WebP pushes image compression further
Image compression has fallen on the backburner the last few years. The rise of streaming video across the Internet has pushed focus to video. Rightfully so, the approval of video standard H.265, is a huge step forward in video compression.
Video aside, much of the web is still made up of images.
Thankfully, some of the advancements of video flow down to images. After all, a video is just a set of still images. Well, in the world of video compression, not really, but there are shared compression methods.
Image compression has been traditional made up of two methods:
- Lossy – compression that discards image detail to reduce size.
- Lossless – compression that reduces size but maintains detail by describing an image as an algorithm.
In the simple terms, JPEGs are lossy and GIFs are lossless.
Lossy sounds bad, but for photos is easily to best way to strip (unnoticeable, or tolerably noticeable) detail. Lossless of compression of photos doesn’t save my space at all.
Google has set about to merge both these compression formats in its recently updated WebP format. Doing so has seen file sizes about 33% less than JPEG for a comparable image.
CNet have a couple of examples here
Historically only supported by Google, the recent update has added features such as EXIF data and alpha transparencies that’s got Mozilla on board too. Getting Mozilla across the line was always going to be the easy one though, Microsoft and Apple will be much more difficult.
Whether WebP takes over the world or not is up for debate. However, anything that shakes up the other formats to think about same level of enhancements we’re seeing out of video, is a good thing in my opinion.
