digital elevation models with 5 m and 10 m post spacing
digital elevation models
with 5 m and 10 m post spacing

Can I view images stored in the Fast Format with Adobe Photoshop?

Yes, you can view images stored in the Fast Format with Adobe Photoshop. What you cannot do with Photoshop is use the geometric information included with the product.

For panchromatic data you simply have to load the image file, that's all.

In the case of multispectral data, you must load the data band by band. That way you can see each separate band. If you have loaded three or more channels, you can merge these channels to create an RGB image (look for Merging channels in the online help). If you have less then three bands, you have to duplicate one of the bands (look for Duplicating channels in the online help) before you can create an RGB image by merging the channels.

To load one image file (one channel of the product) do the following:

  1. Select Open As from the File menu.

    Photoshop File menu
    Photoshop: File Menu

  2. Select Raw (*.RAW) as the format from the Open As list box. Now select an image file to load.

    Check that you really have selected an image file by looking at the bottom line of the dialog where the size of the selected file is displayed. The size of header files is around 5 Kbytes and the size of image files is in the range of Mbytes.

    Photoshop Open As dialog
    Photoshop: File Open As

  3. A dialog where you can specify how the image should be loaded is displayed. Photoshop fills in values which describe the image correctly in more than 95% of cases, so that you can simply press the OK button to see what happens.

    If you are confronted with more dialog boxes, or you only see garbage instead of an image, you have to start with step 1 again. You have to fill in the correct values for the Width and Height of the image in the dialog. These values can be found in the header file included with the Fast Format product:

    PIXELS PER LINE = 2987
    LINES PER BAND = 2880

    The other values are always as displayed.

    Photoshop RAW Options dialog
    Photoshop: RAW file options