The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) just released an update to the Portable Network Graphics (PNG) image format this week. The W3C introduced the initial specifications for this file format in 1996, with the group formalizing the 2003 standard in 2004. This means that it’s been over two decades since it was updated — a virtual eternity in the technological realm. According to ProgramMax, the U.S. Library of Congress, Library and Archives Canada, and the National Archives of Australia recommend PNG for archiving digital images, likely because of its lossless compression. With this amount of trust placed on the file format, it must keep up with the times and ensure that it will continue to help preserve our visual history.
The third edition of the PNG specification introduces three new features: support for High Dynamic Range (HDR) images, animation through Animated PNGs (APNGs), and Exif data storage. This update pushes the file specification into the modern age, making it more competitive against other formats like GIF, WebP, and more. Aside from those, there are already a couple of planned updates — the first one is aiming to improve the way the format handles HDR and Standard Dynamic Range (SDR) interoperability, while the second one is aiming to improve its compression ability.
The push to update the file standard actually came from another group within the W3C working on timed text like captions, subtitles, and audio descriptions. They discovered the need for HDR support in PNG files, so they proposed an update to the format. The experts behind it decided that they could do so much more than just add HDR support, and before long, other parties like Adobe, Apple, Google, BBC, Comcast / NBCUniversal, and MovieLabs soon joined the party.
Because of this, the latest version of PNG is already widely supported. Popular photo and video editing apps like Photoshop, DaVinci Resolve, and Avid Media Composer already support it, alongside Chrome, Safari, and Firefox. Apple’s iOS and macOS also work with the new file standard.
Even though there are competing formats like JPG, WebP, and even GIF, PNG still has some abilities that help deliver the internet as we know it today. The recent and planned updates on it will help push it into the future, allowing it to remain relevant in the 2020s and beyond.
Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News to get our up-to-date news, analysis, and reviews in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button.
