TIFF Sequence

Overview

TIFF is a versatile still-image container supporting 16-bit channels, various compressions (including lossless LZW/ZIP), and extensive metadata tags. Some archives prefer TIFF sequences for preservation because of tooling breadth, embedded ICC profiles, and compatibility with scientific imaging workflows.

Pros and Trade-Offs

• Pros: Lossless options, broad software support, rich tagging, potential storage savings vs uncompressed DPX.
• Cons: Less standardized for cinema keycode/timecode headers; some grading tools handle DPX log workflows more natively. Performance when streaming thousands of files varies by implementation.

Best Practices

Lock a profile (bit depth, compression, planar/interleaved) and record it in the DPM. Validate color with embedded profiles or sidecar OCIO configs. Maintain identical naming and frame padding conventions as DPX to ease interchange.

Use Cases

TIFF sequences shine in preservation of scanned artwork, titles, and animation where lossless compression reduces size without compromising quality. Mixed pipelines may store picture in DPX and artwork in TIFF under the same master umbrella.

Related Terms

• DPX sequence, digital preservation master, checksums, ICC/OCIO.