Buzzwords

FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions. An acronym for a section of text often used on Internet homepages, and containing the most frequently asked questions visitors to the web site might have.

FILE: A single sequence of bytes of data that has a finite length and is stored on a non-volatile medium (like a hard disk) and is named as an individual entity; occasionally referred to as a document. Each program uses a unique file type that is readable by that program or compatible programs. Adobe Photoshop can save image files in a .PSD format thats readable only by itself (and other compatible programs) but also gives you the option of saving the file in an industry standard graphics format like TIFF (Tagged Image File Format.)

FILE CONVERSION: The process of converting one file type to another file type for another platform, as from Windows to Macintosh. While some graphics programs have a limited ability to read files from other platforms, file conversions usually require specialized software to perform the required translation. There are dozens of different types of Windows image files and bunches more for the Macintosh. Graphic file incompatibilities affect many computer users, none more than the digital imager. Understanding what a file acronym means takes some of the stress out of the conversion process. Thats why I write this column and wrote the book The Digital Imaging Dictionary (www.all worth.com), but unless you have the right tools, managing these conversions can be frustrating. When converting files between Macintosh and Windows computers, it helps if you have software that allows your computer to read (or mount) disks that were formatted on the other computer. Most recent version of the Mac OS can read disks formatted on Windows machines, including hard disk and removable media. By allowing your Macintosh to read and format DOS disks, Macintosh PC Exchange software provides file conversion directly from the desktop. DataVizs (www.dataviz.com) Mac-Opener Plus lets Windows users read and write Macintosh floppy disks, as well as CD-ROM disks and removable media, such as Iomegas Zip. Next comes the actual file conversion. Most Windows-based programs are biased in favor of converting more Windows formats than Macintosh files. The same is true of Macintosh conversion programs. Keep this in mind when youre trying to pound a square file into a round hole. The only solution for impossible file conversions may be to open the file using the actual application that created it and then save the file in a more portable format. As a last resort, you can take the file to a service bureau, and for a modest fee they will usually be able to covert the file into a format you can use.

FILE PROTECTION: A means of protecting a file from being erased or overwritten. On a 31/2 floppy disk this is accomplished by sliding the write-protect tab (located in the upper left-hand corner on the back of the disk) from closed to open. Most operating system software allows files on your hard disk or removable media to be similarly protected.

FILM RECORDER: Also called CFR or Color Film Recorder. A desktop film recorder is essentially a camera enclosed in a small box and focused on a high-resolution black and white monitor. The CFR makes three exposures of the image through separate red, blue and green filters to produce the final image. If this sounds slow to youit can be. Not many photographers purchase or use film recorders; youll find most of them in service bureaus. One reason is that theyve typically been designed to meet the needs of producing slides for presentationsnot photographs. The image-making needs of these two groups are different, and presenters are less inclined to go ballistic than the typical photographer if the color in a chart is not in balance.

FILTER: (1) A hardware device that separates specific signals or data from an electronic signal or groups of data. (2) A Photoshop compatible plug-in that can be added to your graphics or image-enhancement program to produce a special effect within user-definable parameters. Instead of screwing these filters onto the front of your lens, all you need to do is copy them into your programs plug-in folder and theyll appear within the programs Filter menu.

FLAT PANEL: A monitor or display that uses LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) technology instead of the CRT (Cathode-Ray tube) in conventional monitors. Not to be confused with a flat screen monitor, which is really a glass-tube CRT, whose face is almost completely flatmaybe even completely flatinstead of the rounded front that is found on traditional glass monitors. A flat panel monitor always uses an LCD screen.

FLOPPY DISK: This is a round, thin disk coated with the same kind of ferrous oxide used on audio cassette tape. The disk is encapsulated in an almost square protective shell with a sliding gate (or shutter) that opens a slot in the shell allowing the drive to read or write onto the magnetic material. In the old days, 8 floppy disks were the standard size and they really were floppy. After the 51/4 floppy disks used by Apple II and early IBM PCs were introduced, 8 disks disappeared. When Apple introduced the Macintosh in 1984, they delivered it with a Sony drive that used 31/2 disks encapsulated in plastic, making them, well, less floppy. Needless to say, computer types, being the kind of people we are, still call them floppy disks. Photographic image files are usually quite large and wont fit on a single floppy disk unless they are compressed using JPEG compression as in cameras such as Sonys series of FD Mavicas or Kodaks Pictures Disk service.

FLOPPY DISK DRIVE: A floppy disk drive is an input and/or output device and is connected to the motherboard. Inside the drive is a read/write head that acts much like the arm of a phonograph turntable, except that instead of being fixed, it can move in and out to find data or write data onto the disk. Steve Jobs axed the floppy drive with the introduction of the iMac and now no new Apple computer has a built-in floppy disk drive.

FPU: Floating Point Unit. A chip that handles a computers floating point operations and quickly calculates a large range of numbers. In floating point arithmetic, digits are stored in two partsthe mantissa, and the location of the decimal point called the exponent. Floating-point math can be implemented by hardware with a FPU chip (or math coprocessor) or can be done with software. The FPU chip is the faster approach. In the past, these chips were physically separate from the CPU. With the advent of the PowerPC and Pentium chips, FPUs are often built into the main CPU chip.

FRACTAL: A graphics term originally defined by mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot to describe a category of geometric shapes characterized by an irregularity in shape and design. Genuine Fractals (www.lizardtech.com) Print Pro software uses this technology to encode CMYK, RGB, CIE-Lab, Multi-channel and Grayscale images as files that can be used to generate any kind of output while remaining small enough to edit, store, and upload. The images have a feature called resolution on demand which means you dont have to store multiple copies of the same fileat different resolutionsfor different purposes. You can encode an image once at medium resolution, then output it at any size or resolution you choose. Genuine Fractals Print Pro lets you save images in two ways: The Lossless option produces a file that uses an approximate 2:1 compression and produces high quality enlargements. Near Lossless encoding produces a file with approximately 5:1 compression but still lets you output an image beyond its 100 percent size at high quality. An original 15-20MB file can be encoded with the Lossless option and printed in sizes (for example) up to the Epson Stylus Photo 1270s full printable size of 12.71x44.

FREEWARE: is a form of software that is just what it sounds likeits free.