> > Am I remembering right that JPEG format files re-compress each time they are > saved? In other words, saving the image on your CF card as a JPEG and then > transferring to the PC would be two steps of loss?
No. Copying a JPEG file is just like copying any other file - lossless. You could go out of your way, of course, to introduce an extra lossy step by directly uploading the image into an image processing program by using the camera as a TWAIN source, and then saving the image as a JPEG. But that's not how any sane person would do it. In fact you shouldn't use JPEG for any intermediate steps, just so you avoid this double-lossy compression problem. All editing, cropping, colour balancing, etc., etc. should be done on TIFFs or PNGs. Read the initial JPEG from the camera, but never re-save as JPEG (except, possibly, for the final step before posting or emailing the image).
