I have an image which I have modified using the ArcSoft PhotoStudio 2000 SE program. The file name ends with .PSF. When I try to upload this file onto my web page, it says invalid file name. Although I knew it was silly, I changed the suffix. All this accomplished was to take apart the layers of the modified image, leaving me with the original.
This is really bumming me out, because I want to enter my image in a “Photo Shop Competition” thread in the humor forum on another board.
Does anyone know what I can do? Thanks in advance to all who reply.
You have to save the file as a different format. Open the file in an image editor, and try file, Save As… changing the file type to something like PNG, GIF, or JPEG. If there isn’t an option to do that under save as, try looking for an Export… option.
The problem is that only some file types can be opened by web browsers. The most common are GIF and JPEG, others that occasionally work include BMP, PNG, and MNG.
Open the photo back up in the program you created it in, merge your layers, save as a .jpg instead of .PSF.
A file suffix does not (ordinarily*) have any effect on the file itself–the file remains what it is regardless of whether you rename it to myfile.psf or myfile.pds or myfile.jpg or myfile.doc–but in many operating systems (such as Windows) the file suffix tells the OS and various programs “hey, this file is a JPEG” or “hey, this file is in Photoshop’s native format”, and that in turn tells the operating system how to behave when you double-click the file.
Some web servers or web sites are set up to allow you to upload only files that your average browser is going to be able to display and open. Browsers know about htm/html files, they can do txt files, they get along nicely with gif and jpg/jpeg files, and thanks to CGI they can deal with asp and php and many other types of files that are actually database function calls. But they probably can’t do much with an “ArcSoft PhotoStudio 2000” file in its native format. If ArcSoft is a typical image editing program, you have the option of saving in other formats (try the Save As menu command).
(* rare exception: some programs run in the background on people’s computers and when you rename a file with a certain extension suffix, they actually modify the file itself. Usually these only respond to one or a tiny handful of specific extensions, though. One example is the full-fledged commercial Stuffit product on the Macintosh, which automatically compresses files or folders if you add the extension “.sit” to them. For all I know, this is true of ArcSoft PhotoStudio, but probably not.)
Dear Boscibo,
I feel like such an idiot. I’ve been teaching myself how to use the Photo Studio 2000 by trial & error. (Why include instructions for the programs when you sell somebody a computer, right?) I overlooked the merge command on the edit part of the toolbar. Thank you so much for pointing that out to me.