Question

I am using the web browser control to generate screenshots of an intranet application developed in ASP.NET.

The screenshot is generated, compressed and then stored as a BLOB in the database. When I developed this facility I investigated the best way of compressing the image (to the lowest byte size), however the images still seem to be too big as the database table is growing larger than I hoped. I am using the TIFF format, but I am now thinking that this may not be the best as it is used by photographers (who I assume require good quality photographs). Here is the code to compress the image (before it is stored as a BLOB):

Public Function compressImage() As String
        Try
            Dim jgpEncoder As ImageCodecInfo = GetEncoder(ImageFormat.Tiff)
            'Dim myEncoder As System.Drawing.Imaging.Encoder = System.Drawing.Imaging.Encoder.Quality
            Dim myEncoderParameters As New EncoderParameters(1)
            Dim myEncoderParameter As New EncoderParameter(System.Drawing.Imaging.Encoder.Compression, CLng(EncoderValue.CompressionCCITT3))
            myEncoderParameters.Param(0) = myEncoderParameter


            Dim ms As MemoryStream = New MemoryStream()
            'bmp1.Save(ms, ImageFormat.Jpeg)
            ConvertedImage.Save(ms, ImageFormat.Tiff)
            Dim bmpBytes() As Byte
            bmpBytes = ms.ToArray()
            'ConvertedImage.Dispose()
            ms.Close()
            ms = Nothing

        Catch ex As Exception
            MsgBox(ex.ToString())
        End Try
    End Function

Private Function GetEncoder(ByVal format As ImageFormat) As ImageCodecInfo

        Dim codecs As ImageCodecInfo() = ImageCodecInfo.GetImageDecoders()

        Dim codec As ImageCodecInfo
        For Each codec In codecs
            If codec.FormatID = format.Guid Then
                Return codec
            End If
        Next codec
        Return Nothing

    End Function

Is there a file format/compression algorithm I should use to try and make the file as small as possible without sacrifycing quality too much

Answer 1

Jpg or Png should get you smaller than Tiff.