that is lossless AND uncompressed). Maybe it is similar to PNG, but not sure which would be smaller, though both would be lossless so identical in terms of quality I should think.
Thanks for this. Very interesting. Photoshop will not save in this format. (as far as I can tell) It can read the files, but it won't save in it. That is frustrating. Apple Photos will save in this format. So you can make other formats into HEIC with that. My Canon R3 wants to save files as HEIF. And photoshop does all kind of weird things with that.
I didn’t understand it before and I hated that when airdropping to mac to email it using a third party app it was A file that doesn’t open Up and apps didn’t support Heic. So do you recommend using it? On iPhone cam and also lets say for screenshots….
@@Abdullah-zl9ub But what are you DOING? Like are you taking a screenshot to send to a help desk? Beta test? What is the purpose of wanting to take screenshots and optimize them?
I like that they take up less space than JPEG. but I can't stand the fact that eBay won't let me upload them when I list items for sale. so I have to convert every single HEIC that I Airdrop to my MacMini. uggh.
@@GarrEFeLix I should have clarified. ONE of my ebay accounts allows HEIC uploads. but the other 4 do NOT. I'm assuming because the one seller account is over 15 years old and the others are newer? Doesn't make sense but that's all I can figure.
9:12 Now wait a minute. You say it would be compressing a compressed photo, but there’s a “lossless” option with HEIC. Do you still save disk space with that option?
Definitely not. Try it and see. You are asking it to take the jpeg, extract each pixel from the compression algorithm, and then save each pixel exactly in a new file. It will be much bigger.
You didn't mention the fact that most photos are viewed in a small size on a website or even on a 4K monitor. Many pixels are thrown away at the time of display. The quality of the display also impacts the photo reproduction. A chain is as strong as its weakest link. The display and size of the photo is the "weakest link" when viewing a photo. Most people don't do pixel peeping.
@@macmost I'm suggesting that discussions of photo compression as it relates to file sizes and perceived "quality" are fine in the abstract, but you can take a non-compressed photo, display it at 72 dpi on a web site and or as a relatively small photo on a monitor (a good one or a mediocre one) and it won't matter what the native resolution/uncompressed nature of the photo is. If you zoom in on a compressed photo and its non-compressed original, yes you'll see a difference. My point is that most people don't do that and probably no one does it in the course of normal photo viewing.
@@emmgeevideo Yes, but when it comes to your own photos, don't you want a high resolution version in your library? I know I do. Precious memories, you know.
I have a question. When I export a HEVC from photos app and it's stored as H.264, the H.264 is actually smaller in size (25.2 MB for H.264 versus 35.4 for HEVC). This seems like it's opposite of the purpose of HEVC. Does anyone know why that is?
Yes, but watch the video where I explain why you shouldn't concert HEIC to jpeg. Unless you are just converting them to send a copy to someone unable to view HEIC, of course.
In Windows there was a free HEIC-format-programm to Install from the Microsoft Store for Free. But sadly now it costs. So I can't convince everyone in my family and all my friends to install it so they can see the heic-images. PS: I'm using a Samsung and they also have heic as their standard 👍🏻
You mention that Windows cannot open HEIC images. Can HEIC images be viewed on internet web pages by Windows users or must they be converted by Mac developers to a viewable format?
Yes. But think about WHY you are converting. If the goal is to send someone a COPY of your photo, and they can't open an HEIC, then converting to jpeg makes sense. But what doesn't make sense is to convert from jpeg to HEIC in order to STORE your original photo.
@@Dulcilady "Best" depends on many factors. Are you using any sort of cloud service? Export from the Photos app and save it there and then find it on your PC.
Also the discussion of movies is very unclear. You compare 2 different movies. The 1st one is a .mov containing H.264 with a size is 23.6 MB. The 2nd is a mov containing HEVC with a size of 34.5 MB which after it's automatic conversion to H.264 results in 38.7 MB. So what is the lesson to learn in this example?
Not sure what you mean. HEVC will usually result in smaller files than h264, but it is less compatible with other devices. However, the point of the tutorial is you can convert them to h264 if you need to send them to someone else that can't view HEVC.
No, loss both ways. Any compressed-to-compressed conversion, or non-compressed-to-compressed, you will lose some quality. My point is that if the pictures are already compressed with one format, then leave it in that format. Just use HEIC for new photos. Leave the old photos as-is.
The billion dollars question is: will we see native support of the new formats on other operating systems and browsers? How long is the internet looking for a handy new format to reduce loading time and space consumption.
@@macmost I mean have a compression algorithm that takes say a jpg and creates something more compact that does not introduce any more compression artifacts than that jpg -- for those instances where the old jpg is the best that exists. With this hypothetical format, you should be able to take the file and reproduce an exact copy of the jpg, byte for byte. Regular compression algorithms may have a hard time compressing jpg's and the resultant archive would not be as easily viewable as an image file would be. Something similar could be done for old video formats.
@@1dgram That's just not practical. "takes say a jpg and creates something more compact that does not introduce any more compression artifacts than that jpg" -- you will not get a better file size than then jpg in that case. Maybe randomly a few images could potentially be a few bytes smaller. But others would be larger. It wouldn't make sense to do that.
@@1dgram But you want exact lossless compression, and advances would likely be in lossy compression. But it is all academic. You have your options as they are now and changes may or may not come in future years.
Thanks for the great tip! I asked ChatGPT to create a one-line command that converts all jpg, jpeg and png files in the current folder to HEIC. I'm freeing up space brutally. 😊 setopt nullglob && for file in *.(#i)jpg *.(#i)jpeg *.(#i)png; do sips -s format heic "$file" --out "${file%.*}.heic" && rm -f "$file"; done
But as I explain in the video, that's not a good idea. You are compressing something already compressed and therefore quality will suffer. I mean you can do what you want, but I wouldn't treat my photos that way.
@@macmost Well, yeah, there's a compromise to consider. Of course, we should decide which photos/folders/galery/topic we don't want to recompress but, actually, I zoomed in to compare details and didn't catch any disadvantages. The balance of compression and quality is exceptional. Anyways, if quality is a minor aspect, this one-line compression can save a huge space. :)
I do not like the HEIC because Google and Apple when to it and nothing open by default a win or linux pc. It took time to find a app to open it so you could convert it so you could use it. Try upload that file on a web site and you get FAIL. I think the format as a file is OK. It just a problem when nothing know what it is.
8:45. Gary is correct here at the end of the video. It's pretty important point, and everyone should listen. Sequentially re-compressing files into different formats is very damaging. (With the exception of "lossless" TIFF format) HEIC is overhyped, I'll explain why… I'm an imaging professional. for a living: After analysis on my own part, I don't approve of HEIC format. I think Apple, shall we say, they have been misinformed to introduce HEIC as a standard over JPEG. It wrecks extreme highlight and shadow detail, leading to posterization and color casts. I've seen this on multiple examples. The file size saving is too minimal for this loss to be justified. Just because a format is old, (like JPEG or GIF), doesn't mean it has any inherent fault and needs to be replaced. Also saving on HD space these days is also a highly dubious motive. Driven by suppliers attempting to save money, not to improve the quality of users saved images.
these files reek havoc as my employees attach them to work orders, from their devices, yet I have to view and manage from a windows 7 server. god bless the march of technology and companies that refuse to move fw.
As a former teacher, I'd like to commend you on your explanations. They are clear, free of anything that might be misunderstood (or else you explain those parts as you go), your pacing is slower as you reduce procedures into small increments, and you demonstrate your explanations with visuals. You're a natural. All so very helpful, thank you! :)
I agree with the above statement. You are a brilliant man and an excellent teacher.
We recently upgraded our MacBook and I've taken this opportunity to collect all of our photos and transfer to the new machine. I knew nothing about the Photos app. Having watched many of your videos on this topic, I'm gaining a very good understanding. You present the information in your videos in a clear, concise manner that makes learning a lot of fun. Thank you for helping us all to get more out of our Macs! I'll be checking out much more of your content as I learn the new MacBook.
You did a great job explaining that, Gary! Thank you!
I have a better understanding of HEIC now! Thank you, Gary!!🥰
Another nice one! I have been using heic for a while without knowing the background. I am now better informed. Thanks
Thanks Gary. The only times I have an issue are sending pics to my Android friends, and that's also an MMS issue, and posting pics to a forum I'm a member of that uses the old VBulletin software and doesn't recognise any HE formats. I usually convert these in Finder, I didn't know they could be converted automatically in Mail, etc.
Bravo! 👏 The best overview of the HEIC format I have ever seen. Prior to today I wasn’t aware of your channel, but the UA-cam algorithm actually worked and recommended this video. And you have a new subscriber. 😃
Thanks for the video! I like your flow without anxiety music on a background. There are so many noises in 2024, the guide needed to be quite, thank you for your kind and pleasure.
Thanks Gary, great explanation as always.
Thanks Garry. After watching this video and doing some experiments with the 14 Pro Max and finding that not all the iPhone lenses are created equal I have changed my shooting format to HEIF Max. Cheers
This video is really good for your image(es) 😉
Thanks for all the interesting and well produced lessons.
You are a real problem solver.
Good to know details about this HEIC format, nice video. Thanks Gary.
The wonderful thing about Gary, is that you can learn to drive a fomula 1 car
Even if you don't yet know how to drive! Thank you Gary always pleasure to watch your tutorials !
Thanks Gary! Hope all is well!
Excellent explanation Gary. I have a better understanding of the situation.
Another image compression format that I've been seeing more of is Google's WebP which is claimed to also maintain good quality and result in files smaller than jpeg. It would be interesting to see a comparison of HEIC and WebP.
Yes, I too have come across this WebP and am stumped to know how to view it on my iMac. Hope Gary will touch this subject too. Listening, Gary?😃
Best explanation of image file compression I've ever heard‼️Thank you❣️
More recently taken photos will be using a newer device with significantly more pixels and HEIC will benefit them more than older, smaller photos.
The Windows Store has available HEIC converter for the photo viewer in Windows. Likewise, Samsung's S24 series will save photos to HEIC format.
But the cost money
I had been wondering what the HEIC these files were about!
Thank you for the info! HEIC! Always wondered what that meant. But I had to send large amounts of photos to a client and they all went as HEIC. The client couldn't open them! I had to hand convert ALL the files to jpeg. Ugh! But this video helps with future transfers of photos and how to do it. Thank you Gary!
Fascinating stuff. Thanks Gary. You are a fount of knowledge!
Thanks Gary. I wondered what HEIC formatting was.
Brilliantly explained Gary!
Thanks very much, Gary, for this informative video! This was most interesting and helpful.
Thanks Gary. So informative as always.
Thanks! I've been wondering about this for some time.
Thanks this had rendered my iPhone 14 photos incompatible with several other systems, I only care what it looks like on a website. so it's very annoying when we cannot use or see photos we need to upload. Had switched from using iCloud last year because of this. Google photos. Was used between coworkers. Until my iPhone started saving as HEIC
A very useful and informative video tutorial today! Very interesting! Thank you,Gary!👏🏻❤️
In regards of images formats, wanted to ask if is there some format of background picture with real time metadata vector, I mean I would like to have a background image in my WebEx or Zoom videoconferencing but with image showing current time changing in my background scenario, for example a Wall watch, the time showed might be the local time of each assistant. I guess it will be an innovative format!
That would need to be a feature that WebEx or Zoom would build into their apps.
Never mind, I looked it up.
When you take a photo on your iPhone or iPad, the image - or images, in the case of dual cameras and live photos - saves as an HEIC file. HEIC stands for High Efficiency Image Container. The format is an updated variant of the High Efficiency Image Format (HEIF), traditionally used by Apple across its mobile devices.
A very helpful video. Thanks for sharing the information.
I was literally scrolling down to the comments to ask about if Photos app can convert JPEG and H264 content to the newer format 😂 Thanks for the info Gary!
Excellent tutorial Gary! 👏
6:34 -- thank you! i use both windows and mac and ifruit (iphone) and android and toggling this BACK to "more compatibility" will make me sleep better at night. thank you!! i have TB and TB of storage so i dont care about that -- for me i need compatibility! also thumbs up and this is the first time ive seen your channel. thanks youtube algorithm!
Excellent explanation, thanks Gary.
This is very informative. What I've had a problem with is when I NEED to send a photo to say a DMV or IRS website they won't accept anything but a jpeg, so I have to convert it which means I have duplicates of those photos in HEIC and JPEG.
Just export as a jpeg, upload, and delete the jpeg.
Fun fact: Bayer image sensors are not fully resolved like an ancient 3chip camera or a computer generated graphics file. A 12MP bayer sensor has 6MP green pixels, 3MP blue pixels, 3MP red pixels. So viewing a 12MP file as a true 12MP actually extrapolate, creates data that never existed to begin with. The raw file likely is three black and white images 6+3+3MP (12MP) images, as that’s what is captured by the sensor. Not much point pixel peeping a camera still image as the image literally is upscaled, more pixels/colors than the sensor that took the image :-)
Thanks Gary, nice and clear explanation.
Very interesting - I wondered what HEIC ext was
Great video as always Gary!!
Several years ago my sister told me that an iPhone photo she took could not be opened by a Windows recipient, yet you say shared HEIC files are converted to JPEG format when shared. I do not know what she did, so I have not tried to duplicate her process. Instead, I told her to simply change the format in Camera settings, as you suggest.
If you want to edit your photos, store your photos as lossless (like TIFF) or in raw format, so you don't get compression on compression. For editing videos, the preferred source format would be ProRes, while the end product can be in H264 or H265 (HEVC)
Depends on the original photo. If you have a jpeg from your camera, then converting to TIFF won't get you anything but a much larger file (you can't convert to RAW). HEIC also has a lossless level. But note that the difference between high HEIC (or jpeg) and lossless TIFF or HEIC is so small that it will come down to the quality of the photo captured in the first place. Probably not worth it for the vast majority of people. ProRes is huge and should only be used when making professional videos and films, when money is no object (you'll need some big fast drives to store it all).
PNG is also lossless
I've been wondering how to manage when I take large numbers of photos from my iPhone to my work Windows pc. I'll change the default setting in my work phone now! Thanks a lot! ☺
Excellent explanation.
Thanks so much Gary!
You can open HEIC on Windows if you have the code from the Windows store on 10 and 11.
For HVEC there's a fee for the codec but there used to be a way around it, not sure if it still works.
Nice video again Gary. Can you explain how to deal with Google's WebP images, how to view it or convert it in iMac?
You should be able to view WebP in Safari, Quick Look and in Preview. You can export to something else in Preview too.
@@macmost Thanks Gary.
Great explanation, thanks.
Good informative clip Gary. Thanks.
Brilliant as usual.
I always wondered. Now I know. Thanks!
Hi Gary. You are such a talented presenter. Whilst there are denizens with lots of knowledge and lacking presentation skills and lecturers with insufficient knowledge and inability to teach, you are a multitalented individual and highly valued by your fans. I also watched your photos duplicates video and still trying to figure out how I managed to have thousands of duplicates on my Mac after switching from Windows to Mac. Would there be a way to establish where each duplicate is located before I delete/merge, as I always only place my photos into one folder? Hope this makes sense.
Once you get them all into your Photos library you'll be able to use a function there to find duplicates: ua-cam.com/video/502eMhFsTeM/v-deo.html
@@macmost Thanks Gary. I found this function and see 2,100 jpegs and 78 videos out of almost 19,000 images. It would be great to see where the duplicates are located before merging. Thanks again.
@@60beats44 You can select each photo and Command+I to see info about them.
@@macmost Thanks Gary. I am aware of that as well. However, the location information is missing. Since these are detected as duplicates they must be located in different locations.
@@60beats44 If you are using the Duplicates function in the Photos app, then all you see there are photos IN your Photos Library. So they are both in the SAME location: your Photos Library. If they are exactly the same, then you can merge them and really you lose nothing.
So when you attach one or more photos to an email on iPhone and are asked what size you want to send it, which should you choose?
I myself select largest size and lowest quality jpeg, but this was a recommendation from a forgotten source.
Nice presentation, thanks
Making the files smaller actually encourages taking more pictures, which will drive up demand for larger storage devices, like in smart phones. But most phone vendors want to push something that costs PER month in a subscription, like cloud storage. As demand grows, so will the prices for onboard storage and for cloud storage as well. Any large vendor, like Apple, is very well aware of how to manipulate their user base; this is just one example.
My vintage 2021 Samsung Galaxy A71 handles HEIC/HEVC just fine, so it's not just an apple iPhone thing.
It depends more on the OS version, not the hardware version. Newer versions of Android will handle HEIC fine.
@@macmost right, but since you only mentioned Apple products, i thought I'd comment so people would know that Android also handled those files, since you didn't.
One huge problem is the need to convert as many file users will not accept heic files. My health insurance co. is one such provider that only accepts jpeg files
Easy to send them jpeg exports while you continue to get the benefits of using HEIC.
Good day sir. about obsolete mac like imac 2014 that no longer be supported with new updates.. do you recommend recommend antivirus for additional security? i only use it for browsing and i do not install apps that i am not familiar with or outside appstore. i hope you can give advice
As long as you don't install apps you shouldn't trust you should be fine.
@@macmost ok thanks for replying
Hi Gary, related question.I have several thousand photos on my local hard drive. I want to use the Photo's app to 'manage' them but it always tries to store them in iCloud which I don't want. I do have my everyday phone snapshots in my iCloud account which is great and works well but I want my local photo's managed separately outside of iCloud. Is that possible?
Yes. Just create a separate library for those. The main downside is that you then need to switch between libraries, but that is OK if those other photos are not something you want to be associated with your personal photos, but work or a separate project.
My iPhone 15 Pro Max files still come over as HIEC files, even though the setting is set to "Most Compatible".
Hi Gary, I’ve always found file formats a bit confusing. I noticed that on my iPhone 14 the file is shown as HEIF which I suppose is the same?
Yes.
Thanks for the HEIC info, but it still seems like a hassle, I'll stick with JPG for now.
My 2019 iPad air stores photos I take in HEIF format, how does that differ from HEIC?
I don’t think Apple looses out by implementing HEIC…or even HEVC. I think it’s more of balancing act as camera sensors get larger so do file sizes under the older formats. By shifting to more efficient file formats it offsets the increasing camera resolutions. So in the end maybe it’s closer to a wash. Plus as time goes on people tend to take more and more photos and videos. So storage requirements will still likely to increase, maybe just at a lower rate.
Excellent video. However, you skipped right over something staring us all in the face; LOSSLESS! 4:01 I'd love to know how well that setting compresses the image, and how that compares to other lossless formats.
That's not something most people would want. It would create very large files and you'd never want to convert a lossy file like jpeg to lossless as all you'd be doing is creating a perfect preservation of the lossy compressed jpeg as a much larger file. You wouldn't gain anything at all, and lose quite a bit in terms of a larger file size.
@@macmost You're totally misunderstanding my comment. I'm talking about using the lossless setting on HEIC for storing your newly taken uncompressed pictures, not for converting your old already compressed ones. How well does the lossless setting compress, and how does that compare to other lossless standards, like TIFF?
@@theclearsounds3911 Unless you are using RAW, then when you take a picture it is compressed right at that moment. Either HEIC or JPEG. If you take RAW and "develop" to an uncompressed HEIC, you'll get a smaller file with the light and color "develop" selections baked in (since it is not RAW anymore). I assume it would be much smaller than RAW. It should also be smaller than TIFF (which is an old format that is lossless AND uncompressed). Maybe it is similar to PNG, but not sure which would be smaller, though both would be lossless so identical in terms of quality I should think.
Informative.
Thanks for this. Very interesting. Photoshop will not save in this format. (as far as I can tell) It can read the files, but it won't save in it. That is frustrating. Apple Photos will save in this format. So you can make other formats into HEIC with that.
My Canon R3 wants to save files as HEIF. And photoshop does all kind of weird things with that.
You should let Adobe know you want this. Not sure why they are behind in this area.
Thank you
I didn’t understand it before and I hated that when airdropping to mac to email it using a third party app it was A file that doesn’t open Up and apps didn’t support Heic. So do you recommend using it? On iPhone cam and also lets say for screenshots….
Sure, I use it. Sharing should convert. Screenshots usually use PNG, not HEIC.
Is it better to change screenshots to jpeg rather than png?
@@Abdullah-zl9ub Better in what way? What is it you want to do?
File size optimization
@@Abdullah-zl9ub But what are you DOING? Like are you taking a screenshot to send to a help desk? Beta test? What is the purpose of wanting to take screenshots and optimize them?
I like that they take up less space than JPEG. but I can't stand the fact that eBay won't let me upload them when I list items for sale. so I have to convert every single HEIC that I Airdrop to my MacMini. uggh.
I don’t have this issue w eBay. But it’s this kind of quirk I prefer JPG.
@@GarrEFeLix I should have clarified. ONE of my ebay accounts allows HEIC uploads. but the other 4 do NOT. I'm assuming because the one seller account is over 15 years old and the others are newer? Doesn't make sense but that's all I can figure.
I have that problem all the time. I receive lots of HEIC that I have to forward and people complain all the time they cant open it
There are packages on Linux one can install to enable compatibility with HEIC files.
9:12 Now wait a minute. You say it would be compressing a compressed photo, but there’s a “lossless” option with HEIC. Do you still save disk space with that option?
Definitely not. Try it and see. You are asking it to take the jpeg, extract each pixel from the compression algorithm, and then save each pixel exactly in a new file. It will be much bigger.
How do you get the camera to record in raw mode?
Depends on the camera.
Great info... Thanks. (Containers FTW)
Beers & Cheers from OZ
You didn't mention the fact that most photos are viewed in a small size on a website or even on a 4K monitor. Many pixels are thrown away at the time of display. The quality of the display also impacts the photo reproduction. A chain is as strong as its weakest link. The display and size of the photo is the "weakest link" when viewing a photo. Most people don't do pixel peeping.
Not sure where that information fits in here. What are you suggesting?
@@macmost I'm suggesting that discussions of photo compression as it relates to file sizes and perceived "quality" are fine in the abstract, but you can take a non-compressed photo, display it at 72 dpi on a web site and or as a relatively small photo on a monitor (a good one or a mediocre one) and it won't matter what the native resolution/uncompressed nature of the photo is. If you zoom in on a compressed photo and its non-compressed original, yes you'll see a difference. My point is that most people don't do that and probably no one does it in the course of normal photo viewing.
@@emmgeevideo Yes, but when it comes to your own photos, don't you want a high resolution version in your library? I know I do. Precious memories, you know.
Why are people still using JPEG as opposed to JPG? What is the difference if any? Thx
They are the same. Just two different file extensions for the same type of file.
I have mov files from an iPhone sent to my android, is there a way to convert those so i can play them
Not sure what the source of your mov files are, but try just renaming them as mp4 and it will probably work.
Excellent
I have a question. When I export a HEVC from photos app and it's stored as H.264, the H.264 is actually smaller in size (25.2 MB for H.264 versus 35.4 for HEVC). This seems like it's opposite of the purpose of HEVC. Does anyone know why that is?
There are other factors: Video dimensions and video quality. Using smaller dimensions and/or lower quality will get you a smaller file.
Can you open HEIC files in Photoshop and save them as jpegs?
Yes, but watch the video where I explain why you shouldn't concert HEIC to jpeg. Unless you are just converting them to send a copy to someone unable to view HEIC, of course.
@@macmost Thanks so much for your reply. Your videos are excellent. Keep up the great work.
In Windows there was a free HEIC-format-programm to Install from the Microsoft Store for Free.
But sadly now it costs. So I can't convince everyone in my family and all my friends to install it so they can see the heic-images.
PS: I'm using a Samsung and they also have heic as their standard 👍🏻
You mention that Windows cannot open HEIC images. Can HEIC images be viewed on internet web pages by Windows users or must they be converted by Mac developers to a viewable format?
HEIC is definitely not well-supported in browsers outsid e of Safari so far. You definitely don't want to use them for web design.
The problem is that platforms haven’t caught up and you can’t upload the image
If converting jpg to heic is going to reduce file quality, then doesnt converting shares from heic to jpg cause similar degrading quality?
Yes. But think about WHY you are converting. If the goal is to send someone a COPY of your photo, and they can't open an HEIC, then converting to jpeg makes sense. But what doesn't make sense is to convert from jpeg to HEIC in order to STORE your original photo.
Great video! Is this why whenever I send a photo to my husbands pc, the physical size of the photo is different than the one on my iPhone?
Possibly. Depends on what steps you are taking exactly.
@@macmostis there a best way to send from iPhone to pc? From within the photos app or from within the mail app (using apple mail)?
@@Dulcilady "Best" depends on many factors. Are you using any sort of cloud service? Export from the Photos app and save it there and then find it on your PC.
Also the discussion of movies is very unclear. You compare 2 different movies. The 1st one is a .mov containing H.264 with a size is 23.6 MB. The 2nd is a mov containing HEVC with a size of 34.5 MB which after it's automatic conversion to H.264 results in 38.7 MB. So what is the lesson to learn in this example?
Not sure what you mean. HEVC will usually result in smaller files than h264, but it is less compatible with other devices. However, the point of the tutorial is you can convert them to h264 if you need to send them to someone else that can't view HEVC.
So, a loss on quality going from Jpeg to HEIC. But no quality loss going from compressed HEIC to Jpeg? How? HEIC compression isn’t lossy?
No, loss both ways. Any compressed-to-compressed conversion, or non-compressed-to-compressed, you will lose some quality. My point is that if the pictures are already compressed with one format, then leave it in that format. Just use HEIC for new photos. Leave the old photos as-is.
The billion dollars question is: will we see native support of the new formats on other operating systems and browsers? How long is the internet looking for a handy new format to reduce loading time and space consumption.
Ugh I don’t like using HEIC since it’s not compatible with some things.
We just need a non-lossy compression that efficiently works on these older file formats.
Not sure what you mean.
@@macmost I mean have a compression algorithm that takes say a jpg and creates something more compact that does not introduce any more compression artifacts than that jpg -- for those instances where the old jpg is the best that exists. With this hypothetical format, you should be able to take the file and reproduce an exact copy of the jpg, byte for byte. Regular compression algorithms may have a hard time compressing jpg's and the resultant archive would not be as easily viewable as an image file would be.
Something similar could be done for old video formats.
@@1dgram That's just not practical. "takes say a jpg and creates something more compact that does not introduce any more compression artifacts than that jpg" -- you will not get a better file size than then jpg in that case. Maybe randomly a few images could potentially be a few bytes smaller. But others would be larger. It wouldn't make sense to do that.
@@macmost depends on whether some of the advances we've made in image and esp video compression could be applied on top of the older techniques
@@1dgram But you want exact lossless compression, and advances would likely be in lossy compression. But it is all academic. You have your options as they are now and changes may or may not come in future years.
Thanks for the great tip! I asked ChatGPT to create a one-line command that converts all jpg, jpeg and png files in the current folder to HEIC. I'm freeing up space brutally. 😊
setopt nullglob && for file in *.(#i)jpg *.(#i)jpeg *.(#i)png; do sips -s format heic "$file" --out "${file%.*}.heic" && rm -f "$file"; done
But as I explain in the video, that's not a good idea. You are compressing something already compressed and therefore quality will suffer. I mean you can do what you want, but I wouldn't treat my photos that way.
@@macmost Well, yeah, there's a compromise to consider. Of course, we should decide which photos/folders/galery/topic we don't want to recompress but, actually, I zoomed in to compare details and didn't catch any disadvantages. The balance of compression and quality is exceptional.
Anyways, if quality is a minor aspect, this one-line compression can save a huge space. :)
Hello garry sir can you please a video on how to make animated memes on mac and apps for i phone waiting for answer 😊 have a nice day
You are amazing but you already know that
I do not like the HEIC because Google and Apple when to it and nothing open by default a win or linux pc. It took time to find a app to open it so you could convert it so you could use it. Try upload that file on a web site and you get FAIL. I think the format as a file is OK. It just a problem when nothing know what it is.
8:45. Gary is correct here at the end of the video. It's pretty important point, and everyone should listen. Sequentially re-compressing files into different formats is very damaging. (With the exception of "lossless" TIFF format) HEIC is overhyped, I'll explain why…
I'm an imaging professional. for a living: After analysis on my own part, I don't approve of HEIC format. I think Apple, shall we say, they have been misinformed to introduce HEIC as a standard over JPEG. It wrecks extreme highlight and shadow detail, leading to posterization and color casts. I've seen this on multiple examples. The file size saving is too minimal for this loss to be justified. Just because a format is old, (like JPEG or GIF), doesn't mean it has any inherent fault and needs to be replaced. Also saving on HD space these days is also a highly dubious motive. Driven by suppliers attempting to save money, not to improve the quality of users saved images.
Thanks so much for sharing your expertise 👍😎 I have not jumped on the HEIC bandwagon ( I guess I am old fashioned.)
You can open an HEIC file on windows
You can if you have something additional installed. Sounds like you do. Not true for everyone though.
these files reek havoc as my employees attach them to work orders, from their devices, yet I have to view and manage from a windows 7 server. god bless the march of technology and companies that refuse to move fw.
Just had a little earthquake here....nice return to "normal". Thanks.