Texture formats

In game development, artists may have several sets of texture files:

1. Source files, native to an image editor such as Photoshop's PSD, stores all editing information such as layers, and high bit depths.
2. Preview files, for previewing on 3D models or importing into a level editor, does not store layers, usually only 8bpp.
3. Runtime files, flattened and compressed files used directly by a game engine, often lossy so not good for editing.

Source Formats

• EXR
• HDR
• PSD
• TIF

Preview Formats

• BMP
• GIF
• JPG
• PNG
• TGA
• TIF

Runtime Formats

These are formats used directly by the game engine.

• 3Dc
• DDS Direct Draw Surface format, which can contain uncompressed, paletted, and compressed variants.
• DXT DirectX Texture format.
• PVR
• S3TC
• TPL
• VTF Valve Texture Format, used in Source Engine games.

To save memory, runtime textures often use compression. Specific compression formats are supported in hardware, which means they stay compressed as they are sent to the video card, which can save a significant amount of memory.

Runtime formats also commonly have pre-created mip levels stored in them, so the game engine doesn't have to create the mips on load, which helps to reduce the time it takes to load the game level.

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